Vancouver's Museum of Anthropology ranks among world's top 25 museums
Quartz included the UBC institution in a prestigious list of museums worth planning a trip around, citing its Northwest Coast Indigenous art collection and Arthur Erickson architecture.
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The Museum of Anthropology at UBC has been ranked among the world's top 25 museums worth planning a trip around.
Quartz included the institution in its prestigious roundup, describing the MOA as having "collections, architecture, and cultural weight that justify booking a flight." The museum holds what Quartz calls "the most important collection of Northwest Coast Indigenous art in the world."
The MOA first opened in 1949 inside the university's main library. Its current home, designed by Arthur Erickson and opened in 1976, was completely rebuilt after a comprehensive seismic upgrade. The Great Hall is now a brand new seismic-safe replica of the original structure, demolished in early 2022. The $40-million project began in 2020, with the museum reopening in 2024.
Highlights include Haida artist Bill Reid's large bronze sculpture The Raven and the First Men, and the Multiversity Galleries, which display about 10,000 objects from the museum's world cultures collection. The approach of making collections physically apparent through layout has since been adopted by other institutions.
