Shelburne Museum is holds a notable collection of American folk art and quilts. The Museum is also home to holdings of decorative arts, design, decoys, and carriages. The paintings collection includes French Impressionists as well as more than 400 18th- to 20th-century American works.
Notable in the American collection are the Hudson River School landscapes, Luminist seascapes, portraits, still-lifes, and genre scenes. Artists include Thomas Cole, Kensett, Bierstadt, Heade, Fitz Hugh Lane, John Singleton Copley, William Merritt Chase, Winslow Homer, and Eastman Johnson. 20th-century paintings include work by Grandma Moses, Carl Rungius, and Andrew Wyeth.
Holdings include 600 pictures by landscape and sporting artist Ogden Pleissner, about 40 of which are on rotating exhibition along with the artist’s Manchester, VT studio.