Teen Art Salon

This fall, MoMA PS1 hosts a presentation in Homeroom of works on paper made by alumni of Teen Art Salon, a Long Island City-based organization that provides resources and visibility to early-career artists ages 11 to 19. Continuing the organization’s relationship with PS1, the exhibition includes a collection of sketchbooks and works on paper that grapple with the revelry and hurdles of adolescence. Bringing together new artwork and a selection works produced over the past decade by teenagers—materials that are often infantilized as “juvenilia”—the presentation underscores the role of young people as both spectators and arbiters of visual culture, archiving a coming-of-age story in real time.

Founded by Isabella Bustamante, Teen Art Salon (est. 2015) demystifies the process of starting a career as an artist and advises teens on how to build a diverse body of work over a career, fostering a strong artistic community between artists across age and experience levels. Its programming is committed to valuing young people as cultural producers, whose early careers deserve to be cultivated, archived, and promoted. Prioritizing individualized instruction, the group provides access to space and helps to secure scholarship awards for the artists—with the objective to overcome socioeconomic barriers and other challenges. Teen Art Salon supports the long-term cultivation of artists from adolescence to adulthood by providing young people free-of-charge art instruction and materials to establish and advance individual studio practices.