Art and nature in harmony
NOMA is committed to the health and safety of our community. Please see safety guidelines below.
Admission is free. Donations are appreciated.
Open seven days a week
Summer Hours (April–September) 10 am–6 pm | Winter Hours (October–March) 10 am–5 pm
Wheelchairs may be used throughout our barrier-free property and are available upon request.
Image: Elyn Zimmerman’s Mississippi Meanders bridge is illuminated at dusk.
The Sydney and Walda Besthoff Sculpture Garden occupies approximately eleven acres in City Park adjacent to the museum. Atypical of most sculpture gardens, this garden is located within a mature existing landscape of pines, magnolias, and live oaks surrounding two lagoons. The garden design creates outdoor viewing spaces within this picturesque landscape. Originally conceived in 2003, the Sculpture Garden doubled in size in 2019 and has grown to include more than 90 sculptures. READ MORE
Sydney and Walda Besthoff are the namesake visionary founders behind a world-renowned sculpture garden for New Orleans.
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Architects, landscape architects, lighting designers, and arborists were among the contractors who made it all possible.
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See highlights of the Sculpture Garden in a virtual tour produced in partnership with the Google Arts & Culture Initiative.
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You can play a role in the historic expansion of the Sydney and Walda Besthoff Sculpture Garden by making a gift to support the project.
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Relive the excitement of the grand opening of the Besthoff Sculpture Garden expansion in May 2019.
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Bronze
Pablo Casals’s Obelisk, a towering accumulation of welded bronze cellos, dominates the waters of a lagoon in the Sydney and Walda Besthoff Sculpture Garden. Standing over twenty feet tall, the Obelisk, built in homage to the world-renowned Spanish-Puerto Rican cellist and human rights activist Pablo Casals, is an imposing example of monumental sculpture by French-born artist Arman.
The Sydney and Walda Besthoff Sculpture Garden at the New Orleans Museum of Art offers detailed entries on 64 artworks in the original 2003 garden, as well as a bibliography and overview of the garden’s founding. 192 pages, hardcover. Edited by Miranda Lash. $49.95
#FlashbackFriday to when @blinkybillmusic helped up kick off the opening of “Wangechi Mutu: Intertwined” at NOMA with a performance featuring @auroranealand and other special guests 🎶 @wangechistudio ...
A few of our favorite @jazzfest 2024 musicians who have performed at the museum 🎶 @mahmoudchouki @folkrockdiva @peoplemuseumband @brucesunpiebarnes @rebirthbrassband @yps_brass_band @helengillet @tremebrassband ...
If you were at the first @jazzfest in 1970, you would have seen artist Sister Gertrude Morgan in a booth selling her paintings. ➡️🔗 Swipe to learn about this important figure in New Orleans art history and then click the link in our bio to keep reading an article by curator Brian Piper.
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🎨: Sister Gertrude Morgan, "A Poem of My Calling," c. 1970. Crayon, tempera, graphite, and ballpoint ink on paper. Gift of Maria and Lee Friedlander, 2000.108.
🎨: Harriet Blum, "Sister Gertrude Morgan, Jazz & Heritage Festival," 1973. Gelatin silver print. Gift of the artist, 2006.47
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The sculptures grouped on this platform in "Wangechi Mutu: Intertwined" are macroscopic impressions of viruses. 🦠
Reminiscent of pottery, they are made from the distinctive and highly fertile red volcanic soil found in the highlands region of Kenya—a lifegiving material that is the source of the region’s dense forests and abundant horticulture.
Enlarging their scale highlights their geometry, symmetry, and distinctive textures, which evolved over millennia to facilitate the viruses’ infiltration of and reproduction within human, plant, and animal cells.
Mutu has specifically chosen to represent viruses that have historically been deployed as bioweapons of colonization (like measles and smallpox) as well as those that are tied to specific geopolitical contexts (like Zika and Dengue) or are otherwise interwoven with human societies (the common cold).
Such pathogens cause sickness and disease but also speak to
fears, vulnerabilities, and experiences that unify humanity.
"Wangechi Mutu: Intertwined" is on view at NOMA through July 14.
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🎨: Wangechi Mutu, various works, 2016–22. Red soil, paper pulp, and wood glue. Courtesy the artist, Gladstone Gallery, and Prout-Lara Collection, Vancouver.
📍: First floor, Ella West Freeman Galleries
📸: @annrowsonlove
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No better way to celebrate #EarthDay than with a walk outside through the Besthoff Sculpture Garden. 🌿🌞🌍
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🎨: Arnaldo Pomodoro, "Una Battaglia (A Battle: For the Resistance Fighters)," 1971. Bronze and stainless steel. Gift of the Sydney and Walda Besthoff Foundation, 98.144.
📍: Sydney and Walda Besthoff Sculpture Garden
📸: @crazymajax
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Thank you, Councilmember Oliver Thomas (@otforus), for speaking to some of the pre-K students who are part of NOMA’s Mini Masters program, which combines in-school instruction and museum visits to bolster learning through the arts. 🎨🏛️✍️ ...
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Discover artworks, collections, and stories in a digital format from NOMA like never before.
