Visible art storage in Glenbow's new home, the JR Shaw Centre for Arts & Culture.

Collections at Glenbow

A resource for our community

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Glenbow’s diverse and expansive collections set it apart from other museums and public art galleries in Canada. With more than 250,000 artworks, objects, and belongings, the museum has the largest public art collection in Western Canada, along with extensive historical collections emphasizing settler and immigrant history, decorative arts, and military history. Additionally, Glenbow stewards a range of belongings representing diverse Indigenous and world cultures.

In Glenbow’s reimagined home, the JR Shaw Centre for Arts & Culture, more of these collections will be on display more often, offering new opportunities for meaningful encounters with art, culture, and history.

Art Collection

Art from Our Region & Beyond

With over 30,000 artworks, Glenbow has the largest public art collection in Western Canada — two thirds of which is by artists in Canada. These artists come from diverse backgrounds, and Glenbow continues to support the work of artists of our region through commissions and exhibitions. Since 2013, we’ve exhibited hundreds of works by artists in Canada and acquired more than 2,000 for the collection.

The art collection encompasses historical and contemporary art and features works in all media including painting, sculpture, photography, prints, and drawings. Highlights include an archive of Indigenous and Inuit art, nineteenth-century works depicting settlement and exploration, and extensive contemporary works.

The JR Shaw Institute for Art in Canada

The JR Shaw Institute for Art in Canada is dedicated to celebrating art in Canada by engaging communities in creative exhibitions and programs, advancing artistic practices, fostering research and inquiry, and providing opportunities for diverse voices.

Created thanks to a $10 million endowment from Shaw Family Foundation, the Institute is devoted to supporting art and artists in Canada. It will feature annual exhibitions, an artist-in-residence program, a research fellowship, opportunities for further study through an internship program, programs for children, and artist-in-conversation events. Through its programs, the Institute will represent stories of art and artists and engage with ideas and artistic expressions that shape Canada today.

History Collection

Settler & Immigrant History

Discovering cultural diversity leads to better understanding of ourselves and others. That’s why we steward belongings and continue to collect art and objects that tell the stories of the diverse settlers and immigrants who make Canada their home.

Decorative Arts & History

Glenbow’s history collection includes an extensive array of decorative arts including furniture, silverware, glass, and ceramics. It also includes fashion, textiles, and collections reflecting how people have lived, worked, played, and worshiped in Calgary and southern Alberta.

Military History

Glenbow’s military history collection focuses primarily on Canadian military history, with an emphasis on southern Alberta. Through objects such as uniforms and equipment, all major conflicts in which Canada has been involved are represented, including the North-West Rebellion, the South African War, the First World War, the Second World War, and the Korean War.

Glenbow’s collection of European and Japanese arms and armour documents historical conflicts and exemplifies the art of the armourer, swordsmith, and gunmaker. The museum’s Japanese armour collection is one of the largest in Canada.

Indigenous & World Cultures Collection

Glenbow stewards art, objects, and belongings that represent diverse Indigenous and world cultures. We recognize these collections are living and require thoughtful stewardship — this includes working closely with the communities they represent to ensure they are appropriately honoured and cared for.

Indigenous Belongings

Glenbow stewards belongings that represent diverse Indigenous cultures and traditions whose ancestral territories exist in what is now called North America.

Our collection includes cultural materials from Indigenous Peoples of the Northwestern Plains, especially Niitsitapi/Blackfoot, Nêhiyawak/Cree, Tsuut’ina, and Anishinaabe, as well as the Îyârhe Nakoda.

The history and culture of the Métis people of Western Canada is also included in our collection, as are diverse Inuit communities across the Arctic. Glenbow also cares for collections from the Northwest Coast, including the Kwakwaka’wakw, Haida, Nuu-chah-nulth, and others, representing their daily life and ceremony.

Belongings representing the Dene of the Subarctic, the six nations of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, and the Mi’kmaq of the Atlantic Coast further illustrate the cultural diversity of Indigenous Peoples of this land.

World Cultures

Glenbow’s world cultures collection includes art, objects, and belongings from West Africa, South and Central America, Oceania, and Asia. By deepening our knowledge and appreciation of these cultures, we enrich our connections with one another.

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