The Anchorage Museum is the largest museum in Alaska. It is located at 121 W. 7th Ave., Anchorage, Alaska 99501. The museum is community-based with exhibits and programs on art, history and cultures of Alaska. The museum also presents many public programs and art classes.

Admission Costs:

Free to members, Adults $8, Seniors/Military/Students with ID $7, Children 17 and under, free but $2 suggested donation, groups of 20 or more per visit is $6 per person with free admission for the tour group leader.

The Museum Shop features:

• Alaska Native Art
• Contemporary crafts and jewelry
• Books about Alaska art, history and cultures

The Marx Bros. Café at the Museum

The café is open during Museum hours serving lunches, desserts and coffee.

The primary focus of the Archives collections of approximately 10,000 titles is upon history, ethnography and art of Alaska and the North. The reference collection includes art auction records, indexes and dictionaries.

Educators

The Museum offers guided tours for classes of all ages. The exhibits of Alaska history and art and in special exhibits are the primary focus of these tours. Educators are able to borrow artifact kits from the Education Department for use in the classroom. Videotapes on discipline-based art education are also available. The Museum Shop is a good source for books, videos, CDs and curriculum guides on Alaska subjects.

Among their collections

There is a wide-range collection of art that reflects Alaska and the circumpolar North, seven galleries in all on the Museum's ground floor. These galleries feature:

• Early view of Alaska
• Life in the North
• Paintings by Sydney Laurence (probably Alaska's best known artist)
• Portraits, both traditional and unconventional
• Landscape paintings
• Works by contemporary Alaska Native artists

As the museum adds new works, the galleries slowly change, or as sensitive works are rotated off display.

The Alaska Gallery

This 15,000 square-foot gallery should prove to be a very interesting place to visit as it is devoted to Alaska's history. It is located on the museum's second floor. The Alaska Gallery displays more than one thousand objects and is the finest presentation of Alaskan history and ethnology in the state. The full-scale and miniature dioramas provide a look at the early lifestyles of Alaska's Aleuts, Eskimos and Indians. Other topics include exploration and settlement by the Russians, the gold rush era, World War II, and statehood.

Source: The Anchorage Museum Online

Important Disclaimer: The URL address in the resource box of this article is not associated with The Anchorage Museum. This article and the web site are offered as a resource for formulating vacation ideas.

This article is FREE to publish with the resource box.

© 2007 Connie Limon All Rights Reserved