Smart Museum of Art
The Smart Museum of Art brings together teaching, research, and creative practice to explore how art shapes—and challenges—our understanding of the world.
Where art expands Chicago minds
At the Smart Museum of Art, great creative works are a starting point for inquiry. Through exhibitions, teaching, and interdisciplinary collaboration, the Museum connects works of art to questions across fields, inviting students and scholars to see and think differently.
As visual culture shapes how we understand the world, this work is essential. The Smart fosters dialogue, experimentation, and discovery through partnerships with faculty, artists, and the broader community.
Philanthropic support will expand exhibitions, strengthen teaching and curatorial leadership, and reimagine the Museum’s spaces, ensuring its role as a vital center for inquiry and creativity.
Priorities
Your giving can support the following areas:
- Exhibitions and curatorial innovation to support ambitious shows, original scholarship, artist collaborations, and interdisciplinary programming that connect art to the defining questions of our time
- Student engagement and arts education programs to expand opportunities for UChicago students and Chicago-area learners to encounter art through courses, internships, tours, workshops, and hands-on experiences
- Collections growth, conservation, and stewardship to preserve and expand the Museum’s collections while ensuring broad public access to works spanning cultures, periods, and artistic traditions
- Artist residencies and public humanities initiatives to bring artists, scholars, students, and community members together through dialogue, performance, research, and collaborative creative practice
- Community partnerships and civic engagement to deepen relationships with South Side schools, cultural organizations, and neighborhood communities through accessible programming and shared cultural experiences
- Digital engagement and innovative interpretation tools to expand access to collections, scholarship, and exhibitions through new technologies, multimedia storytelling, and online learning resources
- Flexible funds for experimental programming and emerging opportunities to give the Museum the agility to respond to timely cultural conversations, new artistic voices, and interdisciplinary collaborations
Contact
Jessica Glaser
773.834.6886
jessicaglaser@uchicago.edu