The UCLA Fowler Museum of Cultural History has an extensive, searchable online collection. It focuse on material art and household items and has objects from all over the world. The website can be browsed either by geographic orgin: Africa, Asia, North and Central America, Pacific, South America, or through its two exhibits, Intersections: World Arts, Local Lives and Fowler in Focus. Some of my favorite objects (but really, everything is entrancing) are The Blind Scholar (a Taiwanese handpuppet), Chikunga (a Zambian mask) and a stirrup spout bottle which looks like a puma eating a piglet (Peruvian). All items have accompanying descriptions and some have short texts or audioguides with further information.
posted by Kattullus on Jul 23, 2008 - 3 comments

Recycled folk art, Mayólica pottery and other exhibitions at the Museum of International Folk Art.
posted by dhruva on May 27, 2007 - 11 comments

The Gregg Museum of Art & Design at NC State University has a great collection of folk arts. The strongest section is in ceramics, with stupendous representation from the NC wood-fired, salt and alkaline glazed traditions. There's this 1868 Hartsoe Alkaline glazed jug, this 19th cent. jug with kild-drip, this Hancock Half-Gallon jug, this Randolph Cty salt-glazed jug with ashy shoulder, and then the moderns: Burlon Craig, Vernon Owen, Mark Hewitt. There are also great photographs, weird furniture, outsider critters, and more. There isn't a good browse function, so you need some idea of what you want to search for.
posted by OmieWise on Mar 15, 2007 - 9 comments

The Russian Avant-Garde Book is an online version of the MoMA exhibit, featuring 112 books originally published in Russia during the intensely creative period between 1910 and 1934, before Stalin outlawed any style but social realism. The site is separated into three chronological themes and includes examples of futurist works, constructivist graphic design, children's books, propaganda, photography and photomontage, revolutionary imagery, architecture and industry, war themes, folk art and judaica...
posted by taz on Oct 8, 2002 - 16 comments