Off-Center Views: The Search for Folk Art

8/24/25

The Search for Folk Art

Folk Art

Once upon a time folk art was dismissed as stuff made by “savage” or “uneducated” people. These days it fetches high prices at auctions and lots of rich people collect it. Truth be known, many of the latter display it as if it is rustic artifacts or as examples of how broad-minded they are.

Once money enters the equation, definitions begin to get hazy and the art is reduced to its value on the open market. Luckily folklorists and cultural anthropologists are decades ahead of a curve they were once eons in back of. The same is true for museum curators. “Folk art” has replaced terms such a “primitive,” “naïve,” or “untrained.” Yet, most museums tend to display just a few pieces of American folk art and things produced abroad–especially in Africa, the Arctic, the Indian subcontinent, or Oceania–are tucked into special galleries that are more focused on ethnography than artistic achievement.

There are only a handful of museums in the United States devoted mostly to folk art. My favorite on the East Coast is Vermont’s Shelburne Museum. But you can find bits and pieces in lots of places if you know what to look for, though whether or not it’s folk art of handicraft is often open for debate. (Aren’t most things these days?)

Look for these tendencies:

1. Folk art is usually unique and hand-crafted. It is seldom reproduced.

2. It often uses unusual materials such as glass bottles, bark, barnboard, and found materials.

3. Much of it has (or once had) a utilitarian purpose. Think of decoys, painted canoes, quilts, weathervanes, and whirligigs. Ditto carved canes, handmade furniture, samplers, baskets, corn brooms, and carved wooden spoons.

4. Folk art is usually specific to a particular community, ethnic group, tribe, or tradition. For example, “hex” signs were common among the Pennsylvania Dutch, certain fiddle styles (and carved instruments) were more common in Appalachia than elsewhere, and Amerindian art varies by tribe and region.

5. It’s no longer a necessity, but folk art tends to be by those with little or no training in the so-called “fine arts.” Folk artists tend to violate expectations such as perspective, relative size, and perspective even when their intent is not abstraction. This often makes it whimsical or gives it a charming child-like appearance. If, for instance, you look at a Grandma Moses painting, you’ll see what I mean.

6. Many folk artists were taught by others within their community. They focus more on tradition within that community than what outsiders may think of it. Think of it as either useful or as community art.

7. Know, however, that all the definitions are contentious. Will Moses, for instance, is the great grandson of Anna Mary Robertson Moses. He paints in her style. In my mind, he is a copyist not a folk artist, but many think he is. So-called “outsider art” is sometimes labeled folk art. Again, I disagree–mainly because the attempt to be different is so often a solo pursuit, the formal training of the artist often shines through, and their community credentials are fuzzy. These, however, are my views and others disagree.

Here's a sampling of this summer’s folk art finds. I excluded the Shelburne Museum because its collection is too rich!

From the Fennimore Museum (Cooperstown NY)