Free Day 2019 | MASS MoCA

MASS MoCA Is Free for All on January 26

History Harvest, art projects, live music, performances, and gallery tours

NORTH ADAMS, MASSACHUSETTS — Amplify your MASS MoCA experience when we throw open our doors for free and fill the galleries with art-making activities, lively discussion, and pop-up performances at our annual Free Day. Create some art, take a tour, catch some live music in the elevator, and learn about the history of life on Marshall Street on Saturday, January 26, from 11am to 7pm.

Free Day visitors can dive deep into the history of MASS MoCA and its vast Marshall Street complex with MASS MoCA’s founding director Joseph Thompson, who will talk about more than 200 years of economic, industrial, and architectural change in North Adams. Visitors are encouraged to participate in a “History Harvest” by bringing in printed photos, tickets, or ephemera from past visits to MASS MoCA, to be scanned and saved in a digital archive. Or share printed material, photos, or artifacts from Sprague Electric, Arnold Print Works, or other North Adams moments. Share images to social media by tagging #mmhistoryharvest.

Throughout the day, activities are designed to engage visitors with the museum’s expanse of visual art galleries and community-generated performance, including pop-ups by Pittsfield-based Youth Alive step dance and drum band troupe, and Berkshire Dance Theatre. Stop by our photo booth in the Sol LeWitt galleries to memorialize the day; create take-home projects; contribute to community art projects; and entertain your kids with a museum-wide scavenger hunt.

In Kidspace, visitors’ senses will be stimulated by art projects inspired by Sally Taylor’s exhibition Come to Your Senses: Art to See, Smell, Hear, Taste, and Touch, available all day at the ArtBar. Tours of our main galleries happen throughout the day. Check out massmoca.org/freeday for a full schedule of activities and events:

Events
All Day
Art-making for allages, live elevator music, photo booth

11:30am & 1pm – History Talk
Join MASS MoCA Director Joseph Thompson for a talk about the history of the MASS MoCA site — spanning more than 200 years of economic, industrial, and architectural change.

11:45am & 12:45pm – Youth Alive performances

12-3pm – History Harvest
A program of the MCLA History Department and Historic North Adams, objects or photos of MASS MoCA, Sprague Electric, Arnold Print Works, or other North Adams-related moments will be scanned and saved in an online digital archive. Dig through your closets and drawers if you’re holding:

Photographs of previous MASS MoCA exhibitions
Printed materials such as saved tickets, brochures, membership cards, maps, etc.
Journals or sketches made during a museum visit
Printed material, photos, or artifacts from the Sprague Electric or Arnold Print Works eras
Any other memorabilia related to MASS MoCA, Sprague, Arnold Print Works, or North Adams
All materials will be scanned while you wait. If you can’t make it on Free Day, participate by posting pictures online with the hashtag #mmhistoryharvest.

12-4pm – Photo Booth, Sol LeWitt: A Wall Drawing Retrospective

1:30pm & 2:30pm – Gallery Talk: Taryn Simon
Join Curator Alexandra Foradas for two talks about the social history of applause, and about the scientific, historical, and religious context of cold-water immersion.

2:45pm – Berkshire Dance Theatre performance

3pm & 4pm – Gallery Talk: Trenton Doyle Hancock
Be among the first to hear what’s next for MASS MoCA’s largest exhibition space, Building 5. Senior Curator Denise Markonish tells all about our upcoming exhibition by Trenton Doyle Hancock: Mind of the Mound: Critical Mass.

3pm – “Making Memories in North Adams”
Students from Drury High School’s E3 Academy interviewed longtime North Adams residents and collected their memories of the city. Compiled by the students into a handmade book, the residents’ stories will be presented to the North Adams Public Library and the North Adams Historical Society. Stop by to listen as students read excerpts from the book.

3-6pm – Assets for Artists Open Studios
Visit working artist studios to view works in progress by artists from Seoul, New York City, San Francisco, and more.

Tours
Gather at the information desk.

11:30am Jenny Holzer
12pm Sol LeWitt
12:30pm Thumbs Up for the Mothership
1pm The Lure of the Dark
1pm Curator-led Tour
1:30pm History Tour
1:30pm Sol LeWitt
2pm History Tour
2pm Curator-led Tour
2:30pm The Lure of the Dark
2:30pm Curator-led Tour
3pm Thumbs Up for the Mothership
3:30pm The Lure of the Dark
4pm History Tour

Sponsorship
Free Day is sponsored by MountainOne and Berkshire Gas.

Images
High-resolution images of MASS MoCA’s winter/spring 2019 events are available through this link: bit.ly/WSP_19mm.

Images of MASS MoCA are available here: bit.ly/2W8z8QL.

About MASS MoCA
MASS MoCA is one of the world’s liveliest (and largest) centers for making, displaying, and enjoying today’s most important art, music, dance, theater, film, and video. MASS MoCA’s 250,000 sq. ft. of gallery space includes partnerships with Laurie Anderson, the Louise Bourgeois Trust, Jenny Holzer, Anselm Kiefer with the Hall Art Foundation, Sol LeWitt, and James Turrell.

Gallery admission is $20 for adults, $18 for veterans and seniors, $12 for students, $8 for children 6 to 16, and free for children 5 and under. Members are admitted free year-round. The Hall Art Foundation’s Anselm Kiefer exhibition will re-open on May 25. For additional information: 413.662.2111 x1 or visit massmoca.org.

Hours
MASS MoCA is open from 11am to 5pm, closed Tuesdays, through June 14. From June 15 through October 14, MASS MoCA’s galleries will be open seven days a week, from 10am to 6pm, and open late some nights.

Download the Free Day 2019 press release here.