AUSTIN, Texas —The Blanton Museum of Artwork at The College of Texas at Austin welcomed 260,899 guests throughout the 2024 calendar yr. This record-breaking attendance exceeds prepandemic figures and follows a interval of great development and transformation that included the museum’s grounds renovation — virtually 200,000 sq. ft of redesigned public out of doors house with new architectural options designed by award-winning agency Snøhetta, large-scale artworks, the Moody Patio and the Butler Sound Gallery.
A current survey by the American Alliance of Museums signifies that half of U.S. museums reported attendance ranges beneath prepandemic figures. In distinction, the Blanton’s attendance final yr exceeded earlier highs.
“Over the past decade, initiatives just like the opening of ‘Austin’ by Ellsworth Kelly, our groundbreaking exhibitions and education schemes, and most not too long ago, the redesign of our grounds by the internationally acclaimed agency Snøhetta, have performed a key position in establishing us as some of the extremely attended and prestigious college artwork museums within the nation,” mentioned Director Simone Wicha. “As the first artwork museum for each UT Austin and the higher Austin neighborhood, welcoming and interesting a large viewers is central to our mission. The grounds strengthened this by increasing the museum expertise outside with the Moody Patio and Butler Sound Gallery. We’re thrilled to see such a constructive response from Austinites, the College neighborhood and guests from throughout the nation and world.”
The Blanton Museum has continued to increase its applications consistent with town of Austin’s speedy development. As town has turn out to be generally known as a prime journey vacation spot and hub for worldwide occasions and enterprise, the Blanton has seen a major improve in vacationer visitation, underscoring the museum’s position within the metropolis’s cultural panorama. In 2024, vacationers accounted for greater than 50% of paid attendance, nearly all of whom visited on weekends.
The grounds undertaking, which opened to the general public in 2023 and was accomplished in 2024, is the newest initiative to increase the museum’s impression and make it a vacation spot for the humanities in Austin. The Blanton Museum’s nationwide recognition soared with the opening of “Austin” by Ellsworth Kelly in 2018. That very same yr, the museum set the earlier attendance file. In a 2024 characteristic for Forbes, author Chad Scott highlighted the transformation: “[‘Austin’] took the Blanton from good school artwork museum to a worldwide arts pilgrimage website instantly.”
Its applications, scholarship and neighborhood engagement have additionally garnered acclaim throughout the previous decade. In 2024, The Washington Publish ranked the Blanton as one of many prime 5 school artwork museums within the U.S., and notably, the one one situated at a public college. Compiled by Pulitzer Prize-winning artwork critics Philip Kennicott and Sebastian Smee, the rankings are primarily based on the standard of museum collections and programming.
The Blanton Museum gives free entry to its grounds, which incorporates the Moody Patio, Butler Sound Gallery and a number of other notable artwork installations. The museum additionally prolonged its attain to the local people by persevering with to supply free admission to its galleries and “Austin” on Tuesdays, a program made attainable by the Moody Household Free Day Endowment. In 2024, the Moody Household Free Day welcomed over 40,000 guests, almost 75% of whom had been from Austin and Central Texas — reflecting the museum’s dedication to being welcoming and accessible. Moreover, the Blanton Museum noticed its largest-ever attendance on an Austin Museum Day, with greater than 7,500 guests for this citywide free museum admission day.
A College and Ok-12 Useful resource
The Blanton serves as a significant useful resource for the UT neighborhood, offering alternatives for tutorial studying and enrichment. Final yr, roughly 27,000 UT college students visited. Of these, 14,000 UT college students from all 19 faculties and faculties had curricular visits designed in collaboration with UT college. These visits supported undergraduate and graduate programs throughout the College, starting from world literature to chance and statistics. Moreover, each first-year medical pupil from the Dell Medical College visited all year long for workshops that emphasised commentary and empathy. In 2024, an identical collaboration was launched with the College of Nursing.
The Blanton additionally gives free admission to all UT college students, college and employees. Final yr, 14% of museum guests had been UT ID holders.
The museum’s nationally acknowledged Ok-12 schooling program additionally made a major impression in 2024, welcoming almost 9,000 Ok-12 college students for curriculum-based visits designed by museum educators. These college students got here from a number of space districts, together with 44% of faculties which can be labeled as Title I and obtained free admission and transportation.
Exhibitions and Public Packages
A various lineup of exhibitions contributed to file attendance, that includes every part from Japanese woodblock prints to modern pictures from the Americas.
Main exhibitions resembling “The Floating World: Masterpieces of Edo Japan” from the Worcester Artwork Museum; “Anni Albers: In Thread and On Paper”; and “Native America: In Translation” included vital loans from different U.S. establishments. “Melecio Galván: The Secret Artist & His Mexican Contemporaries” and “Lengthy Stay Surrealism! 1924–At this time,” on view within the museum’s Paper Vault galleries, foregrounded the Blanton’s assortment and highlighted authentic scholarship by the museum’s curatorial group. Up to date Mission exhibitions showcased immersive new works by main modern artists Marie Watt and Tavares Strachan; and the Movie & Video gallery featured modern video works by Mónica de Miranda and UT affiliate professor of follow R. Eric McMaster.
Along with exhibitions, the Blanton Museum enhanced customer entry to its over 21,000-piece assortment by rotating its assortment galleries eight occasions, together with rotations in European artwork, artwork of the Spanish Americas, trendy and modern American and Latin American artwork, and the brand new Latino artwork gallery.
The month-to-month Blanton All Day program (previously Second Saturdays) is the museum’s hottest public program, that includes a full day of reside music, artwork talks and interactive actions for a large viewers. Beginning in September 2024, Blanton All Day hours and choices had been expanded to accommodate households and younger guests. Moreover, the longstanding B Scene artwork events attracted over a thousand attendees whereas the Blanton Stay speaker sequence captivated a full auditorium and supplied a preferred livestream possibility.
Wanting forward, 2025 initiatives embrace two main exhibitions: “In Artistic Concord: Three Creative Partnerships,” hailed by Cultured as one of many 9 U.S. museum reveals to not be missed within the first half of 2025, and “Spirit & Splendor: El Greco, Velázquez, and the Hispanic Baroque,” acknowledged by The Artwork Newspaper as one of many must-see exhibitions worldwide in 2025. Further highlights embrace the biannual fundraising gala on March 29 and the grand opening of a brand new museum café in collaboration with Justine’s Brasserie in Fall 2025.
