The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, often referred to as The Guggenheim, is an art museum in New York City. It is the permanent home of a renowned and continuously expanding collection of Impressionist,Post-Impressionist, early Modern and contemporary art and also features special exhibitions throughout the year.
In 1959, the museum moved from rented space to its current building, a landmark work of 20th-century architecture. Designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, the cylindrical building, wider at the top than the bottom, was conceived as a "temple of the spirit". Its unique ramp gallery extends up from ground level in a long, continuous spiral along the outer edges of the building to end just under the ceiling skylight. The museum's collection has grown organically, over eight decades, and is founded upon several important private collections, beginning with Solomon R. Guggenheim's original collection.
The collection is shared with the museum's sister museums in Bilbao, Spain, and elsewhere.