John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art

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The John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art is the State Art Museum of Florida, located in Sarasota, Florida. It was established in 1927 as the legacy of Mable and John Ringling for the people of Florida. Florida State University assumed governance of the Museum in 2000.[1]

Designated as the official state art museum for Florida,[2] the institution offers twenty-one galleries of European paintings as well as Cypriot antiquities and Asian, American, and contemporary art. The museum's art collection currently consists of more than 10,000 objects that include a wide variety of paintings, sculpture, drawings, prints, photographs, and decorative arts from ancient through contemporary periods and from around the world. The most celebrated items in the museum are 16th, 17th, and 18th century European paintings, including a world-renowned collection of Peter Paul Rubens paintings and cartoons.^{[citation needed]}

In January 2007, a $76-million expansion and renovation of the Museum of Art was finished. A new Arthur F. and Ulla R. Searing Wing was added -- the new wing being the final component of a five-year master plan that has transformed the museum from a decaying facility to the 16th largest in the United States.[3]

In all, more than 150,000 square feet have been added to the campus, which includes the art museum, circus museum and Ca d'Zan, the Ringlings' mansion, which has been restored, along with the historic Asolo Theater. Entirely new are the Visitors Pavilion, the Education and Conservation Complex, the Tibbals Learning Center and Miniature Circus and the Searing Wing, a 30,000-square-foot gallery for special exhibitions attached to the art museum.[4]

[edit] Points of Interest

Aside from the art museum, the estate of Mable and John Ringling also features Mable Ringling’s rose garden, completed in 1913. The rose garden is located near the original Mary Louise and Charles N. Thompson residence within the beautifully landscaped grounds overlooking Sarasota Bay. The estate also contains the Cà d'Zan ("House of John") - the waterfront residence they designed and built in 1926 - and a museum devoted to the Ringling Brothers Circus. Cà d'Zan was restored in 2002 under the direction of Francis J. Puig during his tenure as curator of the John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art.