Smithsonian Folklife

10/03/2026

This weekend, the first-ever Great Valley Gathering is taking place in Fresno, California. 🌳

Produced by the Alliance for California Traditional Arts (ACTA) and presented in collaboration with "Of the People: The Smithsonian Festival of Festivals," the event brings together immigrant, Indigenous, occupational, and faith-based communities of the region to share the creative expressions that they hold dear.

To figure out how to represent all of this cultural diversity in a festival logo, ACTA director Amy Kitchener reached out to artist and writer Patricia Wakida, a former ACTA staff member and collaborator who grew up in Fresno, to enlist her help in creating a visual identity for the Great Valley Gathering.

A member of our team visited Wakida in her home studio to see how the logo developed from pencil sketches to a carved linoleum block to many linocut prints to a digitized image. Discover the process on the Festival Blog: https://s.si.edu/4ywjdNY

Photos by Elisa Hough

10/02/2026

In 1975, Fermín Herrera and his siblings Jorge, Tommy, and María Isabel took the stage at the Festival of American Folklife to perform as members of the Herrera family band, Conjunto Hueyapan, and demonstrate the harp’s role in ‘son jarocho,’ the lively folk music from Veracruz, Mexico. 🪉

More than fifty years later, family members from Oxnard and Fillmore, California, continue to perform, learn, and make music together, keeping the Herrera family’s “music conservatory” alive across three generations.

In 2018, Jorge Herrera’s children, forming the group Hermanos Herrera, released the album “Sones Jarochos y Huastecos y Más” on Smithsonian Folkways Recordings.

In Folklife Magazine, learn more about Fermín and his family’s musical journey and how family strengthens music, and music strengthens family. Read on and watch the two accompanying videos: https://folklife.si.edu/magazine/hermanos-herrera

🎥: Produced by Charlie Weber and Daniel Sheehy. Story and editing by Los Herederos.

This project received federal support from the Latino Initiatives Pool, administered by the National Museum of the American Latino.

10/01/2026

Happy World Architecture Day! 🏛️⚒️

Today, we celebrate the vital role that architects play in shaping our world. "Built by Hand: Skilled Artisans in the Traditional Trades" is a digital education resource from the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage that showcases the artistry, skill, creativity, and care demonstrated by the artisans who are preserving and passing on a crucial body of centuries-old traditional knowledge.

We invite you to meet extraordinary artisans—stone carvers, decorative painters, preservation carpenters, blacksmiths, ornamental plasterers, stained-glass artisans, and many others—and discover the skills and values that shape and give meaning to their work.

Explore the exhibition: https://s.si.edu/3VPrRsc

1) Photo courtesy of Laura Saeger and Rudy Christian
2) Photo by Justine Angelis, courtesy of Alicia Spence
3) Photo by Molly Baker, courtesy of National Trust for Historic Preservation
4) Photo by Marjorie Hunt, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives

09/30/2026

“It’s about creating something beautiful for the world that can be here for a moment—maybe longer than us.” ♥️

As part of the 2023 Smithsonian Folklife Festival's "Creative Encounters: Living Religions in the U.S." program, New Mexican artists Nicolas Otero and Ruben Gallegos brought the yellows, ochres, and greens of their landscape to the National Mall.

Otero and Gallegos are 'santeros,' traditional artists from the American Southwest who create carved and painted depictions of Catholic saints. These pieces, called 'santos,' take the form of either three-dimensional sculptures (bultos) or wooden altar paintings (retablos).

The tradition of saint making goes back over 400 years, but they are always trying to innovate and experiment in their artistic expression. Gallegos incorporates personal relatives and cultural figures into his work, painting a large 'retablo' at the festival that describes the lives of his parents.

On the Festival Blog, learn more about this fusion of creativity and spirituality: https://s.si.edu/3VUvBbW

Photos by Ronald Villasante, Julie Byrne, and Sonya Pencheva, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives

09/29/2026

Everybody hollerin' G.O.A.T.!

The GOAT Picnic is a free, annual music festival celebrating the best of Hill country blues and Mississippi-style goat cuisine, and this year, our team was thrilled to collaborate with the organizers as part of our initiative "Of the People: The Smithsonian Festival of Festivals."

The festival honors the legacy of “Otha” Turner, a National Heritage Fellow who was devoted to sustaining the fife-and-drum tradition of Mississippi blues. Shardé Thomas-Mallory, Turner's granddaughter, devoted herself to mastering the fife—not only how to play it, but how to craft one with her own hands.

The picnic tradition, which has endured for seventy-six years, is a celebration of Mississippi roots music, food, family, and fellowship. Here's to seventy-six more years!

Where's the Festival of Festivals headed next? See for yourself on our website: https://s.si.edu/4uR4rii

Photos by Mark Puryear, Lirit Gilmore, and Michelle Banks, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives

09/28/2026

Join us at the Smithsonian National Museum of Asian Art for a special performance by one of Kazakhstan’s premier contemporary ethno-folklore groups!

Formed in 2013 in Almaty by PhD and Honored Worker of Kazakhstan Yerzhan Zhamenkeyev, HasSak ethno-folk ensemble is one of Kazakhstan’s premier contemporary ethno-folklore groups. The ensemble features four highly skilled multi-instrumentalists—Yerzhan Zhamenkeyev, Darkhan Alimgazy, Askat Sagat, and Aray Kanatbek—who master over thirty traditional Kazakh instruments.

HasSak is currently participating in Heritage in Motion, a collaboration between the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage and the nonprofit organization Music Unbound. The project provides professional development and networking opportunities to culture bearers and intangible cultural heritage practitioners in Almaty, Kazakhstan, and Tucson, Arizona, leading up to a program at the 2027 Smithsonian Folklife Festival.

Learn more and reserve your seat: https://s.si.edu/4jnve3h

📸: A participant plays the qobyz, a traditional Kazakh instrument, at the 2023 Smithsonian Folklife Festival's "Soul of Tengri" program. Photo by Sonya Pencheva, Ralph Rinzler Folklife Archives

09/26/2026

Celebrating Indigenous excellence at the 2026 All My Relatives Festival. ☀️

Bringing together fashion and music, the All My Relatives Festival at Levitt Sioux Falls is a powerful source of community connection in the Great Plains region. This year's gathering, a collaborator in the 2026 "Of the People: The Smithsonian Festival of Festivals" program, was the fourth iteration of the event, and featured live concert performances, fashion shows, interactive activities for kids and families, and so much more.

Thank you to all who joined the celebration, and here's to many more!

See where the Festival of Festivals is headed next: https://s.si.edu/4uR4rii

Photos by Libby Breckon, courtesy of All My Relatives Festival

09/25/2026

Since 1996, Philadelphia Chinatown’s Mid-Autumn Festival has created a space for generations to celebrate culture, strengthen community, and reconnect with traditions.

The Chinese Mid-Autumn Festival falls on the fifteenth day of the eighth month of the Chinese lunar calendar, centering around the moon, historically as a religious practice in worshipping the moon goddess, Chang’e, as well as representing harmony and unity.

Hosted by Asian Americans United, the event relies on more than 300 high school volunteers who help bring the festival to life each year, carrying traditions forward while creating new opportunities to lead and serve their community.

This year, its thirty-first Mid-Autumn Festival is a part of the "Of the People: The Smithsonian Festival of Festivals" programming. On October 3, Philadelphia will close Tenth Street, replacing traffic with art tables, carnival games, performance stages, and a community wellness space.

Learn more about the event on the Festival Blog: https://s.si.edu/3V2RQfF

Photos by Schyl Arisandi, Jeffrey Heng, and Wei Chen

09/24/2026

The Smithsonian's National Museum of African American History and Culture (NMAAHC) turns 10 years old today. 💜

Before he was the Secretary of the Smithsonian, Lonnie G. Bunch III was the founding director of NMAAHC, bringing it from idea to reality on the National Mall.

This past summer, Secretary Bunch spoke about his experience at the opening ceremony ten years ago as part of our "For the Common Good: Smithsonian Voices on Our Shared Future 250" series in the Smithsonian Arts and Industries Building.

Learn more about how you can celebrate a decade of preserving and sharing African American history and culture: https://s.si.edu/4rtZWtN

09/24/2026