Arizona Sonora Desert Museum

Conservation, education and science programssince its founding in 1952, the arizona-sonora desert museum has put conservation education and science at the core of its mission. From helping to establish protected islands and coastal wetlands in the gulf of california, to breeding and reintroduction programs for endangered species such as the mexican gray wolf, thick-billed parrot, and numerous fish, amphibians, and reptiles, to documenting the biodiversity that helped establish the ironwood forest national monument, the museum's conservation activities have been widely recognized for many decades. Of equal importance are the museum's education programs which touch nearly a half million people each year, including children and families. These programs help to foster love, appreciation and understanding of our desert home.

Art institutethe mission of the asdm art institute is "conservation through art education." we seek to engage people in nature-focused art classes and inspire new conservation advocates. To this end, we offer art classes, art exhibits, and stewardship of the museum's art collection. Art classes: art professionals teach all art classes, and class content emphasizes our living collections and sonoran desert setting. In fiscal year 2025, the art institute served 1,129 students on-site. 25 instructors taught 159 different art and photography classes. Four students graduated from the nature art certificate program and 102 brand new students entered the program. On our website, we offer 10 free videos, viewed by over 1,200 people. We also provide a video class subscription service; it currently has 148 subscribers and 240 videos.total audience served in 2024: 2,477permanent collection:vanishing circles is a permanent art collection comprising 92 original paintings depicting disappearing wildlife, plants, and habitats of the sonoran desert. In addition, the museum has a small permanent collection of 49 art pieces named the sonoran collection. We also have a collection of 73 works by sheridan oman, 108 by manabu saito, and 68 by rhonda spencer. In 2020, we acquired a collection of 23 original scratchboard pieces by priscilla baldwin depicting animals from the museum. This collection is now on permanent display in the baldwin building. In 2024 we purchased a sculpture for the grounds called "more bees please" it serves to call awareness to our pollinator gardenstotal collection pieces in 2024: 432gallery exhibits:we host 8 to 12 unique art exhibits annually in the ironwood gallery and baldwin education gallery. These art exhibits serve the mission of the desert museum by manifesting the beauty of the sonoran habitat and wildlife to our visitors through visual arts. In 2025, we had 48,575 visitors in our ironwood galleries and 4,800 in our baldwin galleries. In total, we produced and opened ten unique art exhibits. These live shows are available virtually on our website, making them accessible to audiences worldwide.thirty-six volunteers staff our galleries. Their job is to facilitate engagement between guests and exhibits; they help visitors deepen their understanding of the intersection between art, science, and conservation.in 2024, we hosted a museum wide glass and steel sculpture exhibition. Several months after the show 2025 ended, the artist permanently loaned us a glass and steel sculpture of monarch butterflies to reside in our butterfly garden. Gallery activity in 2025: 10 exhibits, 53,375 visitors