The Museum's commitment to the art of our own time is demonstrated through our dynamic and growing collection of contemporary art. Beginning with Abstract Expressionist works by Grace Hartigan, Jackson Pollock, and Mark Rothko and continuing through Pop and Minimal art by Chuck Close, Donald Judd, Ellsworth Kelly, Roy Lichtenstein, Richard Serra, and Frank Stella, American art from the 1960s and 1970s is well-represented in the contemporary collection. Another strength of the Museum's contemporary holdings is postwar German art, including signature works by Anselm Kiefer, Sigmar Polke, and Gerhard Richter. The contemporary collection also includes large-scale and site-specific work such as Roxy Paine's 56-foot-tall stainless steel tree-shaped sculpture Placebo, and new media works by artists including Dara Friedman and Hiraki Sawa.

The Museum's Asian collection comprises works from China, Japan, Korea, and South Asia. In 1916, the Museum began to collect ancient Chinese bronzes, which has formed the foundation for one of the most important collections of such work in North America. Since that time, the Chinese holdings have continued to grow through the acquisition of magnificent examples of early Buddhist sculpture, Chinese calligraphy and painting, and a broad range of ceramics and decorative arts, and most recently with the addition of the Robert E. Kresko Collection of later Chinese bronzes. In addition, the Museum has a fine representation of Japanese art that reflects a wealth of themes, styles, and techniques. Highlights include lacquer, calligraphy, screens, and paintings, as well as a collection of objects related to sencha, or infused tea. Other notable works in the Asian collection includes South Asian sculptures and Tantric Buddhist art.

The collection of American art encompasses paintings and sculpture from Colonial portraiture through the modernist and abstract art of the first half of the 20th century. The Museum's American holdings reflect the nation's longstanding appreciation for landscape painting with work by Hudson River School artists such as Jasper Cropsey, Martin Johnson Heade, and Robert Duncanson. The local landscape is well represented in the work of Missouri artists Henry Lewis, Charles Ferdinand Wimar, and George Caleb Bingham. The Election Series, illustrating three stages of the Missouri electoral process, is among the highlights of the Museum's paintings by Bingham.

The collection of American art encompasses paintings and sculpture from Colonial portraiture through the modernist and abstract art of the first half of the 20th century. The Museum's American holdings reflect the nation's longstanding appreciation for landscape painting with work by Hudson River School artists such as Jasper Cropsey, Martin Johnson Heade, and Robert Duncanson. The local landscape is well represented in the work of Missouri artists Henry Lewis, Charles Ferdinand Wimar, and George Caleb Bingham. The Election Series, illustrating three stages of the Missouri electoral process, is among the highlights of the Museum's paintings by Bingham.