A Message from the Interim Director

2020-people-aaa-staff-extra-large.jpg

Though our offices are closed, we're always here for you online. Our staff is available to respond to your questions at aaaemref@si.edu More than ever, during this uncertain time, we hope our collections serve as a source of endless discovery and inspiration.

It is easy for you to investigate from home the lives of American artists, dealers, collectors, critics, and other art world figures through their personal letters, diaries, sketchbooks, scrapbooks, photo albums, and in-depth interviews. We invite you to join us online to learn more about how art has shaped our nation’s history ​and the diversity of the American experience.

Continue Reading

What are you looking for in the Archives?

Featured Exhibition

Pushing the Envelope: Mail Art from the Archives of American Art

Mail art (alternatively called “correspondence art” or “postal art”) emerged as a form of artistic practice in which an international network of participants use the mail to make art and share it with others regarding culture and communications, creatively sidestepping the art market and, in many instances, eluding government censors.

Collections on View

  • Organized by Curator of Manuscripts Mary Savig, the exhibition revisits a 1977 exhibition at Los Angeles’ Woman’s Building, a feminist art school, gallery, and community space founded by Judy Chicago, Sheila Levrant de Bretteville, and Arlene Raven in 1971. The Archives, which holds the Woman’s Building papers in its collections, will reconsider this exhibition by showing responses from the 1977 show alongside new submissions by both original participating artists as well as a new generation of diverse artists. Approximately 75 works will be on view.
    What is Feminist Art? is now on view at the Lawrence A. Fleischman Gallery in Washington, D.C.

News

A Message from the Interim Director

Mar. 20, 2020

Though our offices are closed, we're always here for you online. Our staff is available to respond to your questions at aaaemref@si.edu. More than ever, during this uncertain time, we hope our collections serve as a source of endless discovery and inspiration.

Call for Submissions: Announcing the Felix Gonzalez-Torres Correspondence Archive at the Archives of American Art

Jan. 17, 2020

The Archives of American Art is pleased to announce that we will serve as the leading repository for the Felix Gonzalez-Torres Correspondence Archive. The artist’s correspondence—original letters, postcards, snapshots with notes, and other personal communications, sent to his friends, colleagues, and family—share a rich relationship with his work and providing access to this material will benefit future scholarship. The Felix Gonzalez-Torres Foundation has been conducting research and outreach on behalf of the Archives of American Art since 2018. Their visionary efforts will ensure that these primary sources will be preserved and made available for generations to come.

On the Blog

Terra Foundation Center for Digital Collections

A virtual repository of a substantial cross-section of the Archives' most significant collections.

Visit the Terra Foundation Center for Digital Collections

Visit a Research Center

Original material can be consulted by appointment in our Washington, D.C. Headquarters.

Select holdings are available on microfilm at the Archives' offices in Washington, D.C. and at our New York Office.

Copies of unrestricted microfilm materials can be obtained through one of our affiliated research centers.

Get Involved

Internship, fellowship, and volunteer opportunities provide students and lifelong learners with the ability to contribute to the study and preservation of visual arts records in America.