April 14, 2015
For the sixth year, AAMD is uniting its membership to celebrate Art Museum Day. Held in concert with ICOM’s International Museum Day, this year AAMD’s Art Museum Day will take place on and around Monday, May 18.
In 2014, approximately 180 member museums offered free admission, special programs and events in an international celebration of the importance of museums in our world.
Many AAMD members will offer free or reduced admission, educational programs, and/or discounts on or around May 18. AAMD also encourages museum visitors to use social media to share their Art Museum Day experiences with their museum and with their social networks.
AAMD Member Museums Celebrating Art Museum Day 2015
Following is a list of AAMD member museums participating in Art Museum Day 2015. Note that while ICOM’s International Museum Day is formally held each year on May 18, some institutions shift their celebrations to adjacent dates.
NOTE: Because this year’s Art Museum Day falls on a Monday, many museums are shifting their Art Museum Day celebrations to different days – please read carefully!
*Free Admission including special exhibitions
**Free general admission, not including special exhibitions
†Celebrating Art Museum Day on a date other than May 18
Freer and Sackler Galleries*
The Smithsonian Institution has two museums of Asian art: the Freer Gallery of Art and the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery. The Freer Gallery houses one of the premier collections of Asian art, with objects dating from Neolithic times to the early 20th century, as well as the world’s most important collection of works by James McNeill Whistler. The Sackler Gallery features both permanent and temporary exhibitions of Asian art from ancient times to the present.
On view May 16, 2015 through January 2, 2017: Peacock Room REMIX centers on Filthy Lucre, an immersive interior by painter Darren Waterston. He reinterprets James McNeill Whistler’s famed Peacock Room as a resplendent ruin, an aesthetic space that is literally overburdened by its own excesses—of materials, history, and creativity. Like Filthy Lucre and the original Peacock Room, this exhibition invites viewers to consider the complex relationships among art, money, and the passage of time.
The George Washington University Museum and The Textile Museum*
Monday, May 18:
In celebration of Art Museum Day, the George Washington University Museum and The Textile Museum will open its doors free of charge and host special activities and promotions throughout the day.
Join Senior Curator Sumru Belger Krody at noon for a tour of historical textile masterpieces and contemporary fiber art and fashion on view in Unraveling Identity: Our Textiles, Our Stories. Interact with treasures from the education collection, including fibers, natural dye stuffs, and garments from around the world.
Join as a new museum member on May 18 for a one-day-only membership special, and enjoy a fifteen-percent discount on jewelry, scarves, books, and other items in the gift shop (mention “Art Museum Day”).
National Museum of African Art*
Guided tour of “The Divine Comedy: Heaven, Purgatory, and Hell Revisited by Contemporary African Artists” from 10:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. and from 2 p.m. to 3 p.m.
10% discount from 1 to 3 p.m.
National Museum of Women in the Arts*
Darren Waterston, Filthy Lucre, 2013-2014; Oil, acrylic, and gold leaf on wood, aluminum, fiberglass, and ceramic with audio and lighting components; Courtesy the artist and DC Moore Gallery, New York; Installation view, MASS MoCA, North Adams, MA; Photo: John Tsantes, courtesy Freer|Sackler
https://aamd.org/our-members/from-the-field/art-museum-day-2015
