Where is the Mesa Contemporary Arts Museum?

The Mesa Contemporary Arts is a modern art museum with a great big secret...

Here’s what you see when you drive by the Mesa Art Center. The big building is the theaters and the glass building is the studios mostly.

Mesa Arts Center

Most of the art museum is hidden. About all you can see from the curb is a small glass building next to a blue wall. So where is the art museum?

Are you curious yet?

If you walk next to the museum grounds you will be drawn to look down and check out the large subterranean foyer. The focal point is a cool waterfall made up of square stones artfully stacked on a massive scale. The sound of the trickling water is fascinating and seems to cool you down in the summer.

Waterfall

Your curiosity will build just to find out what’s going on below. At first glance it’s hard to figure out where the art galleries are and that is the fun part—when you finally explore the long stairs into the lower level to look at the galleries. You can also take the elevator.

When you get down below to the museum level here’s what the waterfall looks like.

There are 5 galleries or large rooms that have an assortment of visual arts. Galleries get new art all the time so there is always something new to see. About every 3 months or so you can see brand new art displays.

Some of the art is familiar and some it is really far out there. This is a modern art museum after all. It's a lot of fun to see what artists are doing now!

And some of the art is owned by the famous.

We saw some works on paper that are part of a personal collection of Cheech Marin. Yes, you guessed it, he’s mostly known as the Cheech of Cheech and Chong movies.

How do you find out what is new at the Mesa Contemporary Arts? Just check their website for the current exhibitions: click here for current art. Admission at the time of this writing is $3.50 with free Thursdays. Telephone is 480-644-6500. Located in the Mesa Arts Center at 1 East Main Street.

So the secret? You have to GO to see it! Otherwise you will drive/walk by and not even notice the art museum.