Paintings by Benjamin West, Raphaelle Peale, Thomas Birch, Gilbert Stuart, Thomas Sully, Peter Rothermel, Jacob Eichholtz, Paul Weber, Hermann Herzog, Worthington Whittredge, Frederic Church, Susan Macdowell Eakins, Childe Hassam, William Merritt Chase, John Singer Sargent, John Henry Twachtman, N. C. Wyeth, Edward Redfield, John Fulton Folinsbee, Fern Coppedge, Paulette van Roekens, Walter Elmer Schofield, George Sotter, Daniel Garber, Robert Henri, William Glackens, George Bellows, John French Sloan, Frank Weston Benson, William Paxton, Colin Campbell Cooper, Guy Carleton Wiggins, Abbott Handerson Thayer, Martha Walter, Elihu Vedder, Joseph Stella, Frederick Judd Waugh, Aldro Hibbard, Alfred Henry Maurer, Arthur B. Davies, and Leon Dabo form the core of the historic American art collection.

These join a group of European paintings by Edgar Degas, Charles Francois Daubigny, Julien Dupre, Albert Lebourg, Marià Fortuny, Martin Rico y Ortega, Fritz Thaulow, Oswald Aachenbach, and Anton Mauve, among others, which are in The Museum's holdings.

Sculptures by Aguste Rodin, Edward McCartan, Harriett Whitney Frishmuth, Cyrus Dallin, James Earl Fraser, Henry Moore, Harry Bertoia, George Segal, Nancy Graves, Frank Stella, and Deborah Butterfield are also part of the permanent collection at RPM.

Photographs by Edweard Muybridge, Edward Steichen, Alfred Stieglitz, Ansel Adams, Berenice Abbott, and Dorthea Lange are represented in the collection.

Hundreds of historic North American Indian artworks from the Lenape, Montagnais, Inuit, Blackfoot, Acoma, Hopi, Sioux, Crow, Cherokee, Cheyenne, Chippewa, Cochiti, and Mandan peoples are housed at The Reading Public Museum.