Folk Nation: Crafting American Identities

Join Dr. Emelie Gevalt, curator and deputy director of the American Folk Art Museum, for a lively discussion of craftsmanship, historical memory, and identity through the lens of folk art.

Americans have long crafted and preserved objects as a way of telling stories about themselves. Especially after the Revolutionary War, and with renewed energy around the time of the 1876 centennial, people turned to all kinds of early American artifacts to construct a national history. Expanding on this legacy, the term “folk art” was popularized in the early twentieth century to champion wide-ranging forms of American creative production from the 1700s onward. Covering a kaleidoscopic array of genres produced outside the academic art world, the idea of folk art developed as a long-enduring symbol of authenticity, ingenuity, and independence—key values perceived to be at the heart of United States culture. But concepts of folk art were often romanticized, idealizing a homogenous citizenry and a nostalgic, incomplete view of both the past and the present.

On the occasion of the 250th anniversary of the founding of the United States, the American Folk Art Museum’s 2026 exhibition program offers an opportunity to look anew at the ways Americans have defined themselves through the making, collecting, and passing down of vernacular objects. This talk provides a critical exploration of a range of folk art objects—from weathervanes and whirligigs to quilts, embroidery, carvings, and painted portraiture—examining how folk art has been used as both a mirror and a tool, reflecting and also giving shape to a multiplicity of American identities across the centuries.

Lecture followed by audience Q&A. Free to Members or with Museum admission.