The stone Victorian mansion housing Woodmere Art Museum in Chestnut Hill, Philadelphia

I Dream a World: Philadelphia's Young Artists Imagine the Future

Ended21 May 2026 – 25 October 2026$15

This exhibition has ended.

Philadelphia schoolchildren respond to Langston Hughes's poem "I Dream a World" with art imagining a more compassionate future, made with Global Philadelphia Association.

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On now All of November 2026

One work is a map of Philadelphia, and every piece of it was made by a different student. Another is a tree built the same way, out of separate drawings. Both answer one prompt: Langston Hughes's poem "I Dream a World".

The artists run from kindergarten to high school, from six schools including Esperanza Academy Charter High School, Shawmont and Saint Genevieve. Through Woodmere's partnership with the Global Philadelphia Association, they toured the museum, looked closely at works in its collection and wrote poems, then made photographs, paintings and drawings about freedom, justice, belonging and the future they want. Woodmere's whole mission is Philadelphia's artists, and here you meet the ones still in kindergarten.

It fills the Helen Millard Gallery in Smith Hall and closes on 25 October. Adults pay $15; under-18s, students and the families of the exhibiting children get in free, and everyone does on Sundays.

Look for

The map of Philadelphia
Look for a map of the city pieced together from separate contributions, each part made by a different student.
The drawing tree
A tree assembled from many separate drawings by different children, showing how one picture can hold a whole group's work.

Good for

An Hour Or Less
Locals Who've Seen It All
Small Kids

Skip if

You came for Woodmere's professional Philadelphia painters: every work here is by a schoolchild.

With kids

Under-18s always get in free, and so do the families of children whose work is shown. The artists range from kindergarten to high school, so kids see art by people their own age.