The Menil Collection The Menil Collection

Philanthropists and art patrons John and Dominique de Menil established the Menil Foundation in 1954 to foster greater public understanding and appreciation of art, architecture, culture, religion, and philosophy. In 1987, the Menil Collection’s main building opened to the public.

Today, the museum consists of a group of art buildings and green spaces nestled within a residential neighborhood in central Houston. The Menil remains committed to its founders’ belief that art is essential to human experience and welcomes all visitors free of charge to its buildings and surrounding green spaces.

On a lush campus, visitors are invited to explore the Menil’s main museum building, the Menil Drawing Institute, the Cy Twombly Gallery, Dan Flavin Installation at Richmond Hall, and Fresco Building.

The art buildings are entered at ground level, symbolic of the Menil’s democratic ideals. The museum’s philosophy is to foster each visitor’s direct, personal encounter with works in the collection. The display of carefully chosen artworks in serene settings are hallmarks of the museum.

The free public programs aim to attract, educate, and inspire diverse audiences and are vital to the life of the Menil. Exhibiting artists lecture and perform; curators and scholars explore exhibitions, collections, and artworks; music, dance, and poetry performances are held, and all are organized to foster conversation.

The Menil is also marked by the activism and spiritual pursuits of the de Menils. It is a museum engaged with art for life’s sake, including the witnessing of civil rights photography, the overt spirituality of Byzantine icons, and the contemplative act of viewing abstract painting. The museum and the campus aim to be an oasis in the midst of daily life that offers each viewer a moment to pause, reflect, and reinvigorate.

Spanning from the prehistoric era to the present day, the Menil’s holdings grew out of personal and intellectual passions rather than encyclopedic ambitions. The heart of the collection is comprised of artworks and objects gathered by the de Menils. The collection continues to grow and the Menil regularly rotates its displays with galleries dedicated to the arts of Africa, Americas and Pacific Northwest, Ancient World, Pacific Islands, Medieval and Byzantine Art, and Modern and Contemporary Art, as well as galleries devoted to Surrealism.

The Menil does not aspire to be comprehensive. It strives instead for excellence in the distinct areas established by its founders and successive curators and directors. Rigorous intellectual independence and a commitment to humane values are key criteria for program choices the museum makes. Since its founding, the Menil has supported substantial collaborations with contemporary artists who have used the collection as a jumping-off point for new work.

Scholarship is at the heart of the Menil enterprise. A conservation studio and a research library symbolically flank the public exhibition spaces, and the de Menils themselves commissioned several major research efforts. The conservation department is known for its studies of modern art materials and techniques and helps train conservators. The Menil’s publishing program contributes to the history and interpretation of art, provides intellectual contexts for artworks on exhibition or in the collection, and catalogues artists’ entire bodies of work

Opened in 1987 and designed by Renzo Piano, the architecturally acclaimed main museum building—Piano’s first in the United States—has 30,000 square feet of gallery space illuminated by natural light. The grey cypress-clad main building serves as the centerpiece of the campus, blending seamlessly into the surrounding blocks of small bungalow-style houses and garden apartments. Visitors can peer through large, exterior windows to see areas of the museum traditionally hidden from view. A promenade along the building’s perimeter provides shade and seating for visitors.

The award-winning Menil Drawing Institute building, which opened in 2018, was designed by Los Angeles-based architecture firm Johnston Marklee. The Drawing Institute features a trio of spacious courtyards planted with trees and steel canopies that modulate daylight between exterior and interior.

The Cy Twombly Gallery, which opened in 1995, is the second building by architect Renzo Piano on the Menil’s campus. Twombly was intimately involved in the layout of the nine-gallery structure. The extraordinary quality of light in this space is created as sunlight filters through a linen scrim to produce a Mediterranean glow.

On the southernmost point of the Menil’s campus is the Dan Flavin Installation. The 1930s building, once home to a grocery store and nightclub, is now known as Richmond Hall, referencing the main road that runs parallel to the entrance. The building was rehabilitated for this site-specific installation.

The Fresco Building, designed by Francois de Menil, housed two frescoes rescued for the Church of Cyprus. The frescoes were displayed there from 1997 to 2012 and then returned to Cyprus.

In 2009, David Chipperfield Architects was engaged to create a new master plan for the Menil campus. The first projects to result in this plan were Stern and Bucek’s Bistro Menil and Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates’ gateway landscape and parking lot, all completed in 2014.

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