San Antonio’s $130 Million Cultural Investment

• The McNay Art Museum invested $50.8 million into the 45,000-square-foot Jane and Arthur Stieren Center for Exhibitions designed by French architect Jean-Paul Viguier. The added space allows the McNay to host larger exhibitions can be used an upscale meeting venue for groups up to 800.
• The Witte Art Museum’s multi-million dollar expansion will add 30,000 square feet of exhibit, event and restaurant space to the museum’s footprint, a parking facility for more than 300 vehicles and a new area called The Center for Rivers and Aquifers. Until September 2008, the Witte is hosting a monumental exhibit The Genius of Leonardo, an exhibition of 40 machines built by a group of skilled scientists and craftsmen after an in depth study of Da Vinci’s designs.
• The upcoming Briscoe Western Art Museum, scheduled to open in the fall of 2009, will add a new dimension to San Antonio’s art scene along with upscale meeting space. The one-of-a-kind museum will be devoted to celebrating the art, people and history of the great American West with an emphasis on the western art of San Antonio and the South Texas region. Included will be an arts and education center as well as an artist in residence program. A renovation of the former San Antonio Library and Hertzberg Circus Museum, to cost approximately $18 million will provide more than 40,000 square feet of gallery and exhibition areas.
• America’s Largest Latino Museum Opens in San Antonio (2007). Museo Alameda renders the story of Latinos in America, depicting the depth of a culture that has so richly crafted not only San Antonio, but also the character of the nation. As the first organization to sign an affiliation agreement with the Smithsonian Institution, Museo Alameda has access to the Smithsonian’s collections, exhibitions and educational programming.