A new home for folk art in New York. (Current and Coming).(Brief Article)

Allison Eckardt Ledes

Founding a museum specifically devoted to American folk art was a novel and somewhat outlandish idea when a few passionate enthusiasts established the Museum of American Folk Art in a small town house in New York City in 1961. The museum got off to a rocky start, and by the 1970s, although well regarded for a number of its groundbreaking exhibitions, it was limping along without a clear long-range mission and without sufficient funds to ensure its long-term survival. It was in that decade that the museum encountered the individual who was to become its guardian angel, Ralph Esmerian. His wisdom, vision, and above all, passionate response to and enthusiasm for works created by amateur artists and craftsmen propelled the museum into the twenty-first century. His efforts culminate this month with the inauguration of the museum's new name, new building, and greatly expanded permanent collection.

The American Folk Art Museum opens in a new thirty-thousand-square-foot building at 45 West Fifty-third Street on December 11. In celebration of this milestone, Esmerian has donated more than four hundred seminal works from his personal collection of American folk art, in which nearly every medium is represented-from ceramics and weather vanes to furniture and paintings.

The building comprises eight floors and was designed by Tod Williams Billie Tsien and Associates of New York City. The $22 million project is the firm's first public commission in this city. The new building will enable the museum to exhibit about five hundred works from its permanent collection of approximately four thousand objects. The striking three-dimensional and sharply angular facade of the building is sheathed in sixty-three panels of Tombasil (a white bronze alloy) pierced by openings that admit natural light into the galleries. Seven of the eight floors are dedicated to the public, and include an auditorium, classrooms, a library, a cafe, and a museum ...