Bridgeport Art Galleries, Museums, Supplies & More

Best art galleries Bridgeport museums supplies classes your area

Art in Bridgeport will be covered in full detail for you today and our opening section will discuss the best art galleries and museums near you.

After that we will get into a variety of other topics like local art supply stores, events, festivals, dealers, appraisers, walking tours, sculptures and statues, art classes, studios for rent, and the top frame shops in your area.

If you are after any specific section you can jump straight to it using the table of contents on the left and we are also including a Bridgeport art map with all of the various places we mention throughout the post pinned on it.

We have written quite a few Northeast art guides which you can look through at that link if interested.

Best Art Galleries & Museums In Bridgeport

The best art galleries and museums in Bridgeport would be:

The Housatonic Museum of Art (HMA) is home to one of the best college art collections in the country and you can check it all out starting at 8:30am on weekdays and 9am on Saturday. The HMA collection allows scholars and the general public to view works from the ancient to the modern periods of art history while Africa, Oceania, and the Americas are represented as are prominent modern artists like Jeff Koons, Cindy Sherman, Jenny Holzer, and Felix Gonzalez-Torres to mention a few. If you want to find out about some new up and coming artists check out their Annual Regional High School Art Show in April.

In a redesigned factory building you will find Nest Arts Factory which houses artist and musician studios as well as an art gallery. Knitting machines were replaced by artist easels and sketching desks as the area became the new Nest which was originally a piano factory and then the home of Aerosol Techniques which was the first hair spray.

The Bridgeport Arts and Cultural Council’s foundation is built on the ability to create, curate, and collaborate by empowering local artists, sparking conversation, developing leadership, promoting cultural expression, providing funds, spreading municipal pride, and acting as a catalyst for innovation.

Dan Makara founded the first City Lights on Fairfield Avenue 35 years ago and the second City Lights which you may know about was started in 2004 by downtown visionary Philip Kuchma as a method to give artists in your area on-the-street exposure while also attracting visitors. They are open on Wednesday through Saturday and on the last two Saturdays of each month they host popular art classes and workshops plus they are part of the annual Bridgeport Art Trail every year before Veteran’s Day.

The Armstrong Gallery at The Knowlton is a privately run art facility that hosts monthly shows, discussions, live performances, and other cultural activities. It can also be rented for private events, product launches, meetings, movies, bridal showers, birthday parties, engagement parties, cocktail parties, outside artists, and fashion displays.

The Schelfhaudt Gallery is open from 10am to 5pm Monday through Friday and starting at noon on Saturday as a spacious modern display space in the Arnold Bernhard Center on the UB main campus. They also host the TDC competition held every Fall and Winter that is definitely worth checking out.

You can expect to find a modern framework for thinking about the artist as a link to a collection of continually shifting identities at Read’s Artspace Gallery where themes of context, meaning, and time are explored through painting, sculpture, digital, collage, video, 3D fabrication, and other media.

The Stamford Museum & Nature Center (SM&NC) is open from 9am to 5pm daily and is committed to preserving and interpreting art, natural and agricultural sciences, and history. You will find more than 20,000 pieces in the collection at the Stamford Museum and you should definitely head over on one of their night out events.

The Center for Contemporary Printmaking (CCP) is a non-profit committed to the art of printmaking including intaglio, lithography, monotype, silkscreen, woodblock printing, paper works, books, and digital arts. Workshops, edition printing with master printers, exhibitions, community activities, and an artist-in-residence program are all available to explore the complete spectrum of printmaking skills.

Sono Fine Art is the result of almost 50 years of curating the best in contemporary art while being housed in historic South Norwalk with bamboo flooring, brick walls, and high ceilings. Just don’t go on Monday or Tuesday because the doors will be closed, they usually open at 10am the rest of the week except for Sunday when you can head over at noon.

Materials & Supplies Near You

These art stores are good places to buy new supplies or materials:

Jerry’s Artarama over in Norwalk offers high-quality art supplies from around the world at a reasonable price.

You probably already know what the Michaels in your area has to offer, and if you just want to buy cheap basic art supplies near you Dollar Tree might have what you need.

Shows & Events

The Bridgeport Art Trail is a citywide open house for local arts venues that takes place every November. The climax is the city-wide open studio and arts celebration weekend that goes down just before Veteran’s Day.

Be sure to look into the Downtown Stamford Art Walk that we will be mentioning in an upcoming section too.

Art Dealers & Appraisers

Art dealers and appraisers near you are places to find new unique pieces or learn the value of something you already own:

Black Rock Galleries specializes in excellent personal property and estate furnishings, antiques, art, home décor, and more from the best mansions and estates on the East Coast and in Texas.

Founded in 2002 and headquartered in Stamford Picture That Art Consulting Firm excels at acquiring framed artwork for venues plus the company also offers art consultation, valuation, collection management, and curatorial services to corporations, healthcare organizations, and academic institutions around the country.

Gordon Fine Arts honors artists David E. Gordon and Sue Brown Gordon whose enormous painted paintings depict colorful flowering poppy fields and tree forms evoking a Tuscan countryside with a gentle but graphic edge. Ink washes, acrylic, pencil, and oil are applied to the board and canvas with cloth, wire brushes, and hands.

Nest Arts Factory, City Lights Gallery, and The Firm Gallery from our main list also sell art in your area.

Walking Tours

If the weather is nice go enjoy some great local art on a walking tour:

Artwalk In Stamford is a beautiful evening where art receptions, live music, dance workshops, art demonstrations, and children’s art activities takes place. This free event will include over 100 artists with the majority of the artwork on display available for purchase.

You can learn about all of the magnificent public art that the Sono Art Walking Tour has to offer as it is guided by art students and professors.

Our next topic will suggest that Seaside Park is another good place to walk around to find creative things.

Sculptures & Statues

There are some really nice sculptures around town like:

  • PT Barnum Statue at Seaside Park
  • Soldiers Monument at Seaside Park
  • Statue of Elias Howe at Seaside Park
  • Captured at 200 First Stamford Pl, Stamford

As you can see Seaside Park is home to the PT Barnum Statue, Soldiers Monument, and the Statue of Elias Howe all of which have been in Bridgeport since the late 1800’s.

The PT Barnum Statue is sat on a chair positioned on a pedestal and facing Long Island Sound.

The Soldiers Monument consists of a massive granite base with various artistic components that narrows into a shaft topped by a bronze allegorical representation of the United States while the sides are adorned with bronze statues of an infantry man and a sailor and Melzar Mosman sculpted the three bronze sculptures.

Elias Howe, Jr. was a local manufacturer and Civil War hero that was honored with the first statue erected in Seaside Park. Salathiel Ellis sculpted the memorial as well as statues of Abraham Lincoln and portrait painter Gilbert Stuart.

Seward Johnson sculpted Captured which is a life-size sculpture depicting a lady reading a book on a bench in 2013.

Bridgeport Art Classes

Framing art supply stores Bridgeport lessons near you studios

Whether you are trying to find private lessons or group classes for kids, teens, or adults some of the best Bridgeport art schools can be found at:

Bridgeport Center of The Arts provides cheap full-time K-6th grade education, free 7th to 12th grade home-school co-ops, tutoring, dance, film, skateboarding, and theater workshops.

Patricia Hart was a musician who saw a need for music education for visually impaired children after gradually losing her own sight that created Neighborhood Studios in 1978 which provides high-quality art, music, theater, and dance instruction to children of all ages regardless of aptitude, background, or financial circumstances.

Through seminars, exhibitions, and activities open to the public the Rowayton Arts Center (RAC) promotes the study, creation, and appreciation of the arts in your area.

Eddie Nino Art School offers small lessons with a limit of six students providing a personal atmosphere in which students of all abilities study both fundamental and advanced ideas of drawing and painting.

The training approach at Pinot’s Palette gives you significant experience as well as the confidence to deal with any circumstance. For open-to-the-public studio events you must be at least 18 years old while children aged 13 and above are welcome if accompanied by an adult and their Little Brushes events are open to children aged 5 and up.

Local art classes are also available at other places we have mentioned like The Housatonic Museum, Stamford Museum, and City Lights Gallery.

Studios For Rent Near You

The Ground Floor Gallery at Reads Artspace at 1042 Broad Street is a private space on the first floor of Read’s Artspace Lofts which is a renovated live/work artist community located downtown.

Nest Arts Factory and the Center For Contemporary Printmaking who we have previously linked you to may also have studio space available.

Framing

When you need to find Bridgeport art framing head to:

Thomas Del Spina Fine Frames provides museum-quality custom framing in your area for any size or shape artwork, print, or collectible.

For a custom frame business and gallery that features a monthly changing selection of unique works in oils, acrylics, watercolors, and sculpture contact Framemakers Picture Framing & Art Gallery.

At Art of Framing they have a huge selection of mouldings, pre-made art, presents, and other items and should be able to deliver and install whatever you get.

For almost 35 years Frame & Save has provided the finest in custom photo framing in Bridgeport.

Other places we have mentioned throughout the post like the City Lights Gallery, Michaels, Jerry’s Artarama, and Artists’ Market also offer framing services near you.

By the way we have also discussed the art scene in:

Have Fun Enjoying The Bridgeport Art Scene

Hopefully we did a fair enough job of covering the full art scene near you. The best local galleries, museums, events, shows, supply stores, dealers, appraisers, walking tours, sculptures, classes, studios, and framers that you may want to check out were covered in full detail.

Those who are still reading this probably love art as much as we do. If so our readers would really appreciate it if you could share your own tips or let us know if you think we got anything wrong in the comments.

We hope you enjoy your time at the best Bridgeport art galleries, museums, supply stores, or doing whatever else you plan to do with the info.

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This post and all of the posts on our site are edited by Dan Soloman who has been a huge fan of art since he was a little kid. His mother was a good local artist, and she taught him the trade from a very early age. He studied art and its history in both high school and college, has worked at multiple galleries, and recently has begun creating and editing online content for this site and some other online media platforms.

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