The Dayton Art Institute (DAI) is a

museum A museum ( ; plural museums or, rarely, musea) is a building or institution that cares for and displays a collection of artifacts and other objects of artistic, cultural, historical, or scientific importance. Many public museums make these ...

fine arts In European academic traditions, fine art is developed primarily for aesthetics or creative expression, distinguishing it from decorative art or applied art, which also has to serve some practical function, such as pottery or most metalwork ...

Dayton Dayton () is the sixth-largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Montgomery County. A small part of the city extends into Greene County. The 2020 U.S. census estimate put the city population at 137,644, while Greater Da ...

Ohio Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...

, United States. The Dayton Art Institute has been rated one of the top 10 best art museums in the United States for children. The museum also ranks in the top 3% of all art museums in

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Car ...

in 3 of 4 factors. In 2007, the art institute saw 303,834 visitors.

History

Founded in a downtown mansion in 1919 as the Dayton Museum of Fine Arts, the museum moved to a newly designed Edward B. Green building in 1930. The DAI was modeled after the Casino in the gardens of the

Villa Farnese The Villa Farnese, also known as Villa Caprarola, is a pentagonal mansion in the town of Caprarola in the province of Viterbo, Northern Lazio, Italy, approximately north-west of Rome. This villa should not be confused with the Palazzo Farnese a ...

at Caprarola, and the front hillside stairway after the

Italian Renaissance The Italian Renaissance ( it, Rinascimento ) was a period in Italian history covering the 15th and 16th centuries. The period is known for the initial development of the broader Renaissance culture that spread across Europe and marked the trans ...

garden stairs at the

Villa d'Este The Villa d'Este is a 16th-century villa in Tivoli, near Rome, famous for its terraced hillside Italian Renaissance garden and especially for its profusion of fountains. It is now an Italian state museum, and is listed as a UNESCO World Herita ...

, near

Rome , established_title = Founded , established_date = 753 BC , founder = King Romulus (legendary) , image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg , map_caption ...

, and Italy. It is also visible from and easily accessible from I-75, which passes through the center of Dayton. The museum was later renamed the Dayton Art Institute as an indication of the growing importance of its school in addition to the museum. The nearly building is now listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...

Museum information

The museum's collection contains more than 20,000 objects spanning 5,000 years. In September, 2005, the Museum became one of eleven galleries in the US to host ''The Quest for Immortality: Treasures of Ancient Egypt'', the largest collection of ancient artifacts ever to travel outside

Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediter ...

. The art museum is an

–style building, which sits atop a hill overlooking downtown Dayton. The institute's highlights are the museum's Asian, 17th-century

Baroque The Baroque (, ; ) is a style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th century until the 1750s. In the territories of the Spanish and Portuguese empires including t ...

, 18th- and 19th-century American, and

contemporary art Contemporary art is the art of today, produced in the second half of the 20th century or in the 21st century. Contemporary artists work in a globally influenced, culturally diverse, and technologically advancing world. Their art is a dynamic com ...

collections. In addition to its collections, the museum frequently features other exhibitions.

Notable works

Some of the most notable works held by the institute are: * ''The Song of the Nightingale'' by William-Adolphe Bouguereau * ''Purple Leaves'' by Georgia O'Keeffe * ''Cantata'' by Norman Lewis * ''Untitled'' by Joan Mitchell * ''Sea Change'' by

Helen Frankenthaler Helen Frankenthaler (December 12, 1928 – December 27, 2011) was an American abstract expressionist painter. She was a major contributor to the history of postwar American painting. Having exhibited her work for over six decades (early 1950s u ...

* ''Untitled'' by Louise Nevelson * ''Louise Nevelson'' by

Alison Van Pelt Alison Van Pelt (born September 16, 1963, Los Angeles) is an American painter. Trained in Los Angeles and Florence, Van Pelt is established as a contemporary artist whose work is informed by expressionism, minimalism and pop art. Biography Van ...

* ''Lost and Found'' by

Alison Saar Alison Saar (born February 5, 1956) is a Los Angeles, California based sculptor, mixed-media, and installation artist. Her artwork focuses on the African diaspora and black female identity and is influenced by African, Caribbean, and Latin Ameri ...

* ''Embroidery from Uzbekistan'' by Janet Fish * ''Sawdy'' by

Edward Kienholz Edward Ralph Kienholz (October 23, 1927 – June 10, 1994) was an American Installation art, installation artist and assemblage (art), assemblage sculpture, sculptor whose work was highly critical of aspects of modern life. From 1972 onwards, he ...

* ''Study Heads of an Old Man'' by

Peter Paul Rubens Sir Peter Paul Rubens (; ; 28 June 1577 – 30 May 1640) was a Flemish artist and diplomat from the Duchy of Brabant in the Southern Netherlands (modern-day Belgium). He is considered the most influential artist of the Flemish Baroque traditio ...

* ''High Noon'' by Edward Hopper * ''Aurora Red Ikebana with Bright Yellow Stems'' by

Dale Chihuly Dale Chihuly () (born September 20, 1941) is an American glass artist and entrepreneur. He is best known in the field of blown glass, "moving it into the realm of large-scale sculpture". Early life Dale Patrick Chihuly was born on September 20 ...

* ''After the Bath'' by

Edgar Degas Edgar Degas (, ; born Hilaire-Germain-Edgar De Gas, ; 19 July 183427 September 1917) was a French Impressionist artist famous for his pastel drawings and oil paintings. Degas also produced bronze sculptures, prints and drawings. Degas is es ...

* ''Stacks in Celebration'' by

Charles Sheeler Charles Sheeler (July 16, 1883 – May 7, 1965) was an American artist known for his Precisionist paintings, commercial photography, and the avant-garde film, ''Manhatta'', which he made in collaboration with Paul Strand. Sheeler is recognized ...

* ''Scene in Yosemite Valley'' by Albert Bierstadt * ''Allegory of the Four Seasons'' by Bartolomeo Manfredi * '' Water Lilies'' by

Claude Monet Oscar-Claude Monet (, , ; 14 November 1840 – 5 December 1926) was a French painter and founder of impressionist painting who is seen as a key precursor to modernism, especially in his attempts to paint nature as he perceived it. During ...

* ''American Indian Series (Russell Means)'' by

Andy Warhol Andy Warhol (; born Andrew Warhola Jr.; August 6, 1928 – February 22, 1987) was an American visual artist, film director, and producer who was a leading figure in the visual art movement known as pop art. His works explore the relationsh ...

* ''Homage to Painting'' by

Roy Lichtenstein Roy Fox Lichtenstein (; October 27, 1923 – September 29, 1997) was an American pop artist. During the 1960s, along with Andy Warhol, Jasper Johns, and James Rosenquist among others, he became a leading figure in the new art movement. Hi ...

* ''Shimmering Madness'' by

Sandy Skoglund Sandy Skoglund (born September 11, 1946) is an American photographer and installation artist. Skoglund creates surrealist images by building elaborate sets or tableaux, furnishing them with carefully selected colored furniture and other objects, ...

Gallery

File:'Porto Venere, Spezia, Italy' by William Stanley Haseltine, Dayton Art Institute.JPG, ''

Porto Venere Porto Venere (; until 1991 ''Portovenere''; lij, Pòrtivene) is a town and ''comune'' (municipality) located on the Ligurian coast of Italy in the province of La Spezia. It comprises the three villages of Fezzano, Le Grazie and Porto Venere, and ...

'' by

William Stanley Haseltine William Stanley Haseltine (June 11, 1835 – February 3, 1900) was an American painter and draftsman who was associated with the Düsseldorf school of painting, the Hudson River School and Luminism. Early life and education Born in Philadelph ...

1878 File:'The Song of the Nightingale' by William-Adolphe Bouguereau, Dayton Art Institute.JPG, ''The Song of the Nightingale'' by William-Adolphe Bouguereau File:Manfredi, Bartolomeo - Allegory of the Four Seasons - c. 1610.jpg, ''Allegory of the Four Seasons'' by Bartolomeo Manfredi File:'King Abimelech Restores Sarah to her Husband, Abraham', Flemish tapestry by Frans Geubels, Dayton.jpg, ''King Abimelech Restores

Sarah Sarah (born Sarai) is a biblical matriarch and prophetess, a major figure in Abrahamic religions. While different Abrahamic faiths portray her differently, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam all depict her character similarly, as that of a piou ...

to her Husband, Abraham'',

Flemish Flemish (''Vlaams'') is a Low Franconian dialect cluster of the Dutch language. It is sometimes referred to as Flemish Dutch (), Belgian Dutch ( ), or Southern Dutch (). Flemish is native to Flanders, a historical region in northern Belgium; ...

tapestry Tapestry is a form of textile art, traditionally woven by hand on a loom. Tapestry is weft-faced weaving, in which all the warp threads are hidden in the completed work, unlike most woven textiles, where both the warp and the weft threads may ...

by Frans Geubels File:'The Feast of Achelous' by Jan Brueghel the younger and Hendrick van Balen.JPG, ''The Feast of Achelous'' by Jan Brueghel the Younger and Hendrick van Balen File:Monet Water-Lilies 1903 DAI.jpg, '' Water Lilies'' by

File:High-Noon-Edward-Hopper-1949.jpg, ''

High Noon ''High Noon'' is a 1952 American Western film produced by Stanley Kramer from a screenplay by Carl Foreman, directed by Fred Zinnemann, and starring Gary Cooper. The plot, which occurs in real time, centers on a town marshal whose sense of ...

'' by Edward Hopper

References

External links