The art gallery contains works from all periods, including many by internationally famous artists, as well a collection of modern paintings of Bristol.

The Museum and Art Gallery's origins lie in the foundation, in 1823, of the Bristol Institution for the Advancement of Science and Art, sharing brand-new premises at the bottom of Park Street (about 400 metres (440 yd) downhill from the current site) with the slightly older Bristol Literary and Philosophical Society.

[4] The lease on the former Bishop's College building next door, which had been the Library Society's home since 1855, passed to the local army reserve unit, whose drill hall lay behind it; it became the Victoria (later Salisbury) Club and a restaurant.

Although the new building was extended in 1877, by the 1890s the Museum and Library Association was struggling financially, and even unable to pay its curator, Edward Wilson (1848–1898).

[5] Designed by Frederick Wills in an Edwardian Baroque style work on the new building started in 1901, and opened in February 1905.

It was built in a rectangular open plan in 2 sections each consisting of a large hall with barrel-vaulted glazed roofs, separated by a double staircase.

The 1872–77 Museum building was gutted by fire following a bomb hit on the night of 24–25 November 1940, during the Bristol Blitz, some 17,000 of the natural history specimens being lost.

In February 1947, the remains of the old Museum building (with the exception of the undamaged lecture theatre) were sold to Bristol University: it was then rebuilt as its dining rooms, later becoming Brown's Restaurant.

However, spiraling costs and funding difficulties meant that in 1971 the plans were abandoned and a smaller amount of money was put into upgrading the existing building.

Wholesale refurbishment was required, including rewiring, rearranging offices, creating laboratories and dividing up and furnishing the basement to provide proper storage for the reserve collections.

The Egyptology gallery contains mummies besides other items and a wall decoration made over 3,000 years ago – the Assyrian Reliefs, which were transferred from the Royal West of England Academy.

A natural history gallery contains examples of aquatic habitats in the south west of England and an interactive map of local wildlife sites and a freshwater aquarium containing fish typical of the region.