Our Work and Impact


One need not have expensive tools and materials to be creative—all that is needed is an awareness of one’s environment and the beauties that are there; from this comes the process of creativity and —out of this, comes life.  

– Aminah Robinson

Historic Artists’ Homes and Studios (HAHS) empowers a dynamic network of sites through mentoring, marketing, and peer-to-peer exchange to create meaningful personal experiences at authentic creative places.

HAHS is dedicated to facilitating connections for sharing, learning, conversation, and collective voice. It provides vital support and expertise, including technical skills, resources, and thought leadership.

Art gives me happiness, and when I’m not working I’m miserable.

– Chaim Gross

Our goal is to emphasize the importance of the places where art was made, and that they are vital to inspiring creative endeavors today.    

We strive to provide centralized support to our membership, foster excellence and innovation, so that sites can in turn more effectively provide valuable education, preservation, and engagement opportunities and programs for diverse audiences.  Through our national platform and initiatives, we seek to elevate these sites within the public consciousness, and to the broader professional fields of art, history, and preservation.

HAHS is deeply committed to representing the full breadth and diversity of our country’s artistic legacy through preserved places nationwide. Through its continued growth, HAHS is proactively ensuring that it will tell a fuller story of those artists who have traditionally been underrepresented or experienced erasure of their contributions to our cultural heritage including people of color, members of the LGBTQ+ community, Indigenous, self-taught, and women artists.

The aim of art is to represent not the outward appearance of things, but their inward significance.

– Augustus Saint-Gaudens

At Historic Artists Homes & Studios (HAHS), we celebrate the sacred spaces where creativity was born and nurtured. Our coalition of museums preserves the homes and studios of American artists—each a unique environment where inspiration ignites, and artistic visions come to life.

HAHS supports our membership through professional development, public outreach, peer learning and creative exchange. We connect our members to one another, as well as to experts throughout the world. This collective expertise provides models and standards not only for our members, but for our colleagues in the wider preservation, museum and historic sites professional community. While there is increasing need, no other organization specializes in the preservation of artist properties. It is this growing gap in American cultural and architectural history that HAHS helps to fill. Through our ongoing commitment to internship opportunities, we are also nurturing the next generation of diverse stewards for these unique sites.

It is possible that Modern art is simply a record of humanity trying to find its way…

– Suzy Frelinghuysen

We actively advocate for sites under threat and are the only network in the country dedicated to promoting the transformative power of preserved artist sites. By working closely with living artists, families, descendants, and other partners, we ensure the preservation of the next generation of these vital creative spaces. Our dedication extends to advancing social and racial equity by welcoming and supporting sites of underrepresented artists and communities, while also guiding and mentoring sites whose artistic significance surpasses their financial means.  

We educate diverse audiences and raise public awareness of the enduring importance of these sites of artistic creativity, by amplifying and honoring the rich legacy of our nation’s built artistic heritage. Our collaborations with national and global leaders in the fields of art history, arts and culture, history, and preservation provide for transcontinental learning, and position our members within a broad cultural legacy. Our programming initiatives, often beyond the scope of any individual site’s capabilities, result in a halo-effect for the entire HAHS community.

Together, these interconnected efforts empower our member sites to thrive, while also affirming the broader benefits of art and artist sites to larger audiences, as cultural anchors in neighborhoods, generators for tourism, and drivers of quantifiable economic impact.

Join us in witnessing how art doesn’t happen in isolation—it is cultivated in spaces and communities where ideas flourish, and where the environment itself becomes a catalyst for brilliance.

“For more than two decades the Historic Artists’ Homes and Studios program has served as a vibrant and essential advocate for its member properties, preserved public sites of creativity visited by hundreds of thousands annually.”

Thayer Tolles, President, Saint-Gaudens Memorial, Cornish, New Hampshire, and Marica F. Vilcek Curator, The American Wing, The Metropolitan Museum of Art

“HAHS has served as an innovative partner in helping to guide the museum’s endeavor to preserve and interpret the Charles M. Russell Studio and Charles and Nancy Russell Home, providing opportunities to collaborate with other preservation specialists. With the C.M. Russell Museum located in a remote area it has been particularly valuable having a pool of dedicated professionals willing to collaborate on ideas and share experiences.”

Brenda Kornick, Former Chief Collections & Exhibitions Officer, C.M. Russell Museum, Great Falls, Montana Artists’ Legacies Represented at HAHS Sites

“HAHS is singular as a program whose sole purpose is to promote and support unique places of creativity where artists lived and worked. It is both a central font of information and a collegial alliance of individuals devoted to saving and sharing the special locations that are artists’ homes and studios.”

Sean Ulmer, Executive Director, Grant Wood Studio, Cedar Rapids Museum of Art, Iowa

“The existence of HAHS has dramatically changed our field and the experience of working within it.”

Elizabeth Jacks, Executive Director, Thomas Cole National Historic Site, Catskill, New York

“The Alice Austen House joined HAHS at a pivotal moment in the museum’s history. Our membership has provided critical visibility for the work we are committed to as a leader and mentor for LGBTQ+ interpretation at historic sites.”

Victoria Munro, Executive Director, Alice Austen House, Staten Island, New York

“We are immensely grateful to be part of HAHS. Through membership, our site has realized a higher level of national visibility and experienced meaningful opportunities to tell our story. We recognize the program staff and committee leadership’s dedication to promoting and elevating the importance of unique sites across our country and the ability to share in such a prestigious collection of sites with rich art history and character. ”

Frances Fisher, Board Chairman, Ann Norton Sculpture Gardens, West Palm Beach, Florida

“HAHS has been instrumental in helping raise awareness and profile for our organization, not only in art historical and cultural preservation communities but also in a public national presence. This has been vital to us as a young organization, as we also plan for long-term sustainability.”

Cait Molloy, Former Executive Director, David Ireland House, San Francisco, California