Events

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

Docent Guided Tour
Featured Event

Docent Guided Tour

October 1, 2023
12:00 PM - 1:00 PM

Join us on the 1st FREE Sunday of the month for a docent tour of Alexander Girard’s Multiple Visions: A Common Bond. ASL interpretation is available by request.

To request ASL Interpretation for the tour, email Patricia Sigala by Sept 29 at: patricia.sigala@dca.nm.gov

The 1st Sunday of every Month is FREE for New Mexico Residents 

Additional Dates: 

  • November 5th
  • December 3rd 

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Flea Fall Donation Days for Friends of Folk Art
Friends of Folk Art (FOFA) Featured Event

Flea Fall Donation Days for Friends of Folk Art

October 7, 2023
11:00 AM - 2:00 PM

FOFA is seeking folk art donations of gently used textiles, clothing, ceramics, masks, wood carvings, paintings, sculpture, jewelry, and décor items to be sold at the 2024 Folk Art Flea. If you have folk, tribal, fine art, decorative art, clothing with an ethnic or folk art look, or art books that you are ready to recycle to other art lovers then please join us for our fall donation days.

Each year patrons, collectors and folk art lovers donate a variety of folk art items to be sold at the annual Folk Art Flea, organized by the Friends of Folk Art, to raise funds for the educational and exhibition programs of the Museum of International Folk Art.

Anyone can donate!  If you have friends who are Spring cleaning, downsizing, or holding an estate sale, please let them know about this special opportunity to make a difference at one of Santa Fe’s most celebrated institutions by recycling their art items to the Flea.

Fall Donation Days

Saturday, October 7

Saturday, October 21

All 11 am to 2 pm

Drive to the back of the Museum of International Folk Art parking lot and look for the pods. 

All folk art donations are tax deductible.

If you can’t come by our donation days but still would like to donate then call 505.476.1201 for pick-up or drop-off information.

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MAKE & TAKE @ MOIFA
Family

MAKE & TAKE @ MOIFA

October 8, 2023
10:00 AM - 4:00 PM

Join us for art in the atrium on Sundays with art projects, coloring sheets, and self-guided treasure hunts. Add to your explorations at MOIFA with fun collection-inspired bilingual art kits, facilitated by our fantastic MOIFA docents. Our projects are always changing with changing gallery treasure hunts for the whole family.  

Dates & Themes:

    • October 8 - Make a Tree of Life 
    • October 22 - Make a Tree of Life 
    • November 5 -Weave a Ribbon Basket!
    • November 19 - Weave a Ribbon Basket!

The program time is from 10 am - 4 pm, and the program is free with museum admission. Museum admission is always free for Kids and Members, program is included with admission.

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Cautionary Tales: Climate Crisis & Indigenous Arts Symposium
Lectures and Talks Featured Event

Cautionary Tales: Climate Crisis & Indigenous Arts Symposium

October 14, 2023
9:00 AM - 4:30 PM

    • Cautionary Tales: Climate Crisis & Indigenous Arts is a one-day symposium that brings Indigenous artists and advocates into conversation about the climate crisis, which disproportionately affects Native communities “first and worst.” Coastal erosion, flooding, drought, wildfires, and severe storms threaten the well-being, lands, livelihoods, and arts of Indigenous peoples, with the impact being felt right now.

Featuring Diné ethnobotanist Arnold Clifford, Northern Chumash visual artist Leah Mata Fragua, Iñupiaq parka maker and climate initiatives program director Qataliña Jackie Schaeffer, and filmmaker, climate activist, and policy advocate Jade Begay (Tesuque/Diné/Southern Ute). With a reading by Iñupiaq poet dg nanouk okpik and a spoken word performance by IAIA students of Sheila Rocha’s Performance Poetry course.

Admission to both the symposium and the museum is free, and includes a Pueblo feast-style lunch for participants on a first-come, first-served basis. Time will be scheduled for viewing the annular solar eclipse. The symposium also features a reading by Iñupiaq poet dg nanouk okpik and a performance by IAIA students of Sheila Rocha’s Performance Poetry course.

Full schedule:

      • 9:00am            Blessing, John Garcia (Santa Clara Pueblo)
      • 9:20am            “An exploration of memory, resistance, and creativity amid environmental flux,” Leah Mata Fragua (Yak Tityu Tityu Yak Tiłhini (Northern Chumash))
      • 10:20am          “Look Up!” and solar eclipse viewing, Tony Chavarria (Santa Clara Pueblo), Curator of Ethnology, Museum of Indian Arts & Culture  
      • 11:00am          Ethnobotany and Climate Change, Arnold Clifford (Diné)                            
      • Noon-1:30pm  Pueblo feast lunch, catered by Rena Chavarria (Santa Clara Pueblo)
      • Self-guided exploration of Ghhúunayúkata/To Keep Them Warm: The Alaska Native Parka
      • 1:00pm            Avan Nu Voices, a Performance Poetry Ensemble, Institute of American Indian Arts students and Sheila Rocha (Tarasco)
      • 1:45pm            “Northern Light,” poetry reading by dg nanouk okpik (Iñupiaq)                              
      • 2:00pm            “The Fashion & Climate Intersect,” Qataliña Jackie Schaeffer (Iñupiaq)
      • 3:15pm            Group discussion, facilitated by Jade Begay (Tesuque Pueblo/ Diné/Southern Ute), with Arnold Clifford, Leah Mata Fragua, and Qataliña Jackie Schaeffer

ASL interpretation will be provided throughout the program.

This is a free event. Entry is first come first serve and subject to venue capacity. 

To RSVP please click https://cautionarytalessymposium.eventbrite.com

Cautionary Tales is organized by the Museum of International Folk Art in collaboration with the Museum of Indian Arts & Culture and the School for Advanced Research, and in conjunction with the Museum of International Folk Art’s current exhibition Ghhúunayúkata/To Keep Them Warm: The Alaska Native Parka. Funding for the symposium and the exhibition Ghhúunayúkata is provided by the Terra Foundation for American Art.

How have Indigenous artists’ practices shifted with the ongoing climate crisis? What traditional materials for creative works are increasingly threatened? Does technology play a role in how artists and their communities respond to the changing environment? And in what ways are Indigenous artists awakening the public to the imminent danger of the climate crisis and advocating for change?

Indigenous people are experiencing sometimes severe environmental changes in traditional homelands, the loss of materials for creative practices, threats to traditional skills and foundational knowledge systems, and challenges to subsistence hunting and food sovereignty, among other impacts. Individual presentations by Diné ethnobotanist Arnold Clifford, Northern Chumash visual artist Leah Mata Fragua, and Iñupiaq parka maker and climate initiatives program director Qataliña Jackie Schaeffer will be followed by a group discussion led by filmmaker, climate activist, and policy advocate Jade Begay (Tesuque/Diné/Southern Ute).

This program is organized by the Museum of International Folk Art in collaboration with the Museum of Indian Arts & Culture and the School for Advanced Research, and in conjunction with the Museum of International Folk Art’s current exhibition Ghhúunayúkata/To Keep Them Warm: The Alaska Native Parka.

Funding for this symposium and the exhibition Ghhúunayúkata is provided by the Terra Foundation for American Art. The exhibition is also funded in part by the National Endowment for the Arts, the International Folk Art Foundation, The CIRI Foundation, and the Museum of New Mexico Foundation’s Exhibition Development Fund.

Image: Brian Adams, Kivalina, Alaska: Kivalina Sea Wall, 2007. From the series Disappearing Villages. Courtesy of the artist.

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Flea Fall Donation Days for Friends of Folk Art
Friends of Folk Art (FOFA) Featured Event

Flea Fall Donation Days for Friends of Folk Art

October 21, 2023
11:00 AM - 2:00 PM

FOFA is seeking folk art donations of gently used textiles, clothing, ceramics, masks, wood carvings, paintings, sculpture, jewelry, and décor items to be sold at the 2024 Folk Art Flea. If you have folk, tribal, fine art, decorative art, clothing with an ethnic or folk art look, or art books that you are ready to recycle to other art lovers then please join us for our fall donation days.

Each year patrons, collectors and folk art lovers donate a variety of folk art items to be sold at the annual Folk Art Flea, organized by the Friends of Folk Art, to raise funds for the educational and exhibition programs of the Museum of International Folk Art.

Anyone can donate!  If you have friends who are Spring cleaning, downsizing, or holding an estate sale, please let them know about this special opportunity to make a difference at one of Santa Fe’s most celebrated institutions by recycling their art items to the Flea.

Last Fall Donation Day!

Saturday, October 21

Drive to the back of the Museum of International Folk Art parking lot and look for the pods. 

All folk art donations are tax deductible.

If you can’t come by our donation days but still would like to donate then call 505.476.1201 for pick-up or drop-off information.

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Día de los Muertos Annual Community Celebration
Performance Lectures and Talks Family

Día de los Muertos Annual Community Celebration

October 29, 2023
1:00 PM - 4:00 PM

¡Acompáñanos a celebrar el Día de los Muertos. Decora calaveras de azucar, prueba el pan de muerto tradicional y vea la ofreanda creada por la artista local Stephanie Riggs.

Celebrate Día de los Muertos/Day of the Dead. Decorate sugar skulls/calaveras de azucar, sample traditional Pan de Muerto and view the Ofrenda installation by local artist Stephanie Riggs.

1:00 pm - Disfrute de una plática en la galería con Leigh Thelmadatter, autora de Mexican Cartonería Mexicana: Papel, Engrudo y Fiesta en la exposición La Cartonería Mexicana.

Enjoy a Gallery talk with Leigh Thelmadatter, author of Mexican Cartonería: Paper, Paste and Fiesta in the Cartonería exhibit.

2:00 and 3:00 pm - Vea las actuaciones de danza de Los Niños de Santa Fe

Watch  Los Niños de Santa Fe Dance Performances

2:00 – 4:00 pm  - Firma de libros con Leigh Thelmadatter, autora de Mexican Cartonería: Papel, Engrudo y Fiesta

Book signing with Leigh Thelmadatter, author of Mexican Cartonería/Paper Paste and Fiesta.

Leigh  Thelmadatter lives in Mexico City and works as a freelance writer specializing in Mexican culture. She has a regular column with Mexico Daily News and is the author of  Mexican Cartonería: Paper, Paste and Fiesta (Schiffer 2019). Her mission is to shed light on aspects of Mexican life and culture that do not get the attention they deserve.

Books will be available for purchase in our Museum Shop.

To request ASL interpretation for this event, email Patricia Sigala by October 24, at: patricia.sigala@dca.nm.gov

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Join us for the exhibit opening of Protection: Adaptation and Resistance
Exhibition Opening

Join us for the exhibit opening of Protection: Adaptation and Resistance

December 3, 2023
1:00 PM - 4:00 PM

Protection: Adaptation and Resistance centers Indigenous ways of knowing. Working within intergenerational learning groups and as collaborators in vibrant community networks, Alaska’s Indigenous artists invigorate traditional stories and propose resilient new futures through design, tattoo, regalia, and graphic arts. The projects featured in this exhibition elevate collaboration, allyship, and community as tools of resistance, adaptation, and cultural affirmation. The exhibition explores three themes: Land and Culture Protectors, Activists for Justice and Well-being, and Sovereignty and Resilient Futures.

Our lifeways, material culture, and protocols serve as armor to resist efforts to exterminate us. They are rooted in the power to unite and create space for all people. When we break down the efforts of those who work to silo, segregate, and discriminate, there is space for all people and all living things. — Joel Isaak (Dena’ina)

Protection: Adaptation and Resistance is a project of the Bunnell Street Art Center in Homer, Alaska. Made possible, in part, with support from the National Endowment for the Arts, The CIRI Foundation, Alaska Community Foundation, Rasmuson Foundation, and Alaska Humanities Forum.

Photo Credits - Top left: Dimi Macheras (Ahtna) and Casey Silver, Chickaloonies2019, Seattle, Washington. Digital illustration on aluminum from graphic novel.

Bottom left: Various artists (Lingít), Kaxhatjaa X’óow / Herring Protectors, 2019, Sheet’ká Kwáan (Sitka, Alaska). Wool felt, silk parachute fabric, metallic fabrics, ribbon, mother-of-pearl buttons, akoya shell buttons, abalone shell buttons, dime buttons. Photo by Caitlin Blaisdell

Right: Amber Webb (Yup’ik), detail of Memorial Qaspeq2018-2022, Curyung (Dillingham, Alaska). Ink on cotton muslin.

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Friends of Folk Art Trip To Chiapas, Mexico
Friends of Folk Art (FOFA) Members-only Travel and Tours Featured Event

Friends of Folk Art Trip To Chiapas, Mexico

March 15, 2024 through March 23, 2024
8:00 AM - 5:00 PM

The Friends of Folk Art invite you to join us for a magical trip to Chiapas, the southernmost state in Mexico.

The focus of this trip is to explore the wondrous state of Chiapas, understand its splendid past, honor and appreciate its present, and make a cultural connection from the past to the present.  We are going to use different approaches to understand Chiapas-- from archaeology to folk art, traditional medicine, and popular religiosity.   This trip experience will take you through 3000 years of history.

The trip itinerary includes:  nine days and eight nights.  We will visit four archaeological sites: La Venta, Palenque, Bonampak and Yaxchilan.  Enjoy three indigenous villages: Zinacantan, Tenejapa, San Juan Chamula. Visit museums specializing in textiles, traditional medicine, archaeology, and history.  Stay in the beautiful colonial city of San Cristobal de las Casas for four days.  Share with a local family at the Lacandona jungle.  Tour the Sumidero Canyon by boat and enjoy a private concert with the Nandayapa family.  Enjoy a gastronomical experience with the indigenous chef, Claudia Santiz, exploring the flavors of traditional regional cuisine, which differs from other parts of Mexico.

This trip is for FOFA members ONLY.  FOFA members will receive an invitation by email which will include all of the details and the price. A single membership allows access to one ticket. A dual membership allows for two tickets.

For information on joining FOFA, a membership group of the Museum of New Mexico Foundation, please click here.

For questions, please email friendsoffolkart@gmail.com

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