THE NEW ORLEANS MUSEUM OF ART AND THE SYDNEY AND WALDA BESTHOFF SCULPTURE GARDEN ARE NOMINATED FOR TWO READERS’ CHOICE AWARDS FROM USA TODAY’S 10BEST
Individuals can vote for NOMA as Best Art Museum and NOMA’s Besthoff Sculpture Garden as Best Sculpture Park in the United States through Monday, February 19, 11 am Central Time.
Inclusion in the popular reader-powered polls acknowledges NOMA as one of the country’s leading arts institutions. Nominations are made by a national panel of experts. Winners will be announced on Friday, March 1.
NOMA’s Besthoff Sculpture Garden was named the Best Sculpture Park in the 2022 edition of the USA Today 10Best Readers’ Choice Awards.
NEW ORLEANS – The New Orleans Museum of Art (NOMA) and the Sydney and Walda Besthoff Sculpture Garden are nominated in two categories in USA Today’s popular 10Best Readers’ Choice Awards.
The awards champion the most celebrated cultural institutions and travel destinations across the United States. Each category gives voters four weeks to vote for their favorites from a list of twenty nominees selected by a national panel of experts.
NOMA is nominated for Best Art Museum. This year’s contest features a selection of leading museums across the country with a variety of specialties of world art. Readers can vote to name NOMA the Best Art Museum in the United States here.
NOMA’s Besthoff Sculpture Garden is nominated for Best Sculpture Park. Previously named the Best Sculpture Park in the 2022 edition of the poll, the Besthoff Sculpture Garden highlights world-class art from the 19th century to the present day in a landscape unique to South Louisiana. True to Sydney and Walda Besthoff’s vision for offering a space for New Orleanians to enjoy and experience public sculpture from artists around the world, NOMA’s Besthoff Sculpture Garden is free and open to the public seven days a week. Readers can vote for the Besthoff Sculpture Garden in this year’s contest here.
Each person can vote once a day in each category through Monday, February 19, 11 am Central Time. A full list of categories can be viewed here.
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About NOMA and the Besthoff Sculpture Garden
The New Orleans Museum of Art (NOMA) and its Sydney and Walda Besthoff Sculpture Garden are home to innovative exhibitions, installations, educational programs, and research. Exploring human creativity across time, cultures, and disciplines, the global scope of the museum’s initiatives open a vibrant dialogue with the history and culture of New Orleans. The museum stewards a collection of nearly 50,000 works, with exceptional holdings in African art, photography, decorative arts, and Japanese art, as well as strengths in American and French art, and an expanding collection highlighting contemporary artists. The museum’s exhibitions and dynamic learning and engagement offerings serve as a forum for visitors to engage with diverse perspectives, share cultural experiences, and foster a life of learning at all ages. Recent exhibitions include Black Orpheus: Jacob Lawrence and the Mbari Club, Called to the Camera: Black American Studio Photographers, The Orléans Collection (an exhibition of forty European masterpieces from the collection of the city’s namesake, Philippe II, Duc d’Orléans), East of the Mississippi: Nineteenth Century America Landscape Photography, and Changing Course: Reflections on New Orleans Histories (seven contemporary art projects focusing on reimagining stories from the city’s past).
NOMA’s 12-acre Sydney and Walda Besthoff Sculpture Garden expands visitors’ experiences of the museum with one of the most notable sculpture gardens in the country. The Besthoff Sculpture Garden, free and open to the public seven days a week, has nearly 100 sculptures and outdoor works of art situated in a unique landscape featuring Spanish moss-laden live oaks and a sinuous lagoon surrounded by an expansive ecosystem of native plants. The works in the garden range from the 19th to the 21st centuries, with pieces by Auguste Rodin, Henry Moore, Louise Bourgeois, Ida Kohlmeyer, Claes Oldenburg, Sean Scully, Maya Lin, Do Ho Suh, Ugo Rondinone, Wangechi Mutu, Hank Willis Thomas, and many others. The Besthoff Sculpture Garden features contemporary design elements—including a sculpture pavilion, an amphitheater, and an architecturally significant canal link bridge connecting the garden’s original 2003 footprint with a 2019 expansion. Its water management practices support the health and resiliency of New Orleans City Park and the surrounding environment. Throughout the year, NOMA hosts outdoor programs in the Besthoff Sculpture Garden including festivals, performances, wellness classes, tours, and more.
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Press Contact
Charlie Tatum, Director of Marketing and Communications
New Orleans Museum of Art
ctatum@noma.org