New Jersey Museums

New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the Northeastern United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York.

New Jersey is the 11th-most populous and the most densely populated of the 50 U.S. states, with its biggest city being Newark.

Native Americans inhabited new Jersey for more than 2,800 years, then in the early 17th century, the Dutch and the Swedes founded the first European settlements in the state.

The English later seized control of the region, naming it the Province of New Jersey after the largest of the Channel Islands, Jersey.

New Jersey was the site of several decisive battles during the American Revolutionary War in the 18th century.

New Jersey’s location, between Boston and New York City to the northeast, and Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington, D.C., to the southwest, fueled its rapid growth.

New Jersey is home to the highest number of millionaires per capita of all U.S. states.

Virtual Tour of the Museums in New Jersey

Princeton University Art Museum
Battleship New Jersey
The Newark Museum of Art
Montclair Art Museum
New Jersey State Museum

Highlights Tour of the Museums in New Jersey

Princeton University Art Museum

The Princeton University Art Museum, located in New Jersey, was founded in 1882. It houses over 92,000 works of art that range from antiquity to the contemporary period.

The Princeton University Art Museum’s collections concentrate on the Mediterranean region, Western Europe, China, the United States, and Latin America.

The museum has an extensive collection of Greek and Roman antiquities, including ceramics, marbles, bronzes, and Roman mosaics from excavations in Antioch. Medieval Europe is represented by sculpture, metalwork, and stained glass.

Western European collection of paintings includes examples from the early Renaissance through to contemporary art.

Battleship New Jersey

The USS New Jersey is the most decorated battleship in the US Navy’s history and after 21 years in the active service and was donated as a museum ship in 2001.

The Battleship New Jersey earned 19 battle stars for combat actions and was the only US battleship providing gunfire support during the Vietnam War.

During World War II, New Jersey shelled targets on Guam and Okinawa and screened aircraft carriers conducting raids in the Marshall Islands.

During the Korean War, she was involved in raids along the North Korean coast. In 1968 she was reactivated and sent to Vietnam to support US troops before returning to the mothball fleet in 1969.

She was reactivated once more in the 1980s when she was modernized to carry missiles and recommissioned. In 1983, she participated in US operations during the Lebanese Civil War.

The Newark Museum of Art

The Newark Museum of Art is the largest in New Jersey. It holds collections of American art, decorative arts, contemporary art, and the arts of Asia, Africa, the Americas, and the ancient world.

Its collections of American art include works by Hiram Powers, John Singer Sargent, Frederick Church, Childe Hassam, Mary Cassatt, Edward Hopper, Georgia O’Keeffe, and Frank Stella.

The Museum’s Tibetan art galleries are considered among the best in the world. The Tibetan galleries have a Buddhist altar that the Dalai Lama has consecrated.

In addition to its extensive art collections, the Newark Museum of Art is dedicated to natural science. Its collection includes 70,000 specimens.

Montclair Art Museum

The Montclair Art Museum opened in 1914 as the first museum in New Jersey with public access and the first dedicated solely to art.

Its collection of more than 12,000 items are dedicated to American art and Native American art forms, as well as contemporary art.

The American collection comprises paintings, prints, drawings, photographs, and sculptures dating from the 18th century to the present.

The museum’s holdings of American Indian art and artifacts represent the cultural achievements in weaving, pottery, wood carving, jewelry, and textiles of indigenous Americans.

The American Indian art is mainly from the regions of Northwest Coast, California, Southwest, Plains, Woodlands, Southeast, and the Arctic.

New Jersey State Museum

The New Jersey State Museum offers collections that include natural history specimens, archaeological and ethnographic artifacts, and cultural history and fine art objects.

The museum was the first state museum in the country established with education as a primary mission and was first housed in the New Jersey State House in 1895.

As a center of cultural, educational, and scientific engagement, the museum inspires learning through its collections, research, exhibitions, and programs in science, history, and art.

In its beginning, the museum focused on natural history. In 1912, the museum expanded its focus to include archaeology through the acquisition of Native American artifacts.

In 1924, decorative arts were added to the museum. Soon after, fine arts were exhibited and acquired, and the museum began collecting paintings, sculptures, and then in 1960 works on paper were added.