Frye Art Museum

The Frye Art Museum is located in Seattle's First Hill neighborhood and is dedicated to modern and contemporary art. Founded in 1952, it houses the historic collection of Charles and Emma Frye, which consisted mainly of German and Austrian works from the nineteenth century. The collection was originally focused on representational art with dramatic and psychological themes. Since the late 2000s, however, the museum has broadened its focus and now also shows conceptual and contemporary forms that encourage a wider artistic dialogue.

The building was originally designed by Paul Thiry and was modernized in the 1990s with an addition that includes an auditorium and an education space, among other features. In addition to the permanent collection, which includes paintings, prints, and sculptures by artists such as Franz von Lenbach and Franz Stuck, you can visit changing special exhibitions. These showcase both emerging and established artists and often experiment with new arrangements of the museum's holdings. The museum also offers an extensive library with more than two thousand books on American and German art of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.