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<\/div>\n<\/div>\nSee Memphis arts groups marking milestone anniversaries in 2026<\/p>\n
Take a look at some of the Memphis’ arts-and-culture programs and attractions that are marking milestone anniversaries in 2026.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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<\/story-highlights> This is a milestone year for Memphis.<\/p>\n Close to two dozen of the city’s arts and culture organizations and institutions celebrate significant anniversaries in 2026.<\/p>\n Even as it recognizes the past, Memphis is looking ahead. Downtown’s Memphis Art Museum<\/a> \u2014 certainly one of the more remarkable additions to the landscape in city history \u2014 is just one of several major community gathering places set to debut before the end of the year.<\/p>\n “All these anniversaries and openings are providing opportunities for us to weave this all together and mobilize the whole arts sector,” said Elizabeth Rouse, president and chief executive officer of ArtsMemphis<\/a>. “This really isn’t so much about all the singular moments but about a movement.”<\/p>\n Memphians aren’t the only ones taking note. The New York Times in January listed Memphis as No. 19 on a list of “52 Places to Go in 2026<\/a>,” writing that the opening of the Memphis Art Museum, the expansion of the National Civil Rights Museum<\/a> and other trends signified a “cultural turning point” for the city.<\/p>\n DeMarcus Suggs, who since October 2024 has headed a new city office as Mayor Paul Young\u2019s Director of Creative & Cultural Economy, said the celebration of \u201challmark years,\u201d for all the reflection the anniversaries inspire, is an opportunity for action \u2014 to \u201camplify\u201d and \u201cleverage\u201d the missions of local artists and art organizations.\u00a0<\/p>\n He said his office is charged with “looking at the arts-and-culture ecosystem at large.” After all, “none of this happens in a vacuum” \u2014 a new museum or even public community garden, for example, may require new access roads or other types of city infrastructure improvement, in addition to financial or promotional support.<\/p>\n Rouse said ArtsMemphis \u2014 which last year distributed\u00a0$3.5 million in grants to 90 different nonprofits and individual artists \u2014 has provided anniversary-year assistance and other types of grants for a number of organizations, including the Hattiloo Theatre and the Metal Museum. The arts, she said, represent “a core driver for Memphis’ identity and future growth.”<\/p>\n Suggs said his office is seeking to innovate “cultural policy” that can make Memphis “safer, stronger, and more equitable through innovation, collaboration, and a commitment to our creative culture.” In other words: “How do we leverage the arts not only for its economic value but for what it does for Memphians \u2014 for every Memphian?”<\/p>\n Some organizations have a head start in the search for answers to that question. In fact, some have been thinking about it for more than a century.<\/p>\n So here is a list of some of the significant arts-and-culture programs and attractions that have reason to celebrate this year, listed by milestone anniversary, from quasquicentennial (125th anniversary) to bidecennial (20th). It ends with a look into the future: the year’s newcomers.<\/p>\n Overton Park:<\/strong> The land that would be officially designated as Overton Park<\/a> was purchased by the city on Nov. 14, 1901, as a key component of an overall vision for a 20th century Memphis; the beltway of roads known as “the Parkways” were conceived not long after, to improve access. Originally known as “East Park,” Memphis’ answer to New York’s Central Park was renamed Overton Park by the park commission on July 25, 1902, in recognition of one of the city’s founders, Col. John Overton. Some Memphians had suggested “Robert E. Lee Park,” but The Commercial Appeal editorialized against this and advocated for Overton, writing that Memphis park names should have “local significance.”<\/p>\n Memphis Zoo: <\/strong>With close to a million visitors annually, the city’s most popular attraction<\/a> (sorry, Graceland) was established by the Park Commission on April 4, 1906 \u2014 in part to provide a home for Natch, a black bear that had been chained to an enclosure in Overton Park. “Memphis Will Have a ‘Zoo'” crowed a Feb. 19, 1906, headline in The Commercial Appeal, putting the key word in quotation marks in the text of the story as well as in the headline, because “zoo” at the time was regarded as an informal slang shortening of “zoological park.”<\/p>\n Memphis Brooks Museum of Art (Memphis Art Museum):<\/strong> Founded in Overton Park in 1916 (almost as a sort of companion to the zoo), the city’s most prominent visual arts space<\/a> relocates to a new and greatly expanded and reimagined museum on the Downtown riverfront in December.<\/p>\n\n
ANNIVERSARIES<\/h2>\n
125th<\/h2>\n
120th<\/h2>\n
110th<\/h2>\n