American Folk Art Museum

American Folk Art Museum New York City’s only museum dedicated to folk and self-taught artists. Admission is free! www.folkartmuseum.org

Since 1961, the American Folk Art Museum has been the leading institution shaping the understanding of art by the self-taught through its exhibitions, publications, and educational programs.

Explore the art and legacy of Charlie Willeto in ‘Worlds In-Between: The Art of Charlie Willeto’, online Wednesday, July...
06/17/2026

Explore the art and legacy of Charlie Willeto in ‘Worlds In-Between: The Art of Charlie Willeto’, online Wednesday, July 1, at 1 PM ET.⁠
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Artist Patrick Dean Hubbell (), historian Jennifer Nez Denetdale (), and curator Ninabah Reid Winton for a conversation on the life and legacy of Charlie Willeto.⁠
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A Hatááłii (medicine man) and artist, Willeto created hand-painted wooden sculptures rooted in Diné ceremonial traditions. Through the lens of Diné history, philosophy, and art, this conversation will examine his enduring impact as an artist and healer.⁠
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🗓️ Worlds In-Between: The Art of Charlie Willeto⁠
⏰ Wednesday, July 1, 1–2:30 PM EST⁠
➡️ Free & Virtual, RSVP required. Register here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/worlds-in-between-the-art-of-charlie-willeto-tickets-1986835462352?aff=oddtdtcreator
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This program is organized by Mathilde Walker-Billaud (), AFAM Curator of Programs and Engagement.⁠
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🎨 Charlie Willeto (1897 or 1906–1964, Nageezi, Navajo Nation, New Mexico), Untitled, Near Chaco Canyon, Navajo Nation, New Mexico, 1961–1964. Paint and cotton on cottonwood and pine, 16 x 7 1/2 x 2 3/4 in. American Folk Art Museum, New York, Gift of Audrey B. Heckler⁠
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🎨 Patrick Dean Hubbell, You Guided Our Prayers For Generations, We Will Continue To Persevere, 2025. Oil, Acrylic, Acrylic Dispersion, Enamel, Oil Stick, Oil Pastel, Charcoal, Sharpie, Marker, Pen and Ink, Enamel Spray, Natural Earth Pigment, Synthetic Polymer, Staples, Horse Hair, Leather, Buckskin, Commercial Tanned Deer Hide, Cut Seed Beads, Synthetic Textile, Paper, Sewing, Canvas,105 x 62 in.

Knicks in 5! 🧡🏀💙⁠⁠A few blue and orange favorites from our collection of more than 600 quilts. Explore them anytime at f...
06/13/2026

Knicks in 5! 🧡🏀💙⁠
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A few blue and orange favorites from our collection of more than 600 quilts. Explore them anytime at folkartmuseum.org.⁠
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🪡 Crazy Patch Quilt, Leah Zook Hartzler (active early 20th century), Pennsylvania, United States, 1903, Wool and cotton with cotton embroidery, 88 × 75", Gift of Mr. and Mrs. William B. Wigton, 1984.25.15⁠
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🪡 Calimanco Quilt with Border, Artist unidentified, United States, 1810–1820, Glazed wool, 96 × 91", Gift of Cyril Irwin Nelson in devoted memory of his grandmother Elinor Irwin (Chase) Holden, 1993.6.5⁠
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🪡 Center Star Quilt, Artist unidentified, United States, 1815–1825, Glazed wool, 100 1/2 × 98", Gift of Cyril Irwin Nelson in honor of Robert Bishop, director (1977–1991), American Folk Art Museum, 1986.13.1⁠
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🪡 Variable Stars Crib Quilt, Artist unidentified, United States, 1960, Cotton, 44 1/2 × 30", Gift of Frances Rasmussen in memory of her daughter, Cathyann, 2001.5.1

America’s 250th birthday is almost here. Mark the occasion with a visit to the American Folk Art Museum! 🇺🇸⁠⁠The works f...
06/11/2026

America’s 250th birthday is almost here. Mark the occasion with a visit to the American Folk Art Museum! 🇺🇸⁠
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The works featured in ‘Folk Nation: Crafting Patriotism in the United States’ explore patriotism, politics, protest, and national identity. From a Liberty weathervane symbolizing American independence to a memorial honoring three assassinated U.S. presidents to, these objects reveal how folk makers have engaged with the nation’s history for generations.⁠
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See ‘Folk Nation,’ now on view Wednesday–Sunday, 11:30 AM–6 PM, through September 13. Admission is always free!⁠
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🎨 Possibly Cushing & White (c. 1865–1872), Goddess of Liberty Weathervane, Possibly Waltham, Massachusetts, 1865–1875, Paint on copper and zinc, 18 3/4 x 15 x 2 in., Gift of Jerry and Susan Lauren, 2006.12.2⁠
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🎨 Cenotaph to Three Martyred Presidents, United States, 1925–1940, Wood with photographic images on paper, 38 x 31 3/4 x 1 3/4 in., Gift of the Hirschhorn Foundation, 1997.6.5

Want to learn about an artist's creative process firsthand? 🎨⁠⁠Join us for Dialogue + Studio: Meditative Grids with art...
06/06/2026

Want to learn about an artist's creative process firsthand? 🎨⁠
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Join us for Dialogue + Studio: Meditative Grids with artist Susan Janow, on Thursday, June 25, from 6-8 PM. ✨⁠
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Janow is known for drawing intricate pen-and-ink grids. A member of Creative Growth Art Center since 2003, Janow’s practice is expansive. The artist works with video, ink, ceramic, collage, woodwork, and textile, and she is widely recognized for her short films created in Creative Growth’s Digital Media Lab. Her artwork is in the permanent collections of the Brooklyn Museum, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA), and the Centre Pompidou in Paris, France.⁠
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Participants are invited to join Janow for an interactive drawing workshop inspired by the artist’s process. Attendees will experiment with ink markers, grids, and color to craft rhythmic and textural abstractions.⁠
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🗓️ Dialogue + Studio: Meditative Grids with Susan Janow⁠
⏰ Thursday, June 25, 6–8 PM⁠
➡️ $12 members, students, artists, seniors; $15 general public. Link in bio to register!⁠
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Can't make the workshop? You're still in luck. Janow will be part of a special Closer-Look Tour from 12–1 PM that same day that explores her work in greater depth. The tour is free with registration.⁠
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🗓️ Closer-Look Tour: Meet the Artist Susan Janow⁠
⏰ Thursday, June 25, 12–1 PM⁠
➡️ Free, RSVP required. Link in bio to register!⁠
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🎨 Susan Janow, Untitled, SJ 486, 11/14/24, Sharpie on paper, 11.5 x 18 in, SKU: SJ 486⁠
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🎨 Susan Janow, Untitled, SJ 446, ND, Ink on paper, 11 x 17 in, SKU: SJ 446⁠
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🎨 Susan Janow, Untitled, SJ 477, ND, Ink and colored pencil on paper, 18 x 24 in, SKU: SJ 477⁠
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This program is organized by Mathilde Walker-Billaud, AFAM Curator of Programs and Engagement.

This Pride, we honor artists like St. EOM who fought to be seen—and made space for others to do the same. 🏳️‍🌈 ⁠⁠Between...
06/01/2026

This Pride, we honor artists like St. EOM who fought to be seen—and made space for others to do the same. 🏳️‍🌈 ⁠
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Between growing up in a family of sharecroppers in Marion County, Georgia, and an adulthood spent building a utopian, fantastical religious site called Pasaquan in rural Buena Vista, Georgia, Eddie Owens Martin, later known as St. EOM, lived in New York City. He fled home and hitchhiked to New York at age fourteen, surviving as a fortune teller, drag queen, and s*x worker while exploring the city’s museums and libraries. ⁠
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In the mid-1930s, while feverishly sick, Martin had visions of beings from the future calling him to be reborn as a “Pasaquoyan.” He returned to Georgia and started work on the Pasaquan site in the mid-1950s. In a 1984 conversation with the artist and collector Willem Volkersz, Martin described “the next new religion that’s going to come into the world. . . . Something’s got to give, something’s got to come up into the world besides what we have now. . . . This organized religion is on the way out—as I can see it—because it doesn’t serve the people’s needs. People need to go back to being natural people, being themselves.”⁠
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See St. EOM’s work in ‘Self-Made,’ now on view Wednesday–Sunday, 11:30 AM–6 PM, through September 13. Admission is always free!⁠
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🎨Eddie Owens Martin (St. EOM) (1908, Marion County, Georgia–1986, Buena Vista, Georgia), Untitled, Buena Vista, Georgia, 1935–1957, Watercolor and pen on paper, 17 1/4 x 14 in., American Folk Art Museum, New York, Gift of the Columbus State University Foundation and Kohler Foundation, Inc., made possible by Institute 193, 2018.22.3⁠
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🎨Eddie Owens Martin (St. EOM) (1908, Marion County, Georgia–1986, Buena Vista, Georgia), Untitled, Buena Vista, Georgia, 1935–1957, Watercolor and pen on paper, 19 5/8 x 14 3/4 in., American Folk Art Museum, New York, Gift of the Columbus State University Foundation and Kohler Foundation, Inc., made possible by Institute 193, 2018.22.1

Today is National Hamburger Day! 🍔✨⁠⁠Nicole Appel’s works are “patchwork portraits” in which she depicts objects, motifs...
05/28/2026

Today is National Hamburger Day! 🍔✨⁠
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Nicole Appel’s works are “patchwork portraits” in which she depicts objects, motifs, and sources that pay homage to friends, neighbors, and people in her life. In a unique approach to self-representation, she reimagines the genre by developing an individualized iconographic blueprint from symbolic vocabularies and affiliations with people, places, and communities.⁠
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Appel’s style derives from a childhood practice of birthday-card making, which has grown into a complex form of communication and celebration. Hamburgers, Heels, and Dresses is an homage to Deborah Hillburn—a lifelong friend with a penchant for fashion—whom Appel had just visited in Southern California. Although the In-N-Out Burger logos may capture Hillburn’s fondness for the restaurant chain, they also reflect Appel’s own encounter with this regional staple. As such, her patchwork portraits serve as a personal travelogue and pictorial register that embed her own presence, blurring the line between tribute and self-expression.⁠
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See Appel’s work in ‘Self-Made,’ now on view Wednesday–Sunday, 11:30 AM–6 PM, through September 13. Admission is always free!⁠
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🎨 Nicole Appel (b. 1990, Queens, New York), Hamburgers, Heels, and High Couture, Pure Vision Arts, New York City, 2014, Colored pencil and graphite on paper, 18 x 24 in., American Folk Art Museum, New York, Gift of the artist in honor of Deborah Hillburn, 2026.1.1

As the spring semester comes to a close, we’re looking back on some of our favorite moments from this year’s incredible ...
05/27/2026

As the spring semester comes to a close, we’re looking back on some of our favorite moments from this year’s incredible Museum Career Internship Program (MCIP) cohort. 💫⁠
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MCIP is a partnership that provides paid internships to LaGuardia Community College students interested in pursuing careers in museums and the arts. The program was created to foster diversity and inclusion in the museum field and combines instruction in the field of folk and self-taught art. From a visit to the Museum of Modern Art to exploring the Outsider Art Fair, this year’s interns took part in a wide range of learning opportunities both inside and beyond the Museum.⁠
Last week, our Public Programs intern, Tamara, and Learning & Engagement intern, Jade, led a tour of our current exhibitions for visiting alumni, sharing their insights and experiences from their time at the Museum.⁠
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A huge thank you to all of this year’s MCIP interns. We loved having you at the Museum and can’t wait to see all the amazing things ahead for each of you! ❤️

Adolf Wölfli began to produce his multifaceted oeuvre in 1899, shortly after his hospitalization at the Waldau Clinic in...
05/20/2026

Adolf Wölfli began to produce his multifaceted oeuvre in 1899, shortly after his hospitalization at the Waldau Clinic in Bern, Switzerland. Between 1908 and his death in 1930, he created St. Adolf Giant Creation, an illustrated 25,000-page narrative in five parts, distributed over forty-five volumes and sixteen notebooks, into which 1,620 drawings and 1,640 collages were inserted and folded. Among them were these two works from 1918, belonging to the third part of his magnum opus, “Books with Songs and Dances,” dated between 1917 and 1922. The story is presented as a hymn of praise, dominated by musical compositions—marches, polkas, and mazurkas—and Wölfli’s yearnings for a world from which he was to remain forever excluded.⁠
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See Wölfli’s work in ‘Self-Made,’ now on view Wednesday–Sunday, 11:30 AM–6 PM, through September 13. Admission is always free!⁠
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🎨 Adolf Wölfli (1864–1930, Switzerland), Untitled, Waldau Clinic, Bern, Switzerland, 1918, Graphite and colored pencil on newsprint, 34 x 24 1/2 in., American Folk Art Museum, New York, Gift of Audrey B. Heckler, 2025.14.16

On May 6, we celebrated 65 years of the American Folk Art Museum—and the extraordinary artists, supporters, and visionar...
05/09/2026

On May 6, we celebrated 65 years of the American Folk Art Museum—and the extraordinary artists, supporters, and visionaries who make our mission possible.

We were proud to honor artist vanessa german with our Audrey B. Heckler Visionary Award, along with Broadway icon, self-taught art advocate, and acclaimed quilter Harvey Fierstein; and our outgoing Board President Elizabeth V. Warren for more than four decades of transformative leadership and dedication to the Museum.

Thank you to everyone who joined us for this unforgettable evening and helped support the nation’s museum of folk and self-taught artists. Your generosity sustains free admission for more than 60,000 visitors each year and makes possible dynamic programs that reach audiences across the country and around the world.

Here’s to the next 65 years. ✨

📸 : Lucas Hoeffel, Jane Kratochvil

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2 Lincoln Square, Columbus Avenue At 66th St
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10023

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Thursday 11:30am - 6pm
Friday 11:30am - 6pm
Saturday 11:30am - 6pm
Sunday 11:30am - 6pm

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