Originating in 1958 as the Fort Lauderdale Art Center, the museum is now located in an 83,000-square-foot (7,700 m2)[1] modernist building designed by Edward Larrabee Barnes.

[2] The museum, unlike major museums in nearby Miami, Florida and Palm Beach, Florida, emphasizes contemporary (20th century) projects,[3] although the collection includes works from the 19th through to the 21st century.

The 2,000-square-foot (190 m2) exhibit[8] is the largest collection of his work in existence, and includes both his oldest known (Philadelphia Landscape, 1893) and last completed (White Rose and Other Flowers, 1937) paintings.

In December 2005, a traveling exhibit of relics from the tomb of Egyptian Pharaoh Tutankhamun opened at the Museum of Art.

The museum was one of only four venues for this exhibit, touring the United States for the first time in over 25 years.