About
About
The heritage live oak that shades the eastern side of the San Antonio Museum of Art sprouts alongside the San Antonio River.
The Lone Star Brewing Association is established by San Antonio businessmen John Henry Kampmann and Edward Hoppe with the support and investment of St. Louis beer magnate Adolphus Busch, who eventually buys out local investors.
The Lone Star Brewery complex, with two great towers, crenellated parapets, and outbuildings for cooper and blacksmith shops, bottling facilities, and stables, is built on Jones Avenue (previously Grand Avenue) by St. Louis architects E. Jungenfeld & Co., with local architects James Wahrenberger and Alfred Beckmann of San Antonio.
The Lone Star Brewery thrives until 1917. The growing prohibition movement and the shortage of products necessary for brewing due to World War I bring an end to its prosperity. After the brewery ceases operation, it is converted into a cotton mill. In the years that follow, the complex becomes home to an ice factory, an auto repair shop, a uniform storage business, and other commercial ventures. Eventually, the buildings fall into disuse and disrepair.
The San Antonio Museum Association establishes the Witte Memorial Museum to house collections related to Texas history and natural history, transportation, and art. The fine art collection would later form the basis of the collection of what is now the San Antonio Museum of Art.
Jack McGregor, the director of the San Antonio Museum Association, discovers the derelict brewery while house-hunting.
Led by philanthropist Nancy Brown Negley and McGregor, the association targets the buildings in the historic Lone Star Brewery complex for acquisition and conversion into the San Antonio Museum of Art.
The Old Lone Star Brewery is added to the National Register of Historic Places.
The Brown Foundation, the Elizabeth and George Coates Fund, and the Ewing Halsell Foundation help fund the San Antonio Museum Association’s first purchase on Jones Avenue. The same year, Cambridge Seven Associates of Cambridge, Massachusetts, is selected as the lead architects for the project.
On July 13, Mayor Lila Cockrell leads the celebratory christening of the new museum marked by the breaking of a bottle of beer instead of the usual champagne.
The San Antonio Museum Association completes the purchase of the future museum campus. A grant from the Economic Development Administration, contributions from the Brown Foundation, the Ewing Halsell Foundation, and the Moody Foundation, and a donation from Lt. Gen. Sam Maddux, Jr., and Mrs. Elizabeth Huth Coates Maddux help fund the purchase.
Following a $7.2 million renovation of the former brewery, the San Antonio Museum of Art opens to the public on March 1.
Museum trustees Lenora and Walter F. Brown begin donating Asian objects, mostly Chinese ceramics, leading to the development of the Museum’s extensive Asian art collection.
The Museum receives the unparalleled collections of Latin American Folk Art formed by former Vice President Nelson A. Rockefeller and Robert K. Winn, establishing it at the forefront of American institutions collecting in this area.
Trustee and major San Antonio philanthropist Gilbert M. Denman Jr. makes the first of several large gifts of ancient Egyptian, Greek, and Roman art, forming the basis of what would become one of the largest collections of ancient Mediterranean art in the southern United States. Earlier, in 1977, Denman gave a distinct collection of Oceanic art to the Museum, inspired by his service in the Pacific with the U.S. Navy during World War II, under Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz, a native of Fredericksburg, Texas.
Adjacent to the original brewhouse, the ancient Greek and Roman art galleries open after renovations.
The 7,000-square-foot Cowden Gallery opens to present special exhibitions.
San Antonio’s dramatic cultural growth prompts the San Antonio Museum Association to dissolve and become reconstituted as two separate museums: the San Antonio Museum of Art and the Witte Museum. The San Antonio Museum of Art becomes an independent non-profit organization.
The Beretta Hops House, the brewery's former cooper shop, is renovated, and the Luby Courtyard opens.
The Museum purchases Arden Grove, a 3.3-acre property across Jones Avenue from the brewery complex.
The Nelson A. Rockefeller Center for Latin American Art, a 30,000-square-foot wing designed by local architectural firm Overland Partners, opens to display Latin American art from ancient to contemporary, including one of the most important collections of popular art in the United States.
Patsy and Marshall T. Steves Sr. acquire the iconic Urrutia Arch for the Museum and have it installed it in the Luby Courtyard.
The San Antonio Museum of Art receives accreditation from the American Association of Museums on November 6, 2000.
The new 15,000-square-foot Lenora and Walter F. Brown Asian Art Wing designed by Overland Partners opens in May.
The Museum Reach, a landscaped, 1.3-mile extension of the River Walk, opens. To accommodate the Museum's new riverfront access, the Gloria Galt River Landing, a shaded pavilion, esplanade, and terrace, is built along the Museum's north side.
SAMA installs the six-and-a-half ton Taihu Rock, a gift from San Antonio’s sister city Wuxi in China.
The Museum is conveyed one acre of riverfront property by CPS Energy.
Pritzker Award-winning architectural firm Herzog & de Meuron, Basel, is selected to complete a campus plan for the Museum.
SAMA is reaccredited by the American Alliance of Museums.
The mission of the San Antonio Museum of Art is to bring people together with art by collecting, preserving, and presenting significant works of art representing a broad range of history and cultures, advancing human connection and understanding, and inspiring curiosity, creativity, and discovery.
The SAMA’s campus now encompasses more than twelve acres, and the Museum’s collection of nearly 30,000 works of art spans six continents and more than 5,000 years of human creativity.
