Dallas Resources

SMU students have exceptional access to world-class collections in Dallas-Fort Worth. Thanks to support from a vibrant community of artists, collectors, enthusiasts and philanthropists, the arts in Dallas are thriving.

The SMU campus is located only five miles from downtown Dallas, home of the largest urban arts district in the nation (larger than Lincoln Center in New York and the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C.).  Students not wishing to drive downtown can take the light rail trains; a DART station is located only a couple of blocks from campus. Students can also take the Trinity Railway Express between Dallas and Fort Worth.

SMU art history students have opportunities to intern at several area museums and collections. 

Dallas Museums 

 has an encyclopedic collection of over 22,000 objects with strengths in the areas of American silver, furniture, painting and sculpture; contemporary European and American art, Indonesian textiles, Etruscan jewelry, and African, Pre-Columbian and south Asian art.

SMU’s own  is home to one of the largest and most comprehensive collections of Spanish art outside of Spain, and is open to SMU students free of charge, year round.

, designed by Renzo Piano, contains a stellar collection of modern sculpture that includes works by Picasso, Matisse, Giacometti, David Smith, Henry Moore, Richard Serra and Alexander Calder.

Fort Worth Museums 

, housed in a building by Philip Johnson, has one of the world’s best collections of American photography and a very strong collection of American paintings and sculpture.

 is one of the world’s premiere art museums. Housed in Louis Kahn’s seminal building, the small collection of 300 works offers a wide-ranging survey of European, Asian, Latin American, African, Ancient, Pre-Columbian and Oceanic art of the highest quality.

The Modern Fort Worth is housed in a striking building by Tadeo Ando and is touted by Travel + Leisure magazine as one of the world’s most beautiful art museums. Its collection includes post-1945 paintings, sculpture, photographs and video by such artists as Francis Bacon, Donald Judd, Jackson Pollock and Andy Warhol. 

Architecture in Dallas

In addition to extraordinary museums and collections, Dallas is home to more than nine buildings designed by , many of which are located within the downtown arts district: I.M. Pei (Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center, Dallas City Hall); Renzo Piano (Nasher Sculpture Center); Norman Foster (AT&T Performing Arts Center Margot and Bill Winspear Opera House); Rem Koolhaas (AT&T Performing Arts Center Dee and Charles Wyly Theatre); AIA “Gold Medal” recipient Edward Larrabee Barnes (The Dallas Museum of Art); Thom Mayne (Perot Museum) and Philip Johnson (Thanksgiving Square, The Crescent and others).