Events

There’s always something exciting happening at the Museum of International Folk Art! Join us for our many programs listed below.

Mandela International Magnet School Student Showcase, May 4-16, 2023

Opening Reception: Thursday, May 4th, 5:00p-6:30p

Join Mandela International Magnet School students and the Museum of International Folk Art in celebrating their pottery inspired artwork created during the Museum–School Partnership, Visiting Artist Residency with Taos Pueblo potter, Brandon Adriano Ortiz.

Thank you to the Patricia Arscott La Farge Foundation for Folk Art, the International Folk Art Foundation and the Museum of New Mexico Foundation for their generous support.

+ Read More

FOLK ART FLEA
Friends of Folk Art (FOFA) Shop Event Featured Event

FOLK ART FLEA

May 6, 2023
10:00 AM - 3:00 PM

2023 FOFA Folk Art Flea

Each year, the Friends of Folk Art (FOFA), a volunteer organization that supports the Museum of International Folk Art (MOIFA), hosts the Folk Art Flea to raise funds for the Museum’s education programs and exhibitions.  Gently used art treasures, such as folk, tribal and fine art, decorative art, clothing with an ethnic or folk art look and art books are donated by art lovers like you for resale.   Admission is FREE! 

WHAT: The 2023 FOFA Folk Art Flea

WHEN: Saturday May 6, 10 am – 3 pm

Early bird shopping for FOFA members 9 – 10 am

WHERE:  Santa Fe County Fairgrounds (next to the Genoveva Chavez Community Center) 3229 Rodeo Road, Santa Fe, NM

Plenty of parking!    

Donate your gently loved folk art

FOFA is accepting personal donations of gently used art items for resale at the FOFA Folk Art Flea.  Donations are tax deductible.  Popular items include folk, tribal and fine art, decorative art, clothing with an ethnic or folk art look and art books. YOUR ART DONATIONS MAKE A DIFFERENCE!  Since its inception, the Flea has raised over $750,000 to benefit MOIFA programs and exhibitions. 

To donate folk art: Call (505) 476-1201 to arrange a pick-up of your items or drop off your donations at MOIFA (behind the Museum on Camino Lejo) on the following Saturdays: April 1st, 15th, and 22nd from 11 am to 2 pm. 

Want to volunteer?

Volunteering for the FOFA Folk Art Flea is a fun way to contribute to MOIFA and its educational programs and exhibits.  Please join other folk art lovers for this annual weekend event and other volunteer opportunities by clicking on this link. For more information, you may email Ellen Premack at epremack@gmail.com.

Become a FOFA member

To join or renew your FOFA membership please click here for more information and benefits.

Become a Folk Art Flea Sponsor

To support the Folk Art Flea as a sponsor and enjoy benefits such as priority shopping on Friday, May 5 and more, please click here.

+ Read More

“Where Are We Going? What Are We Doing?”: Elma Pratt's International School of Art, 1928-1967
Lectures and Talks Featured Event

“Where Are We Going? What Are We Doing?”: Elma Pratt's International School of Art, 1928-1967

May 7, 2023
1:00 PM - 4:00 PM

Film Screening: ISA workshop in Hungary  1:00 PM – 2:15 PM        

Public Talk: Nicole R. Cardassilaris, PhD      2:45 PM – 4:00 PM

Educator and humanities scholar, Dr. Nicole R. Cardassilaris will present the vibrant career of Elma Pratt (1888-1977).  Pratt’s life and work as an artist, art educator, explorer, and champion of international folk arts found its fullest expression through her innovative International School of Art and its immersive 20th century folk art excursions throughout Europe and the Americas. The talk will be preceded by a screening of Clara Viola Hoover’s 16mm film of the International School of Art’s Summer 1938 workshop program in Hungary. 

ASL interpretation is provided for the screening introduction and public talk.  The film will be presented with open captions.

During the Progressive Era of American history, American women actively participated in their own society and abroad in ways they believed would make the United States and the world more democratic. Florence D. Bartlett, Clara Hoover, and Elma Pratt are three of these American women whose lives intersected and whose legacies are now evidenced through museum and archival collections. These women were explorers of the social and intellectual life of their era; and through the catalysts of art and culture, travel, and education, they enhanced social change.

Nicole Cardassilaris, educator and humanities scholar, draws relationships between the lives of these three women but will focus on a history of Elma Pratt’s life and work. Elma Pratt (1888-1977) educator, collector, artist, and philanthropist spent much of her life organizing and managing her innovative International School of Art in Europe and the Americas. Pratt acquired a notable 2,500-piece collection of international folk art, which she gave to Miami University in Oxford, Ohio in 1970. Nicole recounts Pratt’s life experiences that shaped her into a devoted art educator and promoter of international folk art in the United States and abroad.

Funded by the International Folk Art Foundation

+ Read More

Axle Contemporary on Museum Hill Plaza
Family

Axle Contemporary on Museum Hill Plaza

May 7, 2023
11:00 AM - 4:00 PM

Come check out Rick Phelps’ Post Fiesta Wares, an installation inside Axle’s mobile artspace. Enjoy FREE museum admission all day for New Mexico residents. Come visit us!

Post Fiesta Wares and programming is presented in conjunction with La Cartonería Mexicana: The Mexican Art of Paper and Paste exhibition, currently on display at the Museum of International Folk Art.

Rick Phelps has a lifelong commitment to making work from materials-at-hand and the cast-off detritus of our out-of-balance society of consumption. He recycles paper, artistic conventions, and his self-proclaimed neuroses in an effort to order and reassemble his world. Phelps’ work is made of recycled papers, from hymnals, encyclopedias, menus, beer cartons, magazines, food labels, security envelope liners or junk mail, ephemera re-pulped and repurposed into dynamic sculptures. His papier-machéand papier-collé sculptures draw on the traditional Mexican arts of Cartoneria and Piñata as well as other paper traditions from across the world, but incorporate an ever-changing array of materials, references, and characters, drawing on Pop, Punk, Folk, Funk, and other vernacular traditions. His work is represented in Santa Fe by Pasqual’s Gallery, in Truchas by Eight MillionGods, and in Madrid by Calliope.-------------------------------

  Post Fiesta Wares and programming is generously funded by Sheila and Kirk Ellis and the Museum of New Mexico Foundation Education Fund  
+ Read More

Ghhúunayúkata / To Keep Them Warm: The Alaska Native Parka
Lectures and Talks Exhibition Opening

Ghhúunayúkata / To Keep Them Warm: The Alaska Native Parka

May 21, 2023
1:00 PM - 4:00 PM

Join us for the exhibit opening!         

1:30 pm – The Women’s Board of the Museum of New Mexico hosts refreshments in the Atrium

2:00 pm – New Directions in Parka Making, Artist Conversation with Ilegvak (Peter Williams), Bobby Lynn Brower, Joel Isaak, and Golga Oscar. Moderated by Melissa Shaginoff.

Ghhúunayúkata / To Keep Them Warm explores the art of the parka, a garment made for survival in the harsh environments where Alaska Native peoples live and thrive.

These unique garments embody the remarkable creativity, craftsmanship, and innovation of their makers, past and present. As complex cultural expressions, parkas are at once innovative and traditional, a garment that harmoniously marries artistry, function, cultural meaning, and Indigenous ingenuity.

At the heart of the exhibition are 20 parkas representing 6 Alaska Native communities: Yup’ik, Iñupiaq, Unangan, Dena’ina, Koyukon, and St. Lawrence Island Yupik. The selection includes parkas from the mid-19th century to contemporary reinterpretations of this iconic garment, illustrating the continuing vitality of this art form.

A rich selection of Indigenous drawings, photographic portraits, and traditional dolls will provide context for how parkas are worn in ceremony, hunting, and daily use. These works underscore Native self-representation and the parka’s importance as a cultural signifier. Sewing tools, themselves beautiful works of craftsmanship in walrus ivory, wood, or animal hide, round out the exhibition content.

Photo credit: St. Lawrence Island Yupik ancestor artist, Ceremonial seal gut parka, early 20th century, Sivuqaq (St. Lawrence Island), Alaska. Seal gut, auklet crests, seal fur, cormorant feathers, cotton thread, red ocher. 43 x 54 in. Museum of International Folk Art, gift of Lloyd E. Cotsen, Neutrogena Corp., A.1995.93.986. Photo by Addison Doty. 

+ Read More