Sneak Peek: MOCA GA’s new digs at the Goat Farm

At the Goat Farm campus in West Midtown, an edifice has arisen to a place of prominence on Foster Street. A sleek steel-clad building sits just behind chain-link fences and is still under construction — for now. This is MOCA GA’s new home, a vision that has come to life under the watchful gaze of co-founder and President, CEO and Director Annette Cone-Skelton. 

The contract to purchase the 1.05-acre site was signed by MOCA GA in 2019, and in the years that followed donations poured in, with the project officially breaking ground in December 2024 with contractors H.J. Russell & and Company. We previously shared renderings and plans developed by local firm Mack Scogin Merrill Elam Architects in 2024. Once completed, the two-story building will have a gross square footage of just over 24,000 square feet dedicated to arts programming and exhibition space. This spring, ArtsATL was invited to tour the space, and today we’re sharing a sneak peek of what you can expect at this exciting new facility.

From the outside, the structure strikes an impressive note with its insulated curtain wall glazing and corrugated weathering steel siding, complemented by synthetic stucco at the lantern — a box-like glass structure that rises over the front door. A promenade that partially wraps the building is made of criss-crossing steel that was designed by Perkins&Will to resemble a train trestle, paying homage to the area’s long history with railroads. Visitors will be able to access the top floor from the ADA-compliant sloping promenade’s entrance in the adjacent garden. 

Once inside the front door, a large, airy space welcomes visitors. One’s eye is immediately drawn upward to the interior of the lantern, which was filled with natural light on the day of our visit. Bob and Betty Edge, longtime supporters of MOCA GA, shared that the board decided to name the lantern “Annette’s Lantern” in recognition of Cone-Skelton’s 25-year commitment to the museum. Nearby, a workshop is hidden behind a glass partition that opens like a garage door. This entire front space will be available for events and rentals. An adjacent library will showcase an extensive collection of books, while neatly organized offices will enable the staff to do their work as they oversee the museum.

Off the main entry, one can walk down a hallway to a small cafe area overlooking the gardens. In a middle space, large stepped seating flanked by stairs will enable the room to serve as a theater with a drop-down projector screen. At the base of the stairs, just outside the windows, sits a massive preserved sycamore tree.

On the lower level are five substantial gallery spaces, each of which will be used to showcase works from the permanent collection or exhibitions. The galleries will also showcase works from the Working Artist Project (WAP) awards program, an annual initiative that supports established visual artists of merit from the Metro Atlanta area. 

“That’s another thing about this program: We just let them go. 
They are the curator,” said Cone-Skelton of WAP. “We help them figure out if they want to hang it somewhere or if they want it on the walls. Whatever they want to do, the staff is here to help them. We promote it and give them an opportunity to meet collectors.”

“That kind of programming and support of our own community keeps them here, but it also encourages others to come from elsewhere and keeps building our art culture. And, you know, if we’re ever going to be a really big city like it looks like we’re headed to be, we need to protect and help the artists that are here, please,” said Cone-Skelton.  

In addition to space for exhibitions and events, another aspect of the new facility that will help to better serve MOCA GA is a spacious storage room equipped with state of the art temperature and humidity control, plus racks upon racks for holding the museum’s permanent collection. For an institution like MOCA GA, it is of utmost importance to have a well-organized and thoughtfully-designed storage facility where the works are not only safe but also accessible. 

“We have a huge number of archives of Georgia arts,” said Cone-Skelton. “There’s not anyone else preserving the history of Georgia arts. So we’re really proud of that.”

One of the last stops on our tour was the rooftop, an extensive and transformable open air space that overlooks the sycamore tree, neighboring Goat Farm buildings and beyond to the Atlanta skyline. For Cone-Skelton and her team, it was imperative to construct a building that would be visually interesting, easily transformable, accessible to all and suitable for MOCA GA’s ever-growing collection of Georgia art. 

Though construction is ongoing, Cone-Skelton said she aims to formally open MOCA GA to the public sometime this summer. Check out more photos below to get a sneak peek of what to expect at this beautiful new facility.

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Isadora Pennington is ArtsATL’s senior editor of art + design and dance. An experienced writer and photographer with a deep love for the arts, Isadora founded the Sketchbook newsletter with Rough Draft Atlanta in 2022. She is also president of the Avondale Arts Alliance and director of the Avondale Arts Center.