Wadsworth Atheneum

Wadsworth Atheneum ranks first on the list of the best places to visit in Connecticut. The Wadsworth Atheneum, the country's oldest free public museum, houses over 50,000 works of art in its Gothic-style building. Its collections of American arts, particularly those of the Hudson River School, are particularly impressive. Portraits by John Singleton Copley, paintings by Georgia O'Keeffe and Andrew Wyeth, and sculpture by Alexander Calder are among the more than 5,000 American works of art on display.

The European collections include works by Italian Baroque painters, Surrealists, and Impressionists such as Claude Monet and Pierre-Auguste Renoir. The European Decorative Arts collection contains over 7,000 pieces, ranging from ancient glass and bronzes to Meissen, Vincennes, and Sèvres ceramics. The wealthy Victorian collectors who displayed their treasures in cabinets without labels or curation inspired the Cabinet of Art and Curiosity room. These collections include artworks as well as natural history and other oddities; digital touch screens provide information that would normally be found on labels in a modern museum.

Google rating: 4.7/5.0

Address: 600 Main Street, Hartford, Connecticut

Phone: +1 860-278-2670

Website: thewadsworth.org