Boca Museum of Art
501 Plaza Real, Boca Raton
Museums are the unsung cultural heroes of smaller cities. The lines are shorter, the curation is generally more daring, and thanks to fewer tourists, you can actually see the art up close rather than from deep in a crowd. In that vein, the Boca Museum of Art is an art lover’s gem in Mizner Park that’s very worth driving for. The permanent collection includes sculpture and contemporary, African, and pre-Columbian art as well as a stellar photography collection (don’t miss Dorothea Lange’s iconic images of the Dust Bowl era). March 2020 will see the arrival of a series of self-portraits by prominent American artists and a selection of Edward Steichen murals. For those visiting with children, check out the galleries on Saturday mornings—they offer painting classes for children. And the outdoor sculpture garden is ideal for little legs to run off one too many ice cream cones. Daily docent tours at 2 p.m. are the way to go if you want to fully appreciate the breadth of the museum’s offerings and learn about the intricacies and symbols within each piece.
