canton museum of art

Wish this museum could be better. A few nice pieces from the Cleveland School and sometimes a good exhibition, but basically 2 rooms of mediocre offerings. One day we visited and they just decided to close.

We are so blessed to have an art museum like CMA in a small city such as Canton, Ohio! Stop in to see our wonderful facility if you are planning a trip here!

If I lived in Canton I'd belong to the museum and be happy to do so. But as someone just driving through town the price of admission was a little high given the small size of their displays.That said, there were some pieces on display --from their permanent collection-- that I'd love to see daily. Clearly the museum's management and donors know what to collect.Be sure to check out what is on display (on their website). It may just be something that interests you.

We visited the museum on a Friday afternoon specifically to see Intent to Deceive. We had been there once before but had heard that the special exhibit was worth taking a look at. The admission cost, like other reviewers have noted, was slightly expensive for the size of the museum. I think that the cost was more because of the special exhibit, normally the admission is eight dollars with discounts for students and seniors. Before entering the museum we were told we could watch a short video which gave an introduction to some of the artists who have created the forgeries. It was worth watching. We did like the exhibit; it was especially interesting reading about the different ways the artist would try to convince others that their work was real. One artist even dressed up in a priest outfit to bring one of his paintings to a museum trying to pass it off as the real deal. Reading these stories was my favorite part.We also toured the main part of the museum which didn't take too long. In total we were there for about an hour and half. There is a tiny gift shop, clean restrooms and plenty of free off street parking. I wouldn't come from a long distance to visit, but if you're in the area it's worth a stop. If you're looking for another art museum, Akron has one that is a little bigger and not that far away from Canton. It's worth a visit as well.

I think this small museum can reward visiting under the right circumstances.I went to see the temporary "Intent to Deceive" exhibit about art forgery, and also browsed the permanent collection. This was worth an hour's drive there and back, plus $15 admission. The forgery exhibit is excellent, if you have a chance to see it. The museum's permanent collection has few big names but a good level of quality.That said, I spent about an hour at the museum total; if there's no special exhibit drawing you there, I would think twice before traveling very far out of your way to visit.

Evaluating this museum with respect of giving it a rating I do to know how I can give it an above average rating for what little I saw of the permanent collection. There was not enough there to make the admission price justifiable. Not much to see in the first place. The small space allocated for the permanent collection is not separate from the main exhibit that brought me there in the first place. So I am not today comfortable with coming to terms with giving this museum a rating above anything approaching an average rating or grade since the collection was below average in size and for other reasons. The exhibit on Fakes and Forgeries - about fraudulent art - was worth my time and it did motivate me to read about these people who perpetrated the frauds. I did learn something new - and I am stretching and exaggerating my opinion here - for a chance to see and understand something that remains unknown for many museum people. For many people connected to a city and living in the shadow of Akron and Cleveland further north there is a fair question waiting for an answer: Why is this museum so small? It is a good idea for finding a location of this museum in the central part of the middle of Canton near the civic center. However, the large building and parking lot made me think that the museum was larger inside. I was disappointed greatly by the small size of the gallery space for displaying more parts of the permanent collection. I didn't come to terms with acknowledging any solid intellectual purpose for keeping scholars here. Where would they do their work? The small space allocated for viewing by audio-visual presentation parts of the exhibit on Fakes and Forgeries was make shift rather being in separate room far from the admissions gate with its own audio visual system Moreover this space was too small to begin with and it was not in a removed room. It was as though it had been set up temporarily to add something new to the exhibit. Not a good quality to promote and sell your museum to first time visitors. The gift shop was a joke. I am really not sure if the Canton Art Museum deserves much praise for the exhibit on forgeries and fakes when the space allocated for displaying the permanent collection is so small and when it charges such an high price for regular admission. $15.00 for one adult admission? There is not much floor space to the gallery to use for displaying more parts of its permanent collection. That is just a beginning point to the complaints to be made and found in visiting this small museum. Canton deserves more of a larger art gallery and museum if it hopes to wants to compete for parts of the audience that visits the NFL Hall of Fame regularly to say nothing of the people who visit the Akron Art Museum and Cleveland Museum of Art more often and rightfully so. Let alone attracting people to come here for a first visit there is not much here to bring people back for a second visit outside of a place for a lunch on the veranda. It seems to me that the veranda for lunch is larger than the gallery space inside. Most likely the cause for this museum being so small has something to do with the culture of the Stark County area. I did see the exhibit called Fakes and Forgeries" but I am not sure if there was a need for charging such a high price. The museum needs more gallery space, an auditorium for musical recitals and related events and lectures - outside of the library whose purpose is questionable. I saw what was described as the library and it was filled with chairs. Moreover there were few books for reading on the shelves. Something large scale is missing here. It might be a larger appreciation of things that can be seen at an art gallery or museum. I was not sure what was the mission for the what few things that were on display. What is the central theme for managing this collection? I did not see any continuity on display there in arranging what few works on art that were on the wall and elsewhere. Thematic coherence was missing for me. I am not sure if I would make a separate special trip to this museum again. In fact I do not think I would travel there again. I did enjoy at chance at understanding the forgeries and fakes and to know about people who undertook these schemes. It was not worth paying $15 for admission. I am suspicious that the museum needs money. For one thing it needs a place for visitors to sit down and think about the exhibit - like a lounge or lobby with chairs and tables inside the museum- rather than rush out to the parking lot forth return ride in there cars got get home. It needs a genuine large library for scholarly pursuits and a separate audio visual room for seeing parts of another large exhibit. If there were another special traveling exhibit I might travel there a second time but not for another chance to see what little was on display from the permanent collection. For the residents of Canton and surrounding communities and rrual area it is probably a mark of local pride. So I do encourage the residents to do something to make the place more worth visiting. I learned recently that the Canton Art Museum combined resources and personnel to present a joint exhibit on one artist with the museum from Youngstown area called the Butler Museum - I believe was its name.This effort is what has to be done to make the Canton Art Museum more viable and worth visiting. I am interesting in knowing what contribution the local schools make to enhancing the collection in the Canton Art Museum. Now the permanent collection s not much to see. I did not come there to buy or eat lunch but I was happy that I did brown bag it enough to save money. To brown bag it in the first place with as little money as I was willing to pay after the admission price was a lucky move on my part for lunch. If it was just the permeant collection for me to see on this same visit I made to see the fraudulent art then i would give the place a poor rating or below average for sure. The exhibit on fraudulent art did make me somewhat more willing to be satisfied with traveling to the Canton Art Museum but the other draw backs were not to be eliminated so I can not and do not want really to say many good things about the entire museum. If you are looking for an intellectual mission of an art museum to deliver you might not find it here. A collection of post cards might have been just as solid of an intellectual contribution to make to visitors. Go if there is an interesting traveling exhibit like fraudulent art. Otherwise stay home and visit the Akron or Cleveland Art Museums later for they have more to see and are worth your time and money. Canton Museum of Art has little for me to recommend it to you.

I was very impressed with this special exhibit! I was a little apprehensive about the fact it was going to cost $15, but after seeing it, I believe it was well worth it! Very very interesting!!! It took me approx 1 1/2 to view. The museum itself is small. There's not a lot to the permanent collection on display. But I highly recommend the special exhibits!!!!

We were surprised at how small the actual collection is despite the large building and parking lot.The main collection is in one room, lacking any real sense of continuity or major artists (maybe there were a few pieces from major artists, but no more than 3-5). The traveling exhibit (about fraudulent art) was interesting and well-curated. I wouldn't make a special trip just for this museum.

We went to Canton mostly to check out the art museum because we were excited to see a special exhibit they had. While the special exhibit was very interesting, the museum itself was quite small (much smaller than we anticipated --- it's less than 10 rooms in total --- and the permanent collection isn't really much to see. On the upside, very easy and free parking and their gift shop features works by local artists. I would go again if there was a specific traveling exhibit I wanted to see, but I wouldn't go just to see their permanent collection.