The Brooklyn Museum

The Brooklyn Museum is one of the oldest and largest art museums in the United States. Its roots extend back to 1823 and the founding of the Brooklyn Apprentices’ Library to educate young tradesmen (Walt Whitman would later become one of its librarians). First established in Brooklyn Heights, the Library moved into rooms in the Brooklyn Lyceum building on Washington Street in 1841. Two years later, the Lyceum and the Library combined to form the Brooklyn Institute, offering important early exhibitions of painting and sculpture and lectures on subjects as diverse as geology and abolitionism. The Institute announced plans to establish a permanent gallery of fine arts in 1846.

The Brooklyn Museum, which is more than 500,000 square feet in size, has a collection of more than 1.5 million pieces. It first opened its doors in 1895 and has objects dating back more than 3,000 years. Some of the most famous artists on display at BKM include Norman Rockwell, Mark Rothko, Edward Hopper, Edgar Degas, and Georgia O'Keeffe.

The Brooklyn Museum stands on land that is part of the unceded, ancestral homeland of the Lenape (Delaware) people. As a sign of respect, we recognize and honor the Lenape (Delaware) Nations, their elders past and present, and future generations. We are committed to addressing exclusions and erasures of Indigenous peoples and confronting the ongoing legacies of settler colonialism in the Museum’s work.