State Fairs: Growing American Craft
Liz Schreiber, State Fairs: Growing American Craft, 2024-2025, various seeds and flower petals, Courtesy of Liz Schreiber
Step right up to the first major exhibition to survey American state fairs’ extraordinary and unconventional crafts from the nineteenth century to the present. The exhibition includes exceptional examples of American craft, highlighting personal stories and regional and cultural traditions.
Description
A culmination of five years of on-the-ground and behind-the-scenes research, State Fairs: Growing American Craft is the first exhibition dedicated to artists’ contributions to the great U.S. tradition of state fairs with more than 240 artworks on view, dating from the mid-nineteenth century to the present.
Each gallery in this exhibition considers personal stories of craft found in different areas of the fairgrounds, from the art exhibits and heritage villages to the parades, dairy barns, and rodeos. Ribbon-winning artworks and engaging craft demonstrations illuminate the lives of the artists—their families, memories, honors, and struggles. It offers a perspective on the social power of fairgrounds across the United States and dispels stereotypes about rural communities. Artists and 4-H clubs from 43 states and tribal nations are represented, with all 50 states represented in a photo gallery.
Visitors will enjoy show-stopping spectacles like the iconic size 96 boots of Big Tex® from the State Fair of Texas®, a life-size butter cow created on-site by the Iowa State Fair’s official butter sculptor Sarah Pratt, and a display featuring a pyramid of 700 glass jars of preserved fruits and vegetables by canning superstar Rod Zeitler. Justin Favela’s new site-specific installation Capilla de Maiz (Maize Chapel) debuts in the Rubenstein Grand Salon to coincide with the opening of State Fairs.
A beautifully illustrated catalogue, published in association with Smithsonian Books, will be available for purchase in the museum’s store and online.
State Fairs: Growing American Craft is curated by Mary Savig, the Lloyd Herman Curator of Craft, with contributing curators Amber-Dawn Bear Robe, Elana Hain, Jon Kay, and Sara Morris with curatorial support from Elizabeth Routhier.
Visiting Information
Credit
State Fairs: Growing American Craft is organized by the Smithsonian American Art Museum. Support is provided by the Smithsonian’s Our Shared Future: 250, a Smithsonian-wide initiative commemorating the nation’s 250th. Signature support for Smithsonian’s Our Shared Future: 250 has been provided by Lilly Endowment Inc.
Major support is provided by Altria Group. Generous support is provided by Sheila Duignan and Mike Wilkins and The James Renwick Alliance for Craft. Additional support is provided by Brenda Erickson, Tania and Tom Evans Curatorial Endowment, Elizabeth Firestone Graham Foundation, Kathleen K. Manatt and Michele A. Manatt, Jacqueline B. Mars Endowment, C.K. Williams Foundation, and Smithsonian Women’s Committee.
