The Winnipeg Art Gallery (WAG) is an art museum in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. Its permanent collection includes over 24,000 works from Canadian, Indigenous Canadian, and international artists. The museum also holds the world's largest collection of Inuit art. In addition to exhibits for its collection, the museum has organized and hosted a number of travelling arts exhibitions. Its building complex consists of a main building that includes of indoor space and the adjacent Qaumajuq building.
The present institution was formally incorporated in 1963, although it traces its origins to the Winnipeg Museum of Fine Arts, an art museum opened to the public in 1912 by the Winnipeg Development and Industrial Bureau. The bureau opened the Winnipeg School of Arts in the following year, and operated the art museum and art school until 1923, when the two entities were incorporated as the Winnipeg Gallery and School of Arts. In 1926, the Winnipeg Art Gallery Association was formed to assist the institution in operating its museum component. The Winnipeg Gallery and School of Art was dissolved in 1950, although its collection was loaned indefinitely to the Winnipeg Art Gallery Association, who continued to exhibit it.
In 1963, the Winnipeg Art Gallery Association was formally incorporated as the Winnipeg Art Gallery by the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba. The museum moved to its present location in September 1971, with the opening of a purpose-built building designed by Gustavo da Roza. In 2021, the museum opened a Michael Maltzan-designed Qaumajuq building in order to house the museum's Inuit art collection.
History
Background
thumb|During the 1890s, the Manitoba Hotel housed the city's first art gallery
The city's first serious art gallery was first opened in the former Manitoba Hotel (built by the Northern Pacific Railway), located at Main and Water Ave. An area of the hotel was set aside for an art studio. The art gallery was organized by Cora Moore, who upon return from a trip to Toronto, organized a Winnipeg branch of the Women's Art Association of Canada and subsequently an artists group for men. The first art exhibit took place in February 1895. The art gallery featured art from artists from Manitoba, as well as Toronto, Montreal, New York, London, and Paris. The art gallery was shut down after the Manitoba Hotel burned down in 1899.
Efforts to create another art museum began in 1902, after the Manitoba Society of Artists was formed, and its members began to lobby for the creation of a provincial civic and arts institution. In addition to the Manitoba Society of Artists, the Winnipeg-branch of the Western Art Association adopted a mandate that promoted the creation of an art museum to art from Manitoba, and the rest of Canada in 1908. The first exhibition held at the museum featured 275 works from the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts. The art school, and museum operated as separate departments of the same institution, initially controlled by the bureau. In 1965, discussions were raised to move the art gallery from the Civic Auditorium, although the institution opposed a proposed move to the Manitoba Centennial Centre, along with the Centennial Concert Hall, and the Manitoba Museum. The Winnipeg Art Gallery criticized the proposal stating that "the politicians of the city have set various arts groups on each other, and the result has been many objections. We of the Arts Gallery are sitting tight — but we are not sitting still."
In 1967, the museum acquired a triangular plot of land across from the Civic Auditorium and launched a competition for architects to submit designs for a new building. The proposed design required the demolition of several buildings on the proposed site, including an unused service station, and the Cinema Centre building. Work on a new museum building began in 1969.
thumb|View of the new building for the art museum in 1971
The gallery moved to its present location in 1971, into a building designed by Canadian architect Gustavo Da Roza. Construction for the building cost approximately C$4.5 million, with the funding coming from the federal and provincial governments, private donations, as well as a public campaign to raise funds. In November 2015, the Government of Nunavut reached a five-year loan agreement with the Government of Manitoba, to exhibit the Government of Nunavut's collection of 8,000 works at the Winnipeg Art Gallery. The Government of Nunavut collection formed in 1999, and was originally housed in the Prince of Wales Northern Heritage Centre in Yellowknife. The Government of Nunavut originally planned to house the collection in a climate-controlled facility in Iqaluit, although those plans were later abandoned.
thumb|WAG@ThePark at the [[Assiniboine Park Pavilion. In 2016, the museum and the park's conservancy entered a partnership that saw the museum curate exhibitions at the pavilion.]]
In June 2016, the museum opened a retail space, known as WAG@The Forks, in an effort to promote and sell Inuit art at The Forks. The retail space was the result of a partnership formed between the Government of Nunavut, and the Winnipeg Art Gallery. WAG@ThePark was opened as a partnership between the Winnipeg Art Gallery and the Assiniboine Park Conservancy, which saw the museum curate exhibitions in the building. Most of the works from the exhibitions at WAG@ThePark is from the Conservancy's collection,
In 2018, a lost painting by Alfred Munnings was located in the permanent collections of the Winnipeg Art Gallery. The painting depicts Brigadier General R.W. Paterson's horse, Peggy, during the First World War, and was lost shortly after a Royal Academy of Arts exhibition in 1919, which featured that piece, and 43 other works from Munnings. The lost painting was identified in the Winnipeg Art Gallery's permanent collection after a public appeal to locate the work was issued by the British National Army Museum; in their efforts to recreate the 1919 exhibition. Cost for the construction of Qaumajuq is estimated to be C$65 million, with C$35 million obtained from the federal, provincial, and municipal government, and the remaining funds covered by public and private donors. The centre would be the first museum building in the world dedicated to Inuit art upon its opening.
Qaumajuq was opened to the public on 25 March 2021.
In 2023, the museum began the process to remove the name of former director, Ferdinand Eckhardt, from its entrance hall, after reports emerged of his Nazi-linked activities in occupied Europe.
Grounds
The main property the Winnipeg Art Gallery presently occupies was acquired in 1967. The museum's main building was opened on the property on 25 September 1971. The building's exterior walls are sloped to reflect sunlight, and uses "aggressive" geometric angles. A wedge that protrudes from the "main mass" forms the entrance to the main building. while its storage for its collections are located in the building's basement. Michael Maltzan, the principal architect for Michael Maltzan Architecture, was contracted to design the building in 2012. PCL Construction was contracted to construct the building. The building's second level includes a 90-seat theatre, a library, and a learning commons on the second floor. Approximately 70 percent of the permanent collection was gifted to the museum by private donors. The museum's works on paper collection contains approximately 6,000 items in its collection, encompassing historical to contemporary works by international artists, and Canadian artists, whose works make up the majority of the works on prints collection.
Canadian art
thumb|Wind Mill, Holland, by [[Maurice Cullen (artist)|Maurice Cullen, 1901. The painting is held in the museum's collection of Canadian art.]]
The museum's Canadian collection includes works from Canadian artists dating back to the 1820s to the present day. The museum's permanent collection includes 200 works by Canadian artists from 1820 to 1910. The collection includes 1,500 ceramics from British artisans in the 18th and 19th centuries; nearly 1,000 Art Nouveau and Art Deco-styled glass objects from the late 19th century to the early 20th century; and 500 works of silver from British and Canadian silversmiths. The museum's international collection includes the Gort Collection, which features 19 panel paintings, and 5 tapestries from Northern Renaissance artists in the 15th and 16th centuries. Inuit carvings make up nearly two-thirds of the museum's Inuit collection, which includes 7,500 antler, bone, ivory, and stone carvings, dozens of hand-sewn wall hangings. Other works in the collection includes 3,000 prints and drawings from Inuit artists. although the museum's first substantial acquisition of Inuit works came in 1960, when George Swinton donated 130 sculptures to the museum. Known as the Clara Lander Library, its holdings include books, and records that assists in the museum's educational mandate; whereas its archives contain administrative, curatorial, and educational documents relating to the museum.