Entry No. 5 — the Boston file — filed under: bad art
Museum of Bad Art (MOBA)
The world's only museum built entirely around sincerely-attempted, seriously-wrong art — a collection that began in 1993 when an antique dealer pulled a painting called 'Lucy in the Field with Flowers' out of the trash in Roslindale. Curators reject nine of every ten submissions for not being bad enough; the 700-piece permanent collection rotates 25-35 works at a time inside a working brewery taproom.
The story
In 1993, antique dealer Scott Wilson spotted a gilded frame sticking out of a Roslindale curbside trash pile. Inside was 'Lucy in the Field with Flowers'—a unsettling painting of an elderly woman floating above a yellow field in a contorted posture. Wilson intended to strip the frame for resale, but his friend Jerry Reilly insisted the canvas was too extraordinary to throw away. They hung Lucy in Reilly's living room, encouraged friends to bring over their own bizarre thrift finds, and threw a house party. The crowd was so eager to celebrate sincere artistic misfires that the collection outgrew private living rooms, eventually bouncing through movie theater cellars in Dedham and Somerville before landing inside Dorchester Brewing Company.
MOBA doesn't collect intentional joke art, velvet Elvisses, or factory-made tourist schlock. The entry bar is strict: the artist must have approached the easel with dead seriousness and genuine ambition, only for the execution to go wildly off the rails. The curation team rejects roughly nine out of ten submissions because forced badness is easy to spot, whereas pure, unironic failure requires real commitment. With a vault of hundreds of rescued canvases, the museum rotates 25 to 35 pieces across the brewery walls at a time, pairing each with a straight-faced curatorial caption that dissects every flawed perspective line and baffling color choice.
What it's like
You walk into Dorchester Brewing, order a pint or a flight, and head straight for the gallery wall display near the seating area. There are no velvet ropes or hushed whispers—just patrons drinking craft beer, leaning in to analyze baffling brushstrokes, and reading the overly academic placards aloud to each other. A full lap takes 15 to 30 minutes, making it less of a full-day commitment and more of a conversation starter over drinks. Aim for a weeknight if you want space to debate the technical failures without jostling past weekend taproom crowds.
The move: Grab a flight of Dorchester Brewing beer and do a slow, argumentative lap of the collection — pick a favorite disaster, hunt down the founding piece 'Lucy in the Field with Flowers,' then debate whose taste is worse over another round.
- 📍 Dorchester, Boston
- 💸 $
- ⚡ Up for anything
- 🌗 Indoors
Where: 1250 Massachusetts Ave (inside Dorchester Brewing Co.), Boston, MA 02125
Hours: Added 2026-07-20 — confirm current hours before you go.
Pair it with
- Eliot Burying Ground — Follow up an afternoon of inspecting tragic canvases with a quiet walk through Roxbury's oldest cemetery, dating back to 1630.
- Shore Leave — Trade taproom craft beers and questionable portraits for tropical rum drinks and sushi in a subterranean South End speakeasy.
- Moki Sauna — Sweat out your aesthetic debates less than a mile away in wood-fired barrel saunas and outdoor cold-plunge tubs.
- Franklin Park - Overlook Shelter Ruins — Pair the museum's salvaged canvas wrecks with Frederick Law Olmsted's 1890s rustic shelter ruins hidden in nearby Franklin Park.
Good to know
Is admission to the museum free?
Yes, viewing the gallery wall inside the brewery taproom costs nothing, though buying a drink or food while you browse is standard etiquette.
How does MOBA decide which art to accept?
Curators look for sincere artistic efforts that failed spectacularly, rejecting about 90 percent of submissions to weed out deliberate jokes, kitsch, or low-effort doodles.
How many paintings are on display at once?
While the total collection holds hundreds of pieces, only 25 to 35 works are hung on the taproom walls at any given time, rotating periodically.
Where in the brewery is the art located?
The collection hangs directly on the walls of Dorchester Brewing Company's public taproom at 1250 Massachusetts Ave.
Plan a visit & invite your people →
Further reading: Official site · Wikipedia · dotnews.com
last checked: 2026-07-20