Albany Institute of History & Art

I came here on a Thursday evening around 6pm, and Thursday evenings are free admissions! It’s a small art museum but it had just enough upstate art collection & the amazing Egyptian mummies collection this summer! I wish I took the guided tour though, but I guess it was too late in the evening.

AIHA is literally Albany’s treasure trove. It’s prermenant collection houses some of the finest Hudson River School paintings found anywhere in the world as well as Ancient Egyptian mummies and objet d’ art collected by Albanians traveling the globe these past five centuries.
We have visited the institute more times than I can count. Our most recent visit, yesterday afternoon, was to see the Walter Launt Palmer painting exhibit. (It runs until August 16^th, 2015.) It was spectacular. In particular, his scenes of Venice were breathtaking. His other works are equally masterful but did not resonate with me the way his depictions of the Piazza San Marco or the island of San Grigori at dusk did.
If you love Impressionism you shouldn’t pass this exhibition up.

I confess to a great fondness for the mid– to small-​sized regional museum, of which the Albany Institute of History and Art is a fine example. One is rarely bothered by crowds of people, nor with the feeling of urgency that one must roam through a vast collection on a limited schedule in order to «see» everything. (I once had four hours to see the Louvre, at least an hour of which was consumed with paralytic decision-​making: do I wait the hour to wade into the front of the crowd to see the Mona Lisa? Or spend the entire time on a single room literally packed ceiling to floor with interesting things I’ve never even heard of? When there are a few hundred more rooms? Ugh.)
So at the Albany Institute there isn’t even a big enough collection to call it «eclectic». The museum has an old collection, dating to the late 18^th century, one of the oldest in the country, but it was never the recipient of significant largesse from a major donor or private collector so much as getting the interesting bits out of people’s attics instead of their drawing rooms. Two-​thirds of the exhibit space now is given over to short-​term exhibitions, and the remaining divided without significant coherence among two Egyptology rooms, two small rooms of early Albany artifacts, two rooms of Hudson River landscapes, and a grand staircase that doubles as a 19^th century American sculpture gallery. (This latter creeps me out: basically just one sculptor and his acolytes, who had a predilection for depicting young female nudes with questionable 19^th century titles such as ‘Indian Captive’.) The Albany artifacts are interesting if a little bit of a hodge podge, with Dutch furniture and early English portraiture from colonial days, then sort of skipping around a bit into the early 19^th century. The Hudson River collection is excellent, without a major work or a major artist represented but with enough examples of fine second-​tier work that it’s an excellent little survey of the school. The Egyptian stuff — including the famous SCARY mummies — is utterly without surrounding context, and while it has its appeal (it’s SCARY!) it veers dangerously close to a curiosity.
The two rotating exhibits at the time of our visit were one on Quilts and Coverlets, that featured a lot of lovely work hanging in the larger third floor exhibit space, but without what I’d call a compelling guided narrative to take one through a history or sense of space. All quilts, no supplemental material (pictures or stories of the creators, displays of materials, explanation of the process, etc. — just the stuff.) The other one taking up nearly all the second floor was a puzzling exhibit on Baseball. With the Hall of Fame just an hour and a half away, the only part of this exhibit that had any unique appeal was the one room dedicated to baseball in the Capital Region, which was in itself a bit episodic, showing the different eras of minor league baseball and a nice little corner on Black /​Negro League baseball. But it also missed a few important bits of curation that would have knitted it all together — timelines, maps, sidebar stories of the famous and not so famous. As a baseball fan, I was somewhat surprisingly bored by the exhibit as a whole — what is the exact point?
The museum also needs some thought put into it as far as signage and visitor flow, given the hodge podge and disparate exhibit spaces/​collections spread over several generations of construction.
The «Children’s Gallery» is a small play room, that had only one small part tied into the exhibits — a small Egypt-​inspired corner where you can rub your own hieroglyphic and sit in a faux Pharaohnic throne. It had some amusement value for the kids for about 20 minutes — one of them spent the whole time doing plastic patterns on the light table.
The shop is above average, which sections heavily tied into the Baseball exhibit at present but with a nice collection of local history books and the more gift-​y type stuff you expect from Art museum shops. There was a sufficient critical mass of children’s books and toys. The shop itself, while tucked away on the second floor, does not require admission so as a mid-​sized gift shop it may be worth a separate trip if you’re looking for something for Aunt Millie’s birthday. Staff were helpful (perhaps excessively so; we had some difficulty browsing in peace) and knowledgeable about the museum.
There’s no snack /​food store, and the parking in the lot in back is literally about 20 spaces, so you’re at the mercy of the Albany street parking gods.
All in all — there’s stuff of interest (I can always find something cool at places like this) but I wouldn’t call this a destination if you’re from out of town. Go based on the appeal of the rotating exhibits to your interests.

Great place to spend an hour wandering and woolgathering on a rainy or snowy afternoon (during the limited days they’re open – Weds-​Sun only).
This is a regional/​provincial museum in the truest sense: most of the items on exhibit are either about Albany, created by an Albany artist, or donated by an Albany collector. There isn’t much good art here but lots of history and the collections are well curated with helpful and informative labels for the most part. There doesn’t seem to be any «permanent» display and right now they have a collection of curios from the vaults including some truly strange stuff like a collection of hair jewelry (that’s jewelry made of hair) and a miniature Indian trading post complete with little tiny Indian artifacts.
Admission’s a bit steep at $ 10 but there’s free parking in the back, and other reviewers have mentioned it’s free on First Fridays. (But it’s better to go on a regular price day when you’ll virtually have the place to yourself.)
Oh, don’t forget the Egyptian «gallery» (a small side room) that contains a counterfeit mummified cat (xrays established it’s actually a dog; cat mummies were in such high demand that other animals were frequently substituted) and the unwrapped human mummy that has given nightmares to generations of Albany schoolchildren. Bwaah!

I always love going to the Institute the day after Thankgiving. I do enjoy seeing some of the newer exhibits, but not all (I don’t consider shoe collections art).

The Hudson River Valley School collection was the reason for my visit. They have divided it between the third floor gallery and a second floor children’s exhibit. Unfortunately, the whole second floor has gone the way of insultingly dumbed down children’s exhibits everywhere. But the Hudson River Valley paintings, while few in number, are more than you can see elsewhere. It was well worth the visit.

The Albany Institute offers a number of exhibits but it is notable for its collection of paintings from the Hudson River School of Art. If, like me, your interest in that subject is lukewarm, it rates three stars. If you are really into the Hudson River School, this is an important resource and a must-​see five star attraction.
See also our review of the Hudson River Valley National Heritage Area.

OK, there *are* some cool things in/​about the Albany Institute of History & Art. For one, I believe it’s one of the very oldest continuously running museums in the USA. And the museum also has a couple of real Egyptian mummies, which is pretty cool! However, I think the rest of the exhibits here are kind of boring and pedestrian; there aren’t a whole lot of things besides the mummies that really «wowed» me, and there really aren’t that many pieces by notable names in the place. I wish I could give this place a higher review, but it’s still a decent place to stop by on First Fridays, when the exhibits are free. For a better museum in the area, stop by the NYS Museum, which is w/​in easy walking distance. The latter’s free, and the exhibits are a lot more fun.

This is definitely an underappreciated museum in Albany.
They have some great permanent collections — including an Egyptian exhibit that features a real mummy.
The New York exhibits are also really cool — especially their collection of Hudson River School of Art paintings. Many of the non-​permanent collections feature New York artists, and they manage to blend art and history beautifully. There’s always a wide range of programming scheduled along with each exhibit, including children’s activities, teacher’s workshops and lunchtime lectures.
They also participate in most of the Albany First Friday events, which is great because it lets you get to see all of the exhibits for free. They always have great food, too. Some months they have wineries or restaurants providing the tastings, which is especially cool.
AIHA also has a great museum gift shop.