Smithsonian Folklife Festival
Celebrate the National Museum of the American Indian with Indigenous voices of the Americas.
What’s On
Featured events and exhibitions
Featured Exhibitions
With over two hundred exhibitions to choose from, we've highlighted select exhibitions from around the Smithsonian—or check out all of our exhibitions.
What's New
-
Benin Bronzes
June 3, 2024 – Indefinitely African Art Museum
-
Unbound: Narrative Art of the Plains
June 1, 2024 – January 20, 2026 American Indian Museum
-
Picturing the Presidents: Daguerreotypes and Ambrotypes from the National Portrait Gallery’s Collection
May 31, 2024 – June 8, 2025 Portrait Gallery
-
Reclaiming My Time
May 31, 2024 – Ongoing African American History and Culture Museum
-
Subversive, Skilled, Sublime: Fiber Art by Women
May 31, 2024 – January 5, 2025 Renwick Gallery
-
Do Ho Suh: Public Figures
April 27, 2024 – April 29, 2029 Freer Gallery of Art
-
Brilliant Exiles: American Women in Paris, 1900–1939
April 26, 2024 – February 23, 2025 Portrait Gallery
-
Zen And the Open Road
April 15, 2024 – Ongoing American History Museum
-
Reckoning with Remembrance: History, Injustice, and the Murder of Emmett Till
April 6, 2024 – September 15, 2024 American History Museum
-
Pattern and Paradox: The Quilts of Amish Women
March 28, 2024 – August 26, 2024 American Art Museum
-
Staging the Supernatural: Ghosts and the Theater in Japanese Prints
March 23, 2024 – October 6, 2024 Sackler Gallery
-
Bold and Beautiful Vision: A Century of Black Arts Education in Washington, DC, 1900–2000
March 23, 2024 – March 2, 2025 Anacostia Community Museum
-
Revolutions: Art from the Hirshhorn Collection, 1860–1960
March 22, 2024 – April 20, 2025 Hirshhorn
-
Artists at Work
March 20, 2024 – March 21, 2025 S. Dillon Ripley Center
Opening Soon
-
Bruce Onobrakpeya: The Mask and the Cross
June 21, 2024 – January 21, 2025 African Art Museum
-
Forensic Science on Trial
June 28, 2024 – June 2025 American History Museum
-
This Morning, This Evening, So Soon: James Baldwin and the Voices of Queer Resistance
July 12, 2024 – April 20, 2025 Portrait Gallery
-
Ruffled Feathers: Creating Whistler’s Peacock Room
July 13, 2024 – January 31, 2027 Freer Gallery of Art
-
Shifting Boundaries: Perspectives on American Landscapes
July 13, 2024 – July 26, 2026 Freer Gallery of Art
-
Stanley: Toward a New Kind of War
July 2024 – Fall/Winter 2026 American History Museum
-
Voting by Mail: Civil War to Covid-19
August 24, 2024 – February 23, 2025 Postal Museum
-
Sublime Light: Tapestry Art of DY Begay
September 20, 2024 – Summer 2025 American Indian Museum
-
OSGEMEOS: Endless Story
September 29, 2024 – July 6, 2025 Hirshhorn
-
Felix Gonzalez-Torres: Always to Return
October 18, 2024 – July 6, 2025 Portrait Gallery
Closing Soon
-
Carrie Mae Weems: Looking Forward, Looking Back
September 22, 2023 – July 7, 2024 American Art Museum
-
Music HerStory: Women and Music of Social Change
June 22, 2022 – July 21, 2024 American History Museum
-
Composing Color: Paintings by Alma Thomas
September 15, 2023 – August 4, 2024 American Art Museum
-
An Atlas of Es Devlin
November 18, 2023 – August 11, 2024 Cooper Hewitt
-
Afrofuturism: A History of Black Futures
March 24, 2023 – August 18, 2024 African American History and Culture Museum
-
Pattern and Paradox: The Quilts of Amish Women
March 28, 2024 – August 26, 2024 American Art Museum
-
Forces of Nature: Voices that Shaped Environmentalism
October 20, 2023 – September 2, 2024 Portrait Gallery
-
Acquired! Shaping the National Design Collection
March 16, 2024 – September 2, 2024 Cooper Hewitt
-
Give Me a Sign: The Language of Symbols
May 13, 2023 – September 2, 2024 Cooper Hewitt
-
Nature of the Book
November 11, 2022 – September 3, 2024 Natural History Museum
-
Fighters for Freedom: William H. Johnson Picturing Justice
March 8, 2024 – September 8, 2024 American Art Museum
-
Reckoning with Remembrance: History, Injustice, and the Murder of Emmett Till
April 6, 2024 – September 15, 2024 American History Museum
Don't Miss
-
Cellphone: Unseen Connections
June 23, 2023 Through 2026 Natural History Museum
-
From the Deep: In the Wake of Drexciya with Ayana V. Jackson
April 29, 2023 – January 6, 2025 African Art Museum
-
Contemporary Craft at the Renwick Gallery
April 19, 2023 – Ongoing Renwick Gallery
-
One World Connected
October 14, 2022 – Permanent Air and Space Museum
-
The Peacock Room Comes to America
September 3, 2022 – Indefinitely Freer Gallery of Art
-
Baseball: America's Homerun
April 9, 2022 – January 5, 2025 Postal Museum
-
The Tibetan Buddhist Shrine Room
March 5, 2022 – Indefinitely Sackler Gallery
-
Laurie Anderson: Four Talks
September 24, 2021 – Ongoing Hirshhorn
-
Americans
January 18, 2018 – Indefinitely American Indian Museum
-
Mark Bradford: Pickett's Charge
November 8, 2017 – Ongoing Hirshhorn
-
America's Presidents
September 22, 2017 – Permanent Portrait Gallery
-
American Democracy: A Great Leap of Faith
June 28, 2017 – Permanent American History Museum
-
Slavery and Freedom
September 24, 2016 – Permanent African American History and Culture Museum
-
Musical Crossroads
September 24, 2016 – Permanent African American History and Culture Museum
-
Nation to Nation: Treaties between the United States and American Indian Nations
September 21, 2014 – January 25, 2025 American Indian Museum
-
The Star-Spangled Banner: The Flag that Inspired the National Anthem
November 21, 2008 – Permanent American History Museum
-
Cold War Aviation
December 15, 2003 – Permanent Air and Space Museum Udvar-Hazy Center
Kids' Favorites
-
Really BIG Money
April 8, 2022 – Indefinitely American History Museum
-
The David H. Koch Hall of Fossils—Deep Time
June 8, 2019 – Permanent Natural History Museum
-
Explore! with the National Portrait Gallery
January 28, 2017 – Indefinitely Portrait Gallery
-
Sports: Leveling the Playing Field
September 24, 2016 – Indefinitely African American History and Culture Museum
-
Wegmans Wonderplace
December 9, 2015 – Indefinitely American History Museum
-
African Elephant
September 4, 2015 – Permanent Natural History Museum
-
Patrick F. Taylor Foundation Object Project
July 1, 2015 – Permanent American History Museum
-
Spark!Lab
July 1, 2015 – Indefinitely American History Museum
-
American Trail
September 1, 2012 – Permanent National Zoo
-
As We Grow: Traditions, Toys, Games
August 22, 2012 – Permanent American Indian Museum
-
Eternal Life in Ancient Egypt
November 17, 2011 – Permanent Natural History Museum
-
Sant Ocean Hall
September 27, 2008 – Permanent Natural History Museum
-
Butterflies + Plants: Partners in Evolution
Natural History Museum
-
Human Spaceflight
November 1, 2004 – Permanent Air and Space Museum Udvar-Hazy Center
-
Kids' Farm
June 12, 2004 – Permanent National Zoo
-
America on the Move
November 22, 2003 – Permanent American History Museum
-
Kenneth E. Behring Family Hall of Mammals
November 15, 2003 – Permanent Natural History Museum
-
Janet Annenberg Hooker Hall of Geology, Gems, and Minerals
September 20, 1997 – Permanent Natural History Museum
-
Insect Zoo, O. Orkin
September 10, 1993 – Permanent Natural History Museum
-
Moving the Mail
July 30, 1993 – Permanent Postal Museum
-
The Dolls' House
Opened 1951 – Indefinitely American History Museum
