The Brooks Museum, which was founded in 1916, is the oldest and largest art museum in the state of Tennessee. The Museum is a privately funded nonprofit institution located in Overton Park in Midtown Memphis. The original Beaux-arts building, a registered U.S. National Landmark, was donated by Bessie Vance Brooks in memory of her husband, Samuel Hamilton Brooks. The Brooks’ facilities also include the Brooks Museum Store, the acclaimed Brushmark Restaurant, the Holly Court garden, and a grand terrace that overlooks the greens and trees of Memphis's Overton Park. The facility consists of 29 galleries, art classrooms, a print study room with over 4,500 works of art on paper, a research library with over 5,000 volumes, and an auditorium. Paintings in the permanent collection include Italian Renaissance and Baroque, Impressionists, and 20th-Century artists. |