The annual event celebrating art.
Slow Art Day is Saturday, April 11, 2026 Join Us!
Photo by Greg Neville
The Tragedy of War and the Power of Art at the National Museum of Decorative Arts of Ukraine
May 26th, 2026On April 11, 2026, the National Museum of Decorative Arts of Ukraine in Kyiv, Ukraine, hosted their second Slow Art Day.
Before we describe the event, let us be clear. We at Slow Art Day stand for peace and global cooperation and it breaks our hearts to see the wars in Europe and around the world.
Official casualty figures for the Russian invasion are closely guarded and difficult to verify, but independent analysts and intelligence agencies estimate that combined military and civilian casualties on both sides of the war have surpassed 1.5 to 2 million people.
That is terrible.
Along with this unbelievable loss of life, there has also been the loss of culture, infrastructure, buildings, art, and many, many homes.
With that in mind, the National Museum of Decorative Arts of Ukraine in Kyiv chose to focus on an artist, Kateryna Hryshko, whose work is dedicated to two important Ukrainian folk artists, Maria Prymachenko and Polina Rayko.
She chose those two because of what happened to their art.
When a Russian shell struck the museum that housed Maria Prymachenko’s art, the museum’s guard, who lived next door, ran into the burning building and managed to rescue the Prymachenko works it housed. Many other pieces in the collection were lost.
In a separate attack, the museum-house of Polina Rayko was destroyed forever by the torrential flooding that followed when the Russians blew up the Kakhovka dam in June 2023. And because Rayko’s art was painted directly on the walls, it too is gone forever.
For Slow Art Day, visitors were invited to engage in a focused and thoughtful contemplation of decorative panel “Wings.”
Olha Frasyniuk led this year’s event, along with museum specialist Olena Shevchuk. Together, they delved into the symbolism of Hryshko’s panel, “Wings”, which was dedicated to Maria Prymachenko and Polina Rayko.
The composition features iconographic images of the Virgin Mary in the center. On the left, Maria Prymachenko is depicted against a night sky with lightning directed towards a house with a stork, symbolizing the Ivankiv Museum destroyed in February 2022. On the right, Polina Rayko’s figure has feet submerged in water with a drowning bird and cat nearby, a symbolic reminder of the Kakhovka tragedy in June 2023, which flooded the artist’s house-museum. At the bottom, a cross “In Memory of the Fallen Heroes” and a line from Lina Kostenko’s poem “Wings” are included. The painting’s field is adorned with recognizable fragments and images characteristic of both artists’ works, framed by a lush carved wooden frame with three cherubs. Kateryna Hryshko donated this deeply meaningful work to the National Museum of Decorative Arts of Ukraine in 2024.
Participants listened with interest to stories about the destruction of the museum-house of Polina Rayko and of the rescue of paintings from the museum that housed Maria Prymachenko’s paintings. They then shared their own experiences of loss and destruction from the war including when their homes or offices were bombed and how they too have lost and/or rescued important personal items.
Out of this terrible tragedy, the Ukrainians show they are a free people who continue to participate in culture and art amidst the destruction around them.
There’s a real beauty to this Ukrainian Slow Art Day that deserves celebration by all of us around the world.
We at Slow Art Day HQ are grateful to the National Museum of Decorative Arts of Ukraine for their thoughtful and poignant Slow Art Day event and for reminding us to hold dear the people and the art around us.
We look forward to seeing what they design for Slow Art Day 2027, and, more importantly, we look forward to the end of this terrible war.
— Ashley, Johanna, Jessica Jane, and Phyl
P.S. View them on Instagram, Facebook, and their website.
Guided Slow Looking and Drawing at the National Gallery of Canada
May 21st, 2026The National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, hosted its fourth annual Slow Art Day on April 11, 2026. Andrea Gumpert, Educator of Wellbeing Programs, led the efforts for this year’s event, which invited visitors to either participate in a guided onsite experience, watch a guided slow looking video from home, or engage independently with a bilingual handout that encouraged them to “Slow Down. Reflect. Discover. Engage.”
A mix of English- and French-speaking participants joined Interpreter-Guides Taylor Simard and Eddie Schmidt for an hour-long onsite guided slow looking session. The groups began with a warm-up and introductory conversation about the purpose of slowing down.
Participants then spent five minutes looking at a chosen artwork, followed by a group discussion. They then moved to a different gallery where they repeated the exercise. Following that, participants were invited to explore the museum and select additional artworks for further slow looking. Some explored Indigenous and Canadian galleries, while others gravitated to the European galleries. They were offered folding stools for comfort, and pencils, paper, and sketch boards, many of which were used for drawing.
During the facilitated sessions, the Interpreter-Guides used open-ended prompt questions to facilitate discussion, including: “What is your first impression? Why did you choose this work?” and “Can you associate a word or an emotion to this artwork?” They also encouraged participants to reflect on what the artwork told them about themselves and to jot down a memory or sketch something simple.
Guide Eddie Schmidt noted that participants were “chatty and had great observations, discussion,” while Taylor Simard observed that several participants were “locked in” for the full ten minutes of observation. Both said that participants truly enjoyed the experience, and would return for the Gallery’s monthly Guided Slow Looking Sunday program.
That’s wonderful. Back in 2010, we set a key goal of the Slow Art Day movement: use the annual day to encourage museums to adopt year-round programming and many have like the National Gallery of Canada.
We think this kind of device-off, intensive, real-space experience with other humans is just what our fractured world needs.
The Gallery also did some great outreach. The Visitor Services team distributed the bilingual Slow Looking handout to 59 groups. The Marketing team created a one-minute guided slow looking video, as noted earlier, that was published on Facebook and Instagram, and was later uploaded to the Gallery’s Guided Slow Looking Sunday page.
We at Slow Art Day HQ are grateful to Andrea Gumpert, Taylor Simard, Eddie Schmidt, and the entire team at the National Gallery of Canada for their continued dedication to our movement and we look forward to seeing what they design for Slow Art Day 2027.
— Ashley, Johanna, Jessica Jane, and Phyl
P.S. View them on their website.
Family Slow Drawing at Wiregrass Museum of Art in Alabama
May 19th, 2026The Wiregrass Museum of Art in Dothan, Alabama, celebrated its sixth Slow Art Day on April 11, 2026, though this doesn’t tell the whole story. Dana Marie Lemmer, the Executive Director of the museum, played a key role as (volunteer) Director of Global Operators in the Slow Art Day movement from 2012 to 2014.
This year, Dana’s colleague, Janin Wise, Art Educator and School Programs & Volunteer Coordinator, hosted the Slow Art Day event using both facilitated discussion and drawing exercises.
Wise invited guests to sit with her for guided slow looking in chairs around a bench in the Marie Saliba Gallery. She started the process by asking “What first caught your eye?”, then by scanning for color and composition, and discussing the artist’s hand.
The featured artworks included:
- “Lilly, 2022” by Sam Gilliam, an acrylic with sawdust, encaustic, and polypropylene on canvas with beveled-edge stretcher
- “Magnitude of Regions, 1962” by Alice Trumbull Mason, an oil on canvas
- “Prelude on Gray, 1982” by Richard Crist, an acrylic on canvas
- “Untitled, 1960” by Angelo Granata, an ink on paper
- “High Beams, 2020” by Derek Cracco, an acrylic on panel
One family with a 17-year-old daughter was drawn to the texture and color of Gilliam’s “Lilly.” When discussing Alice Trumbull Mason’s “Magnitude of Regions,” the mother expressed both empathy, seeing “sunlight through dark curtains”, and hope, after learning the artist made the work after her son’s death.
At the same time, a Korean American family, participated with an older brother translating for his mother and nonverbal younger brother. That family also appreciated the color and texture, and the geometry of Mason’s piece. Everyone who participated were astonished to learn they could literally see the artist’s hand in Gilliam’s work.
For Derek Cracco’s “High Beams,” a drawing exercise was introduced that led to laughter and discussions about childhood art classes and local art opportunities. Participants folded paper into quarters and completed four different drawing tasks:
- a 10-second quick sketch
- drawing with their non-dominant hand
- drawing without looking at the paper
- a continuous line drawing where they imagined changes in time or space
Janin Wise noted that participants were surprised by how relaxing it was to spend so much time with a few pieces of art. Visitors were delighted by the calm, guided slow looking relaxing and by their newfound ability to notice new details and use their imaginations to step into the artwork.
Most did not typically consider themselves “abstract art kind of people” and yet, by slowing down, they thoroughly enjoyed the art.
Yes! That is exactly the kind of discovery Slow Art Day we hope people make.
It turns out that by simply slowing down, participants can find a new relationship to art, including art they may think they don’t like, or don’t understand.
We at Slow Art Day HQ are grateful to Janin Wise and the Wiregrass Museum of Art for their continued dedication to our slow looking movement. We look forward to seeing what they create for Slow Art Day 2027.
— Ashley, Johanna, Jessica Jane, and Phyl
P.S. View them on Instagram and their website.
Self-Guided Slow Looking and Activities at Art Gallery of St. Albert in Canada
May 17th, 2026The Art Gallery of St. Albert in St. Albert, Alberta, Canada, hosted its seventh Slow Art Day on April 11, 2026. Director Leah Louden and her team encouraged visitors to engage deeply with art through a variety of self-guided activities. The event focused on the current main exhibition, “Ephemeral Language / Langue éphémère” by Sébastien Gaudette, and the staircase feature exhibition, “Knotty Enigmas” by Zana Wensel.
Upon arrival, visitors were invited to use a Slow Looking Guide drafted by the Curator to practice slow looking while exploring the current exhibitions. Staff were on hand to provide additional information.
Visitors of all ages were also invited to participate in several additional activities:
– An iSpy activity encouraged close observation to identify detail shots of 12 artworks throughout the building.
– For the “Ephemeral Language / Langue éphémère” exhibition, an activity booklet offered drawing and educational activities such as drawing a paper illusion, completing a word search, or crafting a paper balloon.
– A drop-in Art Nook activity, called “Creative Crumples,” invited participants to create imaginative drawings from crumpled paper.
Light refreshments were also available, encouraging guests to linger and slowly enjoy the artwork. The event was promoted through their website and social media, and a total of 37 people attended.
One of Sébastien Gaudette’s artworks, “Langage éphémère,” a 2026 paper installation from the “Ephemeral Language / Langue éphémère” exhibition, was featured in an Art Minute video prior to Slow Art Day. This piece was chosen to highlight how a seemingly simplistic artwork could reveal its complexity and beauty through close, slow looking. Guests were surprised by the material of many artworks in Gaudette’s exhibition.
We at Slow Art Day HQ are grateful to Leah Louden and the Art Gallery of St. Albert for their continued dedication to fostering deep engagement with art and were impressed by their innovative self-guided activities. We look forward to seeing what they create for Slow Art Day 2027.
— Ashley, Johanna, Jessica Jane, and Phyl
P.S. View them on their website and Instagram.