New Orleans Museum of Art (NOMA), the city’s oldest fine arts institution, opened on December 16, 1911 with only nine works of art. Today, the museum hosts an impressive permanent collection of nearly 50,000 artworks. The collection, noted for its extraordinary strengths in French and American art, photography, glass, and African and Japanese works, continues to expand and grow, making NOMA one of the top art museums in the South.
The twelve-acre Sydney and Walda Besthoff Sculpture Garden at NOMA is one of the most important sculpture installations in the United States, with over 90 sculptures situated on a beautifully landscaped site among meandering footpaths, reflecting lagoons, Spanish moss-laden 200-year-old live oaks, mature pines, magnolias, camellias, and pedestrian bridges.