In the last quarter of 2021, the Dallas Museum of Art made significant headway toward a vital expansion needed for the museum. The company Perkins & Will was commissioned to conduct a planning study for the development of a future building project.
In 2021, Perkins & Will won multiple awards for its achievements in architecture. For its work on the Baylor Scott & White Health Administrative Center in Dallas, the company won an Architect’s Newspaper Best of Design Award.
On a larger scale, they won a World Design Award for the BioCorporate Reboucas in São Paulo, Brazil.
Agustin Arteaga, the director at the Dallas Museum of Art, said that they are now in the very early stages of planning the project.
Expansion is needed for the museum at a time when the odds are stacked against them. According to Arteaga, the museum predicts that it will receive 455,000 visitors this year, a steep drop from its pre-pandemic numbers topping 900,000. Even so, the museum needs space for the expected arrival of the Fast Forward bequest of 2005, in which three families of Dallas art patrons promised to donate their personal collections for display at the museum following their demise.
Robert and Marguerite Hoffman, Cindy and Howard Rachofsky, and Deedie and Rusty Rose are among the patrons whose gifts make up more than 1,000 works of contemporary art. The arrival date is still undetermined, but the museum wants to be prepared to take in such an order.
As far as locations, the Dallas Museum of Art has three different options for the placement of the expansion. The first option would be to return to the museum roots in Fair Park, where it first had a permanent home. The second option would be to construct a wing on its lawn that will face Ross Avenue. The last option would be to build on top of the Barnes extension since the development was designed to support additional floors.
The last time the museum expanded at this level was in 1993, when a new wing was added to the Barnes extension. Currently, the headlining event at the Dallas Museum of Art is “Van Gogh and the Olive Groves,” which will be on exhibit until February 6.