This list of museums in Portland, Oregon encompasses museums defined for this context as institutions (including nonprofit organizations, government entities, and private businesses) that collect and care for objects of cultural, artistic, scientific, or historical interest and make their collections or related exhibits available for public viewing. Museums that exist only in cyberspace (i.e., virtual museums) are not included. Also included are non-profit and university art galleries.
Name | Neighborhood | Area | Type | Summary |
---|---|---|---|---|
3D Center of Art and Photography | Art | Antique and contemporary 3D imagery, currently closed and seeking new location | ||
Architectural Heritage Center | Buckman | Southeast | Art - Architecture | Website; changing exhibits about architecture and art |
Blue Sky Gallery | Pearl District | Northwest | Art | Photography gallery |
Cooley Gallery | Eastmoreland | Southeast | Art | Website; part of Reed College |
Gallery 114 | Old Town Chinatown | Northwest | Art | website, non-profit artists' collective and gallery in all media |
Hat Museum | Hosford-Abernethy | Southeast | Commodity - Hats | Website; displays a selection of most characteristic styles of past eras; in the Ladd-Reingold House; open for private tours for costumers, fashion and history academics and for millinery students |
Kidd's Toy Museum | Buckman | Southeast | Toy | Includes mechanical banks; trains, planes and automobiles; character toys; police badges; railroad locks, lanterns and related items; early Oregon memorabilia; teddy bears and dolls; and holiday collectibles [1] |
Movie Madness Video | Sunnyside | Southeast | Media | Video rental shop and museum of film history with costumes, props and Hollywood memorabilia |
Museum of Odd History | University Park | North | Fraternal History | History of Odd Fellows and their contributions to the development of North Portland Website |
Oregon Historical Society Museum | Downtown | Southwest | Multiple | State history, science, art |
Oregon Jewish Museum and Centre for Holocaust Education | Northwest District | Northwest | Ethnic - Jewish | Jewish culture in Oregon, America and the world, art, history |
Japanese American Museum of Oregon | Old Town Chinatown | Northwest | Ethnic - Japanese | Website; lives and contributions of Oregon's Nikkei community, located in Portland's old Japantown area |
Oregon Maritime Museum | Downtown | Southwest | Maritime | Located on the steam sternwheeler Portland in Tom McCall Waterfront Park |
Oregon Museum of Science and Industry (OMSI) | Hosford-Abernethy | Southeast | Science | Also includes the USS Blueback (SS-581) submarine and a planetarium |
Oregon Rail Heritage Center | Hosford-Abernethy | Southeast | Railroad | Vintage railroad equipment, including steam and diesel locomotives and passenger coaches |
Oregon Sports Hall of Fame | Hall of fame - Sports | Closed temporarily, as of May 2008, according to its website | ||
Pacific Northwest College of Art Galleries | Pearl District | Northwest | Art | Campus includes twelve public exhibition galleries, two professional galleries and ten spaces reserved for student and community showings |
Pittock Mansion | Hillside | Northwest | Historic house | 22 room French Renaissance estate situated on 46 acres (190,000 m2) |
Portland Art Museum | Downtown | Southwest | Art | Includes centers for Native American, Northwest art, and modern and contemporary art, Asian art, an outdoor public sculpture garden, and the Northwest Film Center |
Portland Children's Museum | Washington Park | Southwest | Children's | |
Portland Community College Cascade Gallery | Humboldt | Northeast | Art | Website, on the Cascade Campus |
Portland Community College North View Gallery | Far Southwest | Southwest | Art | Website, on the Sylvania Campus |
Portland Institute for Contemporary Art | Downtown | Southwest | Art | Contemporary performance and visual arts |
Portland Police Museum | Downtown | Southwest | Police | Photographs, equipment, uniforms, and documents; run by the Portland Police Historical Society |
Portland Puppet Museum | Southeast Uplift | Southeast | Puppet | website |
Portland State University School of Art & Design Galleries | Downtown | Southwest | Art | Website. MK, Autzen, AB Lobby and Broadway Galleries |
Stark's Vacuum Museum | Kerns | Northeast | Commodity - Vacuum cleaners | Collection of 300 items includes the two-person-operated Busy-Bee (one person pumps, the other vacuums); operated by Stark's Vacuum Cleaner Sales & Service |
VintageTek | Hayhurst | Southwest | Technology | website, historic Tektronix equipment |
Wells Fargo History Museum | Downtown | Southwest | History | Wells Fargo Company in Oregon history; includes a 19th-century stagecoach, an interactive telegraph, a life-size reproduction of a turn-of-the-20th-century bank, and a treasure box used to carry gold long distances. This museum has closed. |
World Forestry Center | Washington Park | Southwest | Industry - Forestry | Forest industry, importance and natural history of forests |
Marie Watt is a contemporary artist living and working in Portland, Oregon. Enrolled in the Seneca Nation of Indians, Watt has created work primarily with textile arts and community collaboration centered on diverse Native American themes.
The Portland Art Museum (PAM) is an art museum in downtown Portland, Oregon, United States. The Portland Art Museum has 240,000 square feet, with more than 112,000 square feet of gallery space. The museum’s permanent collection has over 42,000 works of art. PAM features a center for Native American art, a center for Northwest art, a center for modern and contemporary art, permanent exhibitions of Asian art, and an outdoor public sculpture garden. The Northwest Film Center is also a component of Portland Art Museum.
The Pacific Northwest College of Art (PNCA) is an art school of Willamette University and is located in Portland, Oregon. Established in 1909, the art school grants Bachelor of Fine Arts degrees and graduate degrees including the Master of Fine Arts (MFA) and Master of Arts (MA) degrees. It has an enrollment of about 500 students. The college merged with Willamette University in 2021.
The Art Gym was a nonprofit, noncollecting contemporary arts gallery at Marylhurst University in Marylhurst, Oregon, United States. The gallery had been permanently moved to the Portland Art Museum in 2018, as Marylhurst University closed at the end of 2018.
Jeff Jahn is a curator, art critic, artist, historian, blogger and composer based in Portland, Oregon, United States. He coined the phrase declaring Portland "the capital of conscience for the United States," in a Portland Tribune op-ed piece, which was then reiterated in The Wall Street Journal.
Jessica Jackson Hutchins is an American artist from Chicago, Illinois who is based in Portland, Oregon. Her practice consists of large scale ceramics, multi-media installations, assemblage, and paintings all of which utilize found objects such as old furniture, ceramics, worn out clothes, and newspaper clippings. She is most recognizable for her sloppy craft assemblages of furniture and ceramics. Her work was selected for the 2010: Whitney Biennial, featured in major art collections, and has been exhibited throughout the United States and internationally, in Iceland, the UK, and Germany.
Brad Cloepfil is an American architect, educator and principal of Allied Works Architecture of Portland, Oregon and New York City. His first major project was an adaptive reuse of a Portland warehouse for the advertising agency Wieden+Kennedy. Since 2000, Cloepfil and Allied Works have completed cultural, commercial and residential projects including the Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis, the University of Michigan Museum of Art, the Dutchess County Residence Guest House and the Museum of Arts and Design. Recent and notable works include the Clyfford Still Museum in Denver, Colorado, completed in November 2011; the National Music Centre of Canada in Calgary, Alberta, which opened in July 2016; and the Providence Park expansion in Portland, Oregon, completed in 2019.
The Museum of Contemporary Craft (1937-2016) in Portland, Oregon was the oldest continuously-running craft institution on the west coast of the United States until its closure in 2016. The museum's mission was "to enliven and expand the understanding of craft and the museum experience." It was known as one of the few centers in the United States to focus on the relationships between art and craft, programming robust shows exploring a wide variety of artists, materials and techniques.
The Merchant Hotel, also known as the Merchants' Hotel, is a historic former hotel building in Portland, Oregon, United States. It is located at 121 N.W. Second Avenue in Old Town Chinatown. It is a contributing property in the Portland Skidmore/Old Town Historic District, which was listed on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places in 1975 and designated a National Historic Landmark District in 1977. It is one of the few remaining examples of Victorian Italianate, cast iron architecture on the West Coast. It occupies half of a city block, specifically along the south side of N.W. Davis Street from Second to Third Avenues.
Betty Feves (1918–1985) was an Oregon artist who helped shape the development of clay as an expressive medium in the years following World War II.
Le Happy is a crêperie in Sandy, Oregon, United States. Previously, the restaurant operated in northwest Portland's Northwest District.
Cynthia Lahti is an American contemporary artist from Portland, Oregon, who works in many mediums: "from collage to ceramics, altered books, and painting".
Kurt Weiser is an American ceramicist and professor. His work—explorations of the relationship between man and nature through narratives rendered in vivid color—are described as "Eden-like." His work has often taken the form of teapots, vases, and cups, though he has recently begun crafting globes as well. Weiser is currently the regents professor at Arizona State University's School of Art.
Heidi Schwegler is an American artist in Yucca Valley, California.
Clyde Common was a restaurant and market in Portland, Oregon, United States. The business opened in 2007. In 2020, Clyde Common closed temporarily due to the COVID-19 pandemic, reopening in July with outdoor dining and as a market. The bar and restaurant became known as Clyde Tavern, and the part of the former dining area was called Common Market. Clyde Common closed permanently in January 2022.
Natalie Ball is a Klamath/Modoc interdisciplinary artist based in Chiloquin, Oregon.
Lloyd Eldred Herman (1936-2023) was an American arts administrator, curator, writer, museum planner and acknowledged expert on contemporary craft. He was known for being the founding Director of the Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington D.C., from 1971 to 1986.
Bailey's Taproom was a beer bar in downtown Portland, Oregon, United States. The bar, which was established by owner Geoff Phillips in 2007, was a popular destination for craft beer tourism and garnered a positive reception. The bar had a second-floor sibling establishment called The Upper Lip, which was also known as Bailey's Upper Lip. Both establishments closed in 2021 during the COVID-19 pandemic.