The Museum of Modern Art’s Party in the Garden Tuesday night was a celebration of a great museum and the creative, business, and social leaders who support it.

“Really what we have here is a jewel in the crown of the cultural institutions of this city,” Mayor Bloomberg said before 900 bedecked and bejeweled patrons, many of whom are the leading supporters of the multitude of gems in the city, from Lincoln Center to Carnegie Hall to the Metropolitan Museum and dozens more.

This was MoMA’s night, and a successful one at that, raising $2.8 million. “I feel like I have to pinch myself,” Mr. Bloomberg said. “How lucky we are, to have this beautiful architecture and collection. And the museum has a board bar none.”

The applause, however, was reserved for two fabulous women who in their own fashion have made a difference at MoMa: board member Joan Tisch and the actress Sarah Jessica Parker.

“Every once in a while, the stars align and you get to say thank you to two of New York’s greatest citizens,” the museum’s director, Glenn Lowry, said.

The museum’s president, Marie-Josee Kravis, described the honorees. She got to know Ms. Parker from afar, watching her on the television show “Sex and the City” (that is, when her husband, Henry, would give up control of the remote). They met in person on a tour of the museum with a camera crew, for a segment on “The Oprah Winfrey Show” that showed the museum to more than 20 million viewers. Ms. Parker had told Ms. Winfrey that the museum was her favorite place. Now a more formal relationship is blossoming. Ms. Parker has taped an audioguide and is supporting the museum’s education initiatives.

Ms. Tisch is a worker and a giver with a passion for art and for helping people. When she wanted to do something about the AIDS epidemic, she called the Gay Men’s Health Crisis and was recruited to answer the telephone. Later she joined as a member of the board. “She has done so much for the museum, always in an unassuming way,” Ms. Kravis said.

Neither woman seemed comfortable with the spotlight. “To be perfectly candid, I was quite reluctant to share a bill with Joan Tisch,” Ms. Parker said. She talked of her childhood visits to the museum with her mother and how her commitment now is shaped by her own role as a mother.

Ms. Tisch hit on the quality of the museum she is motivated to preserve: It is a place that draws people “from literally all walks of life,” she said. And she spoke of her late husband, Preston Robert Tisch. “He loved everything about MoMA and he would have loved this tribute,” Ms. Tisch said. In the audience were Ms. Tisch’s children, Steve, Jonathan, and Laurie, as well as many members of the extended Tisch family, whose presence Mr. Bloomberg acknowledged at the podium.

“Talk about a family that gives back,” he said.

He had a complaint though for Ms. Parker, related to her television celebrity. “Sarah Jessica Parker has done a lot for the city. My only complaint is that I didn’t even get a chance to audition for Mr. Big,” he said. And that was the second night in a row when he talked of his acting aspirations. Won’t someone get this man a cameo? (How about Steve Tisch, who is producing the film “Pursuit of Happyness,” a rags-to-riches story of a San Francisco stock broker starring Will Smith.)

As for the party, MoMa was a spectacular spot on this rainfree late spring night. The festivities began in the garden and then moved inside with peonies on the tables and Andy Warhol’s “Ten-Foot Flowers” on the wall. Dinner by Glorious Food included white asparagus, chicken Milanese, and rhubarb pie with strawberry ice cream. Afterward, 1,000 new guests arrived for dancing in the garden and a performance by John Legend.

agordon@nysun.com