The Stirling Smith Art Gallery and Museum, formerly known as The Smith Institute, was founded in 1874 and immediately played a very special role in Stirling's history. It was born as a contemporary art gallery, with a museum and a reading room in the library to be able to use it. Ancoa today is a gallery, museum and cultural center for the Stirling area. It is the repository of Stirlingshire's historic artifacts and paintings, while providing exhibition opportunities for contemporary artists. The Stirling Smith Art Gallery and Museum's collection has more than 40,000 objects including artwork and photographs about Stirling and its role in the country's history. From the beginning, the goal was to acquire the portraits of all the illustrious personalities associated with the city of Stirling from the Reformation onwards. The portrait collection is not complete but overall its 275 portraits make up a significant part of the collection of paintings and sculptures. Inside the museum there is also a series of paintings by Thomas Stuart Smith, founder of the gallery, he woven portraitist. Today his paintings are highly regarded and famous all over the world. In particular, the history of Scottish and English watercolor painting is well represented in the Smith collections. The Old Watercolourists Society (OWS) main lights represented include Charles Branwhite, David Cox, James Duffield Harding, and William Henry Hunt. There are also oil paintings on canvas, prints and drawings.