In the first decades of the twentieth century, curiosity seekers hit the open road. Roadside attractions proliferated along mainstream American highways and backroad byways, touting oddities and curiosities, miniatures and gigantics, relics and totems, and other homegrown marvels.

Drawn from the collection of American Folk Art Museum, Roadside Attraction evokes the spirit of this cultural phenomenon—a cabinet of curiosity for the automobile age.

Tradeshow signs, circus banners, and miniatures are exhibited alongside artworks illustrating the paranormal, fantastic, and carnivalesque. Highlighting works created within artist-built environments, this exhibition examines the relationship between curiosity and entertainment, illuminating the ways they interweave to make space for extraordinary ideas and other worlds.