"Grandma Moses: A Good Day's Work" - A Comprehensive Exhibition on the Life and Art of Anna Mary Robertson Moses

A new exhibition, "Grandma Moses: A Good Day's Work," is set to open at the Smithsonian American Art Museum in October 2025, commemorating the life and art of Anna Mary Robertson Moses, a pioneering American folk artist. The exhibition will feature 88 artworks, including many of Moses' most celebrated paintings, which will weave together to create a narrative that explores lesser-known aspects of her life, from her years living and working in post-Reconstruction Virginia to her artistic evolution as a labor of artmaking displaced the hours once dedicated to family and farming.

Key Takeaways:

• The exhibition will reposition Anna Mary Robertson "Grandma" Moses as a multidimensional force in American art, showcasing her art as a fusion of creativity, labor, and memories from a century-long life.
• The 88 artworks in the exhibition are drawn from the Smithsonian American Art Museum's collection, including many of Moses' most celebrated paintings, and will explore lesser-known aspects of her life, including her years in post-Reconstruction Virginia.
• The exhibition will be anchored by artworks from the museum's collection, including many of Moses' most celebrated paintings.
• Photographs, ephemeral objects, and Moses' own words will be used to illuminate artworks that were deeply connected to the artist's life.
• The exhibition will be on view at the Smithsonian American Art Museum from October 24, 2025, through July 12, 2026.
• The exhibition will travel following its premiere in Washington, D.C.
• The museum is establishing a destination-collection of 33 works by Moses, balanced across styles, dates, themes, and historical moments.
• A major asset within the museum's internationally recognized collection of work by folk and self-taught artists, the Moses collection will comprise significant works, spanning from her earliest extant painting to her last completed painting.

Statistics:

• The exhibition will feature 88 artworks from the Smithsonian American Art Museum's collection and loans from private collections and public museums and institutions.
• Moses' art career spanned a lifetime of seismic historical shifts, including the post-Reconstruction and civil rights eras and two world wars.
• Moses began painting in earnest in her late 70s and was 80 when gallerist Otto Kallir introduced her to the American public with her first solo exhibition.
• Moses had one solo exhibition in 1940 and in the aftermath of World War II, she was seen as a global ambassador for democratic American values.
• In 1947, Hallmark licensed the rights to reproduce her paintings on greeting cards.
• Moses died at 101 in 1961, after painting more than 1,500 images.

Sources:

• Smithsonian Institution
• Smithsonian American Art Museum
• Leslie Umberger, senior curator of folk and self-taught art
• Randall Griffey, head curator
• Maria R. Eipert, curatorial assistant
• Jane Carpenter-Rock, Acting Margaret and Terry Stent Director of the Smithsonian American Art Museum
• Erika Doss, Eleanor Jones Harvey, Stacy C. Hollander, Jane Kallir, and Katherine Jentleson, contributing authors to the catalog