The Albany Museum of Art will be open to the public 10 am-5 pm on Saturdays beginning June 12, 2021, Executive Director Andrew J. Wulf, Ph.D., announced today.

“We are pleased to announce that we are resuming Saturday hours beginning this Saturday, June 12,” Wulf said. “This will give more families the opportunity to come out and enjoy our fabulous art exhibitions, and for children to visit our activity center, AMAzing Space. We will be adding new activities to that area in the coming weeks, so there will be fun, new ways for our youngest visitors to engage themselves.”

The AMA maintained Saturday hours before the March 2020 COVID shutdown, and reopened in July 2020 with a Tuesday-Friday schedule. With the resumption Saturday hours, the AMA is open 10 am-5 pm Tuesdays-Saturdays with the exception of Thursdays, when the museum closes two hours later. The museum offers free admission to everyone.

“We added Art After 5 with the museum open until 7 pm on Thursdays so that guests who cannot visit during the day can come in after work, and we shall continue with that,” Wulf said. “We realize that Saturdays are more convenient for many of our visitors, especially those with children, so we are happy to be able to resume those hours.”

 In addition to children’s activities in AMAzing Space, there is comfortable seating for parents, as well as a library of books that range in age interest from tots to adults. Families also may go on a scavenger hunt for art objects in the Haley Gallery exhibition Butch Anthony: Art, Nature, and Intertwangleism. A checkoff list for the scavenger hunt is available at the front desk.

 “With temperatures already back into the 90s as summer tightens its grip, the climate-controlled Albany Museum of Art offers a comfortable respite from the heat and humidity,” Wulf noted. “Discovering new art and artists, and simply enjoying art make for a wonderful family adventure that will be treasured forever.”

The Saturday hours come in time for those who have not had the opportunity to visit two exhibitions that will close on Saturday, June 26: Work, Worship & Community: Photography by Paul Kwilecki in the East Gallery and Educators as Artists, the 4^th juried college faculty exhibition in the upstairs McCormack Gallery.

Work, Worship & Community includes Kwilecki’s black-and-white photography of people and places in Bainbridge and Decatur County. Shooting 35mm film, he captured small-town life with images of Black agricultural workers, working-class individuals, cafés, courthouses, grocery stores, cemeteries and churches. His work has been exhibited nationally, and a large archive of his photos and writings are held in the David M. Rubenstein Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Duke University. The images in the exhibition are from The Do Good Fund Collection.

Educators as Artists includes artworks by college faculty at Albany State University, Columbus State University, Florida State University, Florida A&M University, Georgia Southwestern State University and Valdosta State University.

Art, Nature, and Intertwangleism continues in the Haley Gallery through the end of July, and Escape Plan, an installation by Athens artist and musician Elinor Saragoussi, is on permanent exhibition in the West gallery.