MFA Offers Free Admission October 9
Honors Indigenous Peoples' Day
By: MFA - Sep 07, 2021
The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (MFA), is offering free general admission on Saturday, October 9 in honor of Indigenous Peoples’ Day, inviting visitors to recognize and honor the heritage of all Indigenous peoples and the histories of their nations and communities.
The free day, also part of the Fenway Alliance’s annual Opening Our Doors festival, will feature giveaways of art-making kits as well as children’s books selected by Ekua Holmes (African American, born 1955) and Elizabeth James-Perry (Aquinnah Wampanoag, born 1973), artists, activists and creators of the Garden for Boston on the Museum’s front lawn.
Free tickets can be reserved online starting at 10 am on October 5 and will also be available at the Museum day of, on a first-come, first-served basis.
Indigenous Peoples’ Day is sponsored by Ameriprise Financial. Additional programming support is provided by the Vance Wall Foundation.
Throughout the day, visitors can explore Native American art in the MFA’s Art of the Americas Wing—from ancient Mississippian pottery, Mi’kmaq quillwork and Lakota beadwork in the Native North American Art Gallery to more recent works by Maria Martinez (San Ildefonso Pueblo), Wendy Red Star (Crow) and T.C. Cannon (Kiowa/Caddo).
Outside, visitors can enjoy Holmes’ Radiant Community and James-Perry’s Raven Reshapes Boston—installations that have reshaped the grounds around Cyrus Dallin’s monumental Appeal to the Great Spirit (1909) sculpture with sunflowers and corn, opening new dialogues about the history of the land that the MFA stands on.
Starting at 10 am on the Huntington Avenue Lawn, families can pick up free corn husk weaving kits inspired by James-Perry’s Raven Reshapes Boston. Inside, in the Carol Vance Wall Rotunda, the Museum will offer free copies of five picture books to take home, recommended for children of different ages: Thanks to the Animals (written by Allen Sockabasin, illustrated by Rebekah Raye), Muskrat Will Be Swimming (written by Cheryl Savageau, illustrated by Robert Hynes), Out of Wonder: Poems Celebrating Poets (written by Kwame Alexander with Chris Colderley and Marjory Wentworth, illustrated by Ekua Holmes), Black Is a Rainbow Color (written by Angela Joy, illustrated by Ekua Holmes) and The Tiny Seed (written and illustrated by Eric Carle).
Art kits and books will be available while supplies last.
Founded on February 4, 1870, the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (MFA), stands on the historic homelands of the Massachusett people, a site which has long served as a place of meeting and exchange among different nations.