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Slow Art Day News

• Ashmolean Museum Hosts 10th Slow Art DaySeptember 24, 2026

  On April 11, 2026, the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford University, hosted its tenth annual Slow Art Day, welcoming visitors for a unique experience of slow looking.

  Led by Educator Jude Barrett and Gallery Lecturers Lynne Ward and Anna Steven, the event offered a guided slow looking session followed by a facilitated discussion over afternoon tea. The Ashmolean Museum has been a consistent and enthusiastic participant in Slow Art Day, even hosting online during the COVID pandemic, and their events are consistently fully booked.

  The featured artworks, chosen by co-host Lynne Ward and all located on the same floor for ease of movement, included:

  • “Portrait of Prince Rupert, Colonel William Legge and Colonel John Russell” by William DOBSON (1611-1646), c 1645
  • “Roman Capriccio” by Giovanni Paolo PANINI (1691-1765), 18th century
  • “Still Life” by William VAN AELST, 17th century
  • Fitzwilliam COIN CABINET, 1748-50 – stand made in England c1720-90
  • “Blowing Hot, Blowing Cold” by Matthias STOM (c1589/1600-after 1652), c1640

  View a word doc with images and details of all of the works.

  The event began with a guide introducing each work, after which participants had seven minutes for quiet, independent looking.

  To aid in close observation, guests were encouraged to sketch or write in a notebook, to feel comfortable in the space, and to sit or move around to view the object or work from different perspectives.

  Following this silent looking period, the group engaged in a brief discussion about their observations, what stood out, how the work made them feel, and their interpretations.

  This process was repeated for each of the five selected works.

  At the conclusion of the slow looking session, everyone gathered for afternoon tea (how civilized, how British!), providing a relaxed setting to further discuss their experiences, the artworks, and the power of slow looking.

  A total of 24 people attended the event. Participants said they quite enjoyed the experience would like to participate in slow looking again.

  Like most who slow down, many were surprised by just how enjoyable slow looking can be.

  We at Slow Art Day HQ are grateful to Jude Barrett, Lynne Ward, Anna Steven, and the entire team at the Ashmolean Museum for their continued dedication to Slow Art Day.

  Their commitment to fostering deep engagement with art, evident in their fully booked events and near-universal positive responses, is truly inspiring. We look forward to seeing what they create for Slow Art Day 2027.

  — Ashley, Johanna, Jessica Jane, and Phyl

  P.S. You can learn more about the Ashmolean Museum by visiting their website or Instagram.

• Klimt Color Enigma and AI at Deutsches Museum Bonn in GermanySeptember 22, 2026

  On Slow Art Day 2026, the Deutsches Museum Bonn in Bonn, Germany, welcomed visitors for their second annual Slow Art Day event. Curator Tanja Löschner, alongside hosts Luise Gottfriedsen and Maxim Frick, invited participants to explore “The Klimt Color Enigma,” an experience focused on Gustav Klimt’s Faculty Paintings. The event encouraged guests to view the black and white versions of these destroyed works before experiencing their recolored interpretations (love that!).

  The event began in the AI Cabinet of the Deutsches Museum Bonn, where attendees gathered to look at three of Gustav Klimt’s Faculty Paintings. The originals were destroyed when retreating Nazi SS troops deliberately set fire to Immendorf Castle in Austria on May 8, 1945, an act of needless destruction on the very day the war in Europe ended and their genocidal regime fell.

  Participants were first invited to examine the black and white photos, taken before the war, allowing their imaginations to consider what colors might have originally adorned the Sphinx or the walls in the Jurisprudence building. This slow looking process encouraged a deep, personal connection with the art, prompting reflection on the lost vibrancy of the paintings.

  Following this exercise, the hosts revealed the recolored versions of the paintings, brought to life through artificial intelligence, a computer scientist, and an art historian.

  This allowed visitors to compare their mental images with the AI-generated interpretations. No specific prompts were used, but participants were encouraged to simply look.

  Comfortable seating and yoga mats were provided in the Cabinet, contributing to a slow experience.

  Approximately 30 people attended. We at Slow Art Day HQ are glad to see the smiles and joy this art experience brought modern visitors deprived of looking at the originals.

  

  

  

  We at Slow Art Day HQ are grateful to Tanja Löschner, Luise Gottfriedsen, Maxim Frick, and the Deutsches Museum Bonn for their continued dedication to fostering slow art experiences. And, in this case, we are deeply appreciative of their efforts to bring these important works, destroyed decades ago, back to life for people today.

  We look forward to seeing what wonderful design they come up with for Slow Art Day 2027.

  — Ashley, Johanna, Jessica Jane, and Phyl

  P.S.:

  Learn more about Deutsches Museum Bonn on their website and Instagram.

• Sixth Slow Art Day at Glen Foerd in PennsylvaniaSeptember 20, 2026

  Glen Foerd, a historic estate and public park in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, hosted its sixth annual Slow Art Day on April 11, 2026. Executive Director Ross Mitchell guided participants through a facilitated discussion focused on close observation of art.

  The event began with participants welcomed to the second-floor art gallery, where they sat before three historic paintings displayed on easels. Ross Mitchell introduced the Barnes Method, priming the audience to observe art through specific lenses such as color, light, line, and space. He encouraged attendees to approach art with the painstaking appreciation a surgeon might have for anatomy, considering each interlocking part of a living structure. Following this introduction, he invited the group to spend several silent minutes with the first painting before guiding a discussion. This process was repeated for each artwork, with audience members sharing their findings and connections. This exercise prepared the group to apply the same level of analysis to a contemporary multimedia installation located in a separate part of the mansion. Prompts included vocabulary like “creative distortion,” “local & nonlocal color,” and discussions of illustrative, decorative, and expressive aspects, all designed to deepen appreciation for the artists’ strategies.

  Featured Works:

  • “Threadbare and Tarnished: Tales from a Gilded Age,” 2017, Mixed Media by Talia Eve Greene
  • “Village and Calvary,” c. mid-1930s, Oil on canvas by Luigi Setanni
  • “Head of a Young woman in a Black Feathered Hat,” 1862, Oil on Panel by Thomas Sully
  • “The Madonna Lily,” c. 1925, Oil on canvas by Edith Emerson

  These pieces were chosen for their wide breadth of creative devices and subjects, which allowed for more creative and dynamic comparison during the facilitated discussions. Participants reflected on the peaceful feeling of paying slow, close attention to art, finding it an unintentional respite from screens and the many demands of modern life. One regular volunteer and visitor shared that she gained a new appreciation for paintings she had seen many times before (we hear that a lot from docents, curators, and educators).

  

  

  

  

  

  We at Slow Art Day HQ are grateful to Ross Mitchell and the team at Glen Foerd for their continued dedication to the principles of our movement. Their thoughtful approach provides a unique and enriching experience for participants. We look forward to seeing what they design for Slow Art Day 2027.

  — Ashley, Johanna, Jessica Jane, and Phyl

  P.S. Learn more about Glen Foerd on their website and Instagram.

• The Tragedy of War and the Power of Art at the National Museum of Decorative Arts of UkraineMay 26, 2026

  On April 11, 2026, the National Museum of Decorative Arts of Ukraine in Kyiv, Ukraine, hosted their second Slow Art Day.

  While many of us can enjoy art without the threat of bombs, missiles or drones, that is not true in Ukraine.

  Official casualty figures for the Russian invasion are closely guarded and difficult to verify, but independent analysts and intelligence agencies estimate that combined military and civilian casualties on both sides of the war have surpassed 1.5 to 2 million people.

  That is terrible.

  Along with this unbelievable loss of life, there has also been the loss of culture, infrastructure, buildings, art, and many, many homes.

  With that in mind, the National Museum of Decorative Arts of Ukraine in Kyiv chose to focus on an artist, Kateryna Hryshko, whose work is dedicated to two important Ukrainian folk artists, Maria Prymachenko and Polina Rayko.

  Olha Frasyniuk led this year’s event, along with museum specialist Olena Shevchuk. Together, they encouraged participants to look slowly at Hryshko’s panel, “Wings”, which was dedicated to these two artists whose works were either damaged or destroyed.

  The composition features iconographic images of the Virgin Mary in the center. On the left, Maria Prymachenko is depicted against a night sky with lightning directed towards a house with a stork, symbolizing the Ivankiv Museum destroyed in February 2022. On the right, Polina Rayko’s figure has feet submerged in water with a drowning bird and cat nearby, a symbolic reminder of the Kakhovka tragedy in June 2023, which flooded the artist’s house-museum. At the bottom, a cross “In Memory of the Fallen Heroes” and a line from Lina Kostenko’s poem “Wings” are included. The painting’s field is adorned with recognizable fragments and images characteristic of both artists’ works, framed by a lush carved wooden frame with three cherubs. Kateryna Hryshko donated this deeply meaningful work to the National Museum of Decorative Arts of Ukraine in 2024.

  

  Gryshko honored these two Ukrainian folks artists in her panel “Wings” because of what happened to their art.

  When a Russian shell struck the museum that housed Maria Prymachenko’s art, the museum’s guard, who lived next door, ran into the burning building and managed to rescue some of the Prymachenko works it housed. Many pieces in the collection were lost.

  In a separate attack, the museum-house of Polina Rayko was destroyed forever by the torrential flooding that followed when the Russians blew up the Kakhovka dam in June 2023. And because Rayko’s art was painted directly on the walls, it is gone forever.

  One of the most powerful aspects of any Slow Art Day happens after the slow looking, when the participants get a chance to talk, share and see through each other’s eyes.

  In this event, participants listened with interest to the stories shared by Olha Frasyniuk and Olena Shevchuk about the destruction of the museum-house of Polina Rayko and of the rescue of paintings from the museum that housed Maria Prymachenko’s paintings.

  And then because everyone in the Ukraine has been affected by this war. They then shared their own experiences of loss and destruction including when their homes or offices were bombed and how they too have lost and/or rescued important personal items.

  There’s a real beauty to this Ukrainian Slow Art Day that deserves celebration by all of us around the world.

  

  

  We at Slow Art Day HQ are grateful to the National Museum of Decorative Arts of Ukraine for their thoughtful and poignant Slow Art Day event and for reminding us to hold dear the people and art around us.

  We look forward to seeing what they design for Slow Art Day 2027, and, more importantly, we look forward to the end of this terrible war.

  — Ashley, Johanna, Jessica Jane, and Phyl

  P.S. View them on Instagram, Facebook, and their website.