American Visionary Art Museum

For starters you can go to their gift shop called the “side show” for free and support those artists. Normally gift shops are steep, but this one is not that way. Everything is priced really fairly and has been curated over many decades. I spent about 2hrs at the museum. The museum two buildings, the round mosaic building has 4 floors of art. When I was there it was mixed media. The second building (which you get to by walking through the outdoor sculpture garden) has kinetic art, which means it moves! It has three floors, the third one lets you go into this cool birds nest balcony. There is a lot of attention to detail and cohesion, jam packing art even into the bathrooms or elevators. The stair railings incorporate the cast metal look tree branches and organically bent metal tubing that cohesively can be found if you look closely in the benches, outdoor sculptures, and door handles across the multiple buildings. This is not just celebrating art but showing by example how it can be incorporated into mundane furnishings. Next to highlight the platform and investment this museum put into the children of the community from displaying art to having the mosaics projects that adorn the building involve them. Highly recommend you support .

Explore Baltimore - American Visionary Art Museum 800 Key Hwy, Baltimore, MD 21230 Open ⋅ Closes 5 PM (410) 244-1900 JOHN CULVER Untitled Low Res.jpg What is Visionary Art? Like love, you know it when you see it. But here's the longer definition, straight out of our Mission Statement ​ “Visionary art as defined for the purposes of the American Visionary Art Museum refers to art produced by self-taught individuals, usually without formal training, whose works arise from an innate personal vision that revels foremost in the creative act itself.” ​ In short, visionary art begins by listening to the inner voices of the soul, and often may not even be thought of as 'art' by its creator. ​ What is Art? The ancients—the Greeks, Egyptians, Hopis, and the New Guinea tribesmen— were among earth’s most prolific art-making peoples. Yet, none had any word for “art” in their respective languages. Rather, they each had a word that meant “well made” or “beautifully performed.” Our American Visionary Art Museum believes that this view of what art really means is as perfect an understanding of art as ever was. It speaks to an art incumbent upon all its citizens, pervasive throughout all the arts of our daily life. Its emphasis is on process and consciousness, not mere artifact. Martin Luther King, Jr. expressed his profound respect for the true artistry each member of a society can uniquely evidence to bless our communities, “If a man is called to be a streetsweeper, he should sweep streets even as Michelangelo painted, or Beethoven composed music, or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He should sweep streets so well that all the Hosts of Heaven and earth would pause to say: ‘Here lived a great streetsweeper who did his job well. ’”

My new favorite museum. Hilarious one moment, then deeply affecting in another. I wish I could visit again. Plus the most fascinating museum shop. Inspirational too in its insistence that anyone can express themselves artistically.

This place is really cool!! There's so much to take in! Each room focuses on different artists. There was an deaf artist with Downs syndrome who created amazing sculptures out of found objects. There was an artist who embroidered pictures to tell the history she lived during the holocaust that was unbelievable. I would highly recommend this place! We ate next door at the Rusty Scupper afterwards. We actually parked in the public parking across the street from the museum and validated our parking ticket for $10 parking for the whole afternoon! Also- if you have AAA you'll get an extra discount into the museum. You'll need to ask for it though!

Very interesting art museum! I really love this museum because it is very different from any other art museum that focuses on classical art. Each piece has detailed information of the art piece and the artist which is interesting. Museum has 2 builidngs where the first building focuses on painting and objects whereas the other building focuses on statues and mechanical toy art which is more interactive. I was able to get the student discount so make sure you bring your student ID for discount. I highly recommend this place!