San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA)
The West Coast's first museum devoted solely to 20th-century art, now stretched across 170,000 square feet after a 2016 expansion that nearly sextupled public space.
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Founded in 1935, SFMOMA broke ground in 1936 by establishing a photography collection when almost no museum treated photographs as art. The 2016 Snøhetta expansion more than doubled gallery space and brought in the Doris and Donald Fisher Collection of contemporary art, pushing the holdings past 33,000 works spanning painting, sculpture, photography, architecture, design, and media arts.
What to look for
- Diego Rivera's The Flower Carrier (1935) — one of 36 works gifted by collector Albert Bender that seeded the permanent collection
- The 1995 Mario Botta–designed building alongside Snøhetta's 2016 addition — two architecturally distinct eras side by side
- The photography galleries, a collection started in 1936 when SFMOMA was among the first museums in the world to recognize photography as a fine art form
In the SoMa district; ranked 14th among U.S. art museums by the Washington Post in 2024.
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) is one of 31 sights worth the detour in San Francisco, all bundled offline in Voyage GO — download the San Francisco pack and it sits on your map with no signal, filling your travel passport the moment you walk past.
More to see in San Francisco
- Golden Gate BridgeOpened May 27, 1937 as simultaneously the world's longest and tallest suspension bridge — you can walk the 4,200-foot main span yourself.
- Alcatraz IslandFor 29 years, cold Bay tidal currents did what bars alone could not — make escape nearly impossible.
- Transamerica PyramidAn 853-foot pyramid that ruled San Francisco's skyline for 45 years — still on the Transamerica logo even though the company quietly moved its HQ to Baltimore.
- Golden Gate ParkSan Francisco turned three miles of bare shifting sand dunes into the country's third-busiest urban park — starting from scratch in 1870.
- Alcatraz Federal PenitentiaryA 9-by-5-foot cell surrounded by cold bay currents — the federal government once staked its reputation on the claim that no one could leave.
- Lombard StreetEight hairpin turns cut into a 27% hillside — the 1922 engineering fix for a grade too steep to drive straight.