As a collecting museum, the Meadows Museum of Art at Centenary College is charged with the collection, preservation and interpretation of visual artworks. Our Permanent Collection was founded by the donation of the Indochina Collection of Jean Despujols by Algur H. Meadows. This donation included 360 paintings, watercolors, and drawings by the French Academic artist Jean Despujols, created during his 1936 - 1938 tour of French Indochina.

Since that time, the permanent collection has grown to over 1,600 works reflecting a variety of world cultures and traditions including: the Stein Collection of Inuit Art, the Miller Collection of Haitian Art, and the Carlton Collection of African Art. Art by American Impressionists Mary Cassatt and Alfred Maurer, German Expressionist George Grosz, Mexican artists Emilio Amero and Rufino Tamayo, Louisiana artist Clyde Connell, and Texas Regionalist Don Brown also enhance its collection, as do ninety prints by William Hogarth, and "The Triumphal Arch of Maximilian I" by Albrecht Durer.

The collection is actively used by the Museum's staff and Centenary students to curate new exhibitions and conduct scholarly research.

View selections of the museum’s collection online below; additions are made regularly.