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Slow Art Day across the U.S. East Coast

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Slow Art Day 2024 is coming up this Saturday, April 13 and yet again there are an amazing variety of museums, galleries, churches, cities, sculpture parks joining us from around the world (see the full list) – including across the East Coast of the United States.

To name just a few across the East Coast…

The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Met Cloisters will be hosting again in New York City.

Mass MoCA will be hosting again in North Adams, MA while the Worcester Art Museum will yet again produce a Slow Art Day in that city. The beautiful and wonderful Athenaeum will be hosting in Boston. Connecticut and New Jersey supports several locations including the Grounds for Sculpture.

Philadelphia has a nascent citywide including The Barnes Foundation, Glenn Foerd, and the Magic Gardens.

In Washington D.C., the National Museum of Women in the Arts is hosting yet again (they are one the founding museums for Slow Art Day). Virginia and North Carolina have multiple locations across those states while Florida hosts *7* different venues including the Frost Art Museum and the Lowe Art Museum both in Miami.

Here are a few locations –

Mass MoCA

This year, Mass MoCA has created two ways to experience Slow Art Day:

  1. Slow Looking Tours
  2. A paired audiowalk they are calling “Where I End & You Begin,” which requires advance reservations.

The museum has had a close relationship with artist James Turrell and with the now-deceased Professor Arden Reed who wrote a terrific book, “Slow Art : The Experience of Looking, Sacred Images to James Turrell”, which talks about Slow Art Day (and for which I gave a blurb on the back cover).

James Turrell, “Once Around, Violet (Shallow Space),” 1971.

Barnes Foundation

The Barnes always produces a thoughtful and interesting Slow Art Day (and we are in conversations with them about a conference – stay tuned for more details).

This year, when participants arrive, they will receive a list of five paintings for self-guided slow looking. They will be encouraged to spend an hour or so looking, and then will be invited to a discussion in the Herbert and Joyce Kean Family Classroom. That discussion will be led by Barnes senior instructor Michael Williamson.

Pierre-Auguste Renoir. Before the Bath (detail), c. 1875. BF9. Public Domain.

National Museum of Women in the Arts

We love the National Museum of Women in the Arts – they are founders of the Slow Art Day movement and they have led the global re-awakening to the centuries-old role of women artists.

Their event this year is sold out. So, if you live in Washington, DC then plan ahead for their Slow Art Day 2025.

Deborah Butterfield, Big Horn, 2006; Cast bronze, 92 x 114 x 41 in.; National Museum of Women in the Arts, Gift of Jacqueline Badger Mars in honor of Wilhelmina Cole Holladay; © Deborah Butterfield; Image courtesy of L.A. Louver

Boston Athenaeum

The Boston Athenaeum, which combines a library, with a museum and cultural center, is hosting Slow Art Day in their landmark building.

They will be focusing on a single painting by Boston artist Allan Rohan Crite.

Worcester Art Museum

Our friends at Juniper Rag are co-sponsoring a Slow Art Day at the Worcester Art Museum. The WAM will be focusing their slow looking event on the new Terrain Exhibition, which features 21st-Century landscape photographers and how these contemporary artists use different photographic processes to explore the idea of landscape.

Frost Art Museum

For their *13th* Slow Art Day (Frost is one of the founding museums of this slow looking movement), Frost will feature performances by Miami-based artists Smita Sen (pictured on the right – below), who explores the relationship between the body and memory through sculpture and technology, and Agua Dulce (left – below), a Miami-based artist who uses organic materials to blur the line between the mystical and mundane.

These are just a few of the hundreds of places hosting events around the world this year.

And, of course, you can run your own personal Slow Art Day anywhere anytime. 

We hope you have a wonderful Slow Art Day 2024.

– Phyl 

P.S. If you have not yet registered your Slow Art Day with us, then go to this page.

P.P.S. Our 2023 Annual Report is out. Read it and get inspired!

Philadephia’s Citywide Slow Art Day 2023

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Slow Art Day is but *2* days away and more than 185 museums have registered their events, including five in Philadelphia, making that city part of a growing number of cities hosting 5, 10 or more events.

[Remember to register your Slow Art Day with us so we can write-up a report about your work and feature you in our next Annual Report, which has become the Bible of the slow looking movement.]

Philadelphia Inquirer journalist Michelle Myers wrote a wonderful article about the citywide Slow Art Day – Everything You Need to Know About Slow Art Day in Philadelphia.

For the educators and curators reading our blog, here’s a quick summary of the design of the five events.

1. The Barnes Foundation
With a lot of support from Bill Perthes, the foundation’s Bernard C. Watson director of adult education, The Barnes Foundation has participated in Slow Art Day since 2017. This year visitors will have an hour to observe four works of art, including pieces by Paul Cézanne, Henri Matisse, Honoré Daumier, and Pablo Picasso. Participants will then gather for a 30-minute conversation with Michael Williamson, a member of the Barnes faculty and former Germantown Friends School art history teacher.

2. Corridor Contemporary
Corridor Contemporary will showcase their exhibition, “Printed Perspectives,” which features printmaking techniques such as silk screening and lithography. Visitors can visit the gallery for free between 6 and 9 pm and observe each piece.

3. Glen Foerd
Glen Foerd, primarily known as a historic site and arboretum, will provide participants with a chance to observe four works of art: a portrait by Sir Peter Lely, Poppies in Vase by Hobson Pittman, The Virgin and Child with the Infant St. John the Baptist by Girolamo da Santacroce, and An Archive of Desire by Jennifer Johnson. Participants will then gather for a conversation with executive director Ross Mitchell, discussing aesthetics and themes of each artwork.

4. Philadelphia Magic Gardens
This year, the Magic Gardens will observe four pre-selected, untitled terracotta sculptures by the Garcia family of Oaxaca. The gardens anticipate 15 to 20 participants, and the conversation will be guided by educator Samantha Eusebio, focusing on folk art and the importance of passing down family traditions.

5. Philadelphia Museum of Art
The museum’s Slow Art Day event is a guided walk around the Anne d’Harnoncourt Sculpture Garden, led by mindfulness instructor Grady Bates. Visitors will observe Bronze Bowl with Lace by Ursula von Rydingsvard and other works of art.

Wherever you are in the world – Philadephia, Prague (Czech Republic), Pamplona (Spain), Pecs (Hungary), Parkes (Australia), or Provo, UT (U.S.), we hope you have a GOOD and Slow Art Day 2023. 

Best,

Phyl and the volunteer Slow Art Day team

P.S. If you need the Slow Art Day logo for use in your print or digital efforts, or any of the tools and tips from our Annual Reports, then go to the host tools section of our Slow Art Day website.

Philadelphia Museums’ Plea to Visitors: Slow Down!

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The Philadelphia Enquirer / The Barnes Foundation

“Come to a gallery, sit with it for a while, absorb the works there. It’s like listening to a great piece of music. Looking at a really good work of art over and over again, you begin to see it differently.”

Excellent advice from William Perthes, senior instructor at The Barnes Foundation, in the Philadelphia Inquirer‘s great article on Slow Art Day at Philadelphia museums. In addition to the Barnes, The Fabric Workshop and Museum and Philadelphia’s Magic Gardens are also hosting events this Saturday!

Read the full article here.