It has 48,000 square feet (4,500 m2) of space devoted to all periods of art, dating from ancient Egypt to contemporary photography.

In addition to collection galleries, the museum features 6 to 10 special exhibitions each year from national and international museum collections as well as exhibitions of art by contemporary artists, faculty and graduate and undergraduate students .

The building incorporates contemporary Egyptian art decorative elements in an overall post-modernist design.

With over 132,000 visitors annually, the museum supports scholarship through the Fred and Donna Giertz Education Center.

[4] The museum is a unit within the University of Illinois College of Fine and Applied Arts.