The Museum is open Wednesday - Saturday 11 - 4, Sunday 12 - 4.
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Founded in 1912, the Newport Art Museum is one of the oldest continuously operating and most highly regarded art museums and schools of its kind in the country.
The Newport Art Museum’s collection consists of approximately 3,000 works of art in a range of media including works on paper (prints, drawings, watercolors, and photographs), paintings, sculptures, decorative arts, installation works, and textiles and is expanding to include new media. Concentrated on American art and contemporary art, the Museum’s collection includes works of art from the 18th century to present.
As a valued Newport Art Museum member you're entitled to free admission, are invited to members' only events and exhibition tours, receive discounts on Museum School class tuition and public program tickets, and will be supporting the Museum's mission to share a diversity of art and experiences to our Newport community and beyond.
By supporting the Newport Art Museum Annual Fund at any level, you help make a positive difference in the lives of many. Our exhibitions, public programs, education, and community outreach, which includes a diversity of artistic voices, would not be possible without you. Help the Newport Art Museum continue to spark reflection, inspiration, discovery and build lasting connections by making your tax-deductible contribution today. We thank you for believing in the transformative power of art and allowing us to make art accessible to all for generations to come. Help the Newport Art Museum continue to spark reflection, inspiration, discovery, and build connections by making your tax-deductible contribution TODAY!
Are you a business owner who is looking for new ways to engage and connect with local Newport customers on a year round basis? We have the perfect opportunity. Sponsor a Newport tradition - The Newport Art Museum - Make NAM part of your marketing plan in 2025. We have an array of events and exhibits to offer you. Our first exciting event is the 2025 Winter Speaker Series in its 97th Year.
$20.00 Per person
Newport, Rhode Island has been often referred to as “The Eden of America.” This richly illustrated lecture series celebrates the publication of America’s Eden: Newport Landscapes Through the Ages (2022). Lectures will explore over three centuries of landscape design, literature, and art that have been created in this verdant place. With garden shovel and spade, pen, brush, paint, and camera, generations of gardeners, nursery owners, writers, and artists have literally and figuratively shaped the land. Among them were renowned figures such as landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted and his sons, writers Harriet Beecher Stowe and Henry James, the painter Childe Hassam, and pioneering photographer Frances Benjamin Johnston. The result of their work is an extraordinary heritage, a vision of human-made Eden through the ages.
In this lecture, Tschirch will dive into an exploration of the development of Newport’s topography from colonial settlement through the 18th century, when classical ideals of landscape planning fused with practical horticulture. A view of period maps, rare literary works, and letters reveal this lost world.
Lecture will be followed by Q&A with John Tschirch, sale and book signing of America’s Eden: Newport Landscapes Through the Ages.
“Every place has a tale to tell.”
John Tschirch is an architectural historian, writer, teacher and Honorary Member of the Garden Club of America. His latest books include America’s Eden: Newport Landscapes through the Ages (2022) and Newport: The Artful City (2020), which received the Victorian Society of America Book Award in 2021. John received his M.A. (1986) in Architectural History and Historic Preservation from the School of Architecture at the University of Virginia. His thirty-year career in the preservation and study of historic landmarks and landscapes across the globe has led him on treks to French chateaux, English castles, Italian villas, Austrian palaces, Croatian fortresses, Argentinian mansions and the Gilded Age houses of America. Currently, he teaches the theory and history of design at Rhode Island School of Design, advises on historic preservation projects, and has entered the world of historical fiction writing, inspired by his travels, with the publication of Gods and Girls: Tales of Art, Seduction and Obsession (2019).
John’s work in preserving and interpreting historic places has been featured in the Magazine Antiques, Martha Stewart Living, The New York Times and Conde Nast Traveler and he has appeared on the A&E documentary series, America’s Castles. From 1986 to 2013, he served the Preservation Society of Newport County, first as Director of Education and later as Director of Museum Affairs and Architectural Historian, overseeing the curatorial, conservation, education and research activities at the organizations eleven historic house museums and gardens. He has published essays on history and socio-cultural issues for The Public Humanist (2018-19), “The New Thing at Newport: The Tiffany Glass Wall at Kingscote” in The Magazine Antiques (January 2013), the essay, “Newport Cottages” for The Encyclopedia of New England Culture (Yale University Press, 2005) and “Newport” in Parisian Palaces of La Belle Epoque (Paris 1992). He was inducted as an Honorary Member of the Garden Club of America in 2012 for his contributions to the research and restoration of historic landscapes. In recognition of his service to historic preservation, he received the 2013 Frederick C. Williamson Professional Leadership Award from the Rhode Island State Historic Preservation and Heritage Commission.
The preservation of heritage sites of international significance is of foremost interest to John. He has lectured widely in the U.S. and abroad on architecture, landscapes and historic cities, from the Attingham Conference in London to Yale University’s Mellon Center Seminar on 18th Century French Design and the UNESCO sponsored conference on Architecture and Culture in Buenos Aires.
By John Tschirch. Published by D Giles Limited, 2022. 304 pages, hardcover. $45 Available for purchase and signing after the lecture.
In 1789, Jedidiah Morse described Newport and its environs as the “Eden of America” in the First Geography of the United States. America’s Eden: Newport Landscapes through the Ages builds on this legendary image of a centuries-old paradise, and establishes Newport as a cultural landscape of national significance.
The comprehensive history from European settlement to the present day is illustrated by a treasure trove of rare period maps, paintings and photographs by prominent artists, and drawings and sketches by leading designers. The book serves as a critical resource guide encompassing landscape architecture, fine art, tree and plant propagation, and the conservation of natural sites. A rich story of art, design and horticulture awaits readers among the gardens, gazebos and trees of Newport.
Image Credits: Banner: Charles Blaskowitz. Detail of landscape and gardens from A Map of the Towne of Newport, 1777. Library of Congress Thumbnail: Cliff Walk, ca. 1900. Library of Congress