Please see information at right - Click to enlarge
ARTS & CRAFTS: The National Gallery of Art and The National Geographic Society will exhibit Afghanistan: Hidden Treasures from the National Museum, Kabul, May 27-September 7. The exhibition will explore the cultural heritage of Afghanistan dating back to the Bronze Age (2500 B.C.). The nation’s location on the ancient Silk Road - at the crossroads of Central Asia - "created a rich mosaic of cultures and civilizations.” Nearly 230 archeological treasures dating back more than 4,000 years will be displayed. The treasured objects were found at four sites. Gold objects from “the Bactrian hoard,” a 2,000-year-old treasure cache found in 1978, will also be included in the exhibition. The objects had been lost, but were rediscovered in the presidential bank vault in Kabul in 2003.
Richard Misrach (born 1949) - Untitled 1132-04, 2004 - chromogenic print, 177.8 x 230.8 cm (70 x 90 7/8); 190.5 x 243.5 cm (75 x 95 7/8) - Collection of the Artist. Courtesy Fraenkel Gallery, San Francisco; Pace/MacGill Gallery, New - York; and Marc Selwyn Fine Arts, Los Angeles - Courtesy of The National Gallery of Art - Click to enlarge
The National Gallery of Art will exhibit Richard Misrach: On the Beach in the photography galleries, May 25-September 1. A contemporary American photographer, Misrach’s work “addresses contemporary society's troubled relationship to nature, especially in the American West.” The exhibition, which consists of 19 color photographs from one of his most recent series, On the Beach, will be displayed in five galleries. The large-scale chromogenic prints were made between 2002 and 2005. Misrach was very much affected by the events of September 11, 2001, and his works, despite their beauty, are said to express a sense of disquietude.
The National Gallery of Art is exhibiting In the Forest of Fontainebleau: Painters and Photographers from Corot to Monet through June 8. The forest of Fontainebleau is about 35 miles southeast of the center of Paris, and works created there greatly influenced the development of landscape painting and photography. More than 100 paintings, pastels, and photographs made in the forest from the mid-1820s through the 1870s are being shown in the exhibition. Visit www.nga.gov/press/aes.shtm
The National Geographic Museum will have three new exhibitions to complement the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing. Susan Norton, director of the museum, has said that “Each exhibit presents a unique perspective on China, from modern-day life to the secret world of warrior monks to its marine history 600 years ago.” The first exhibit, Visions of China, is open through July 13 and features photographs taken throughout modern-day China. The photos, which were made for the May 2008 special issue of National Geographic magazine, document tradition and change in the vast and historic country. Next, China’s Forgotten Fleet: Voyages of Zheng He, on view June 11-September 7, will tell the story of a great Chinese armada which sailed nearly a century before Christopher Columbus. Over three decades, the great Admiral Zheng led his fleet of ships to the South Pacific, Persian Gulf and Africa. The exhibition will feature objects, maps and ship models from two Chinese museums to explain Chinese navigation and shipbuilding methods. Also on view June 11-September 7, Shaolin: Temple of Zen will feature Photographs by Justin Guariglia. The photographer gained permission from the secretive warrior monks of the Temple, a Chinese Buddhist sect dedicated to preserving a form of Kung Fu, to create a record of their arts; the temple also marks the birthplace of Zen Buddhism. He photographed the monks in their 1,500-year-old Buddhist temple over the past eight years, and the exhibition includes video as well as still pictures.
The National Geographic Museum in is exhibiting a new outdoor display, “Trash People,” featuring 50 life-size figures sculpted from trash by the German artist HA Schult throughJune 8. Schult creates the figures to raise awareness of the volume of garbage left by humans over a lifetime. Photos of some of Schult’s previous installations are also on view at the Museum. To read more about HA Schult, visit www.haschult.de/ National Geographic is displaying A Camera, Two Kids and a Camel, a new exhibit featuring more than 30 images by photographer Annie Griffiths Belt, through September 14. The images are complemented by four personal stories drawn from Belt’s new book, A Camera, Two Kids and a Camel: My Journey in Photographs, a National Geographic publication which is now in bookstores. Visit www.ngmuseum.org
The National Museum of Women in the Arts (NMWA) is presenting an exhibition of the works of Paula Rego through May 25. Rego, a figurative artist, produces works based on her observations, memories, literature, fantasy, art history, and more.
The NMWA is exhibiting NMWA Collection Focus: Louise Nevelson: Dawn’s Wedding Feast throughMay 18. Nevelson (1899–1988), called her installations “environments.” She created the room-size Dawn’s Wedding Feast in 1959 for an exhibition titled Sixteen Americans at the Museum of Modern Art. The Jewish Museum set about reconstructing the entire room-size white wood installation for a retrospective, and the NMWA then took the opportunity to bring the installation to Washington.
The NMWA is exhibiting Cherel Ito: Recent Donations to the Collection through May 25. The exhibition displays some 30 of the American photographer’s pictures, which she made as she traveled the world. Ito (1947-1999) “regarded her camera as a repository of stories and memories…..” Visit www.nmwa.org/exhibition/detail.asp?exhibitid=171
The Art Galleries at the historic Dumbarton Oaks estate in Georgetown reopened on April 15 after extensive renovations. The galleries feature pre-Columbian and Byzantine art, plus European works. Mildred and Robert Woods Bliss, who purchased the estate in 1920, subsequently donated it to Harvard University in 1940. A pre-Columbian wing, designed by Philip Johnson, was added in 1963. More recently, a gallery has been added commemorating the Bliss family, and the museum gift shop has been enlarged. Visit www.doaks.org/general_info.html
A photo from the exhibition titled "Visions of China," at top, and below, two photos from "Shaolin: Temple of Zen" - by Justin Guariglia - Courtesy of the National Geographic - Click to enlarge
The Music Room at Dumbarton Oaks - Click to enlarge
The Renwick Gallery, which is near the White House, is exhibiting Ornament as Art: Avant-Garde Jewelry from the Helen Williams Drutt Collection through July 6. The exhibition features 275 pieces of contemporary avant-garde jewelry from around the world and explores the history of the craft of making jewelry. The exhibition also includes twenty drawings and watercolors and five constructions and sculptures. Visit www.si.edu/visit/whatsnew/renwk.asp
The Smithsonian American Art Museum (SAAM) is exhibiting Aaron Douglas: African American Modernist through August 3. Douglas (1899-1979) “established a new black aesthetic and utopian vision” in his works in the 1920s through the 1940s. The Harlem Renaissance painter is said to have developed a “radically new visual vocabulary,” by combining Cubism and Art Deco with African and African American imagery. He produced paintings, murals and illustrations for books and journals. The exhibition, which is the first nationally-touring Douglas retrospective, showcases some 80 rarely-seen works, including paintings, prints, drawings, and illustrations. The exhibition was organized by the Spencer Museum of Art at the University of Kansas in Lawrence Visit http://americanart.si.edu/reynolds_center/event.cfm?key=567&exhibit=2781
The SAAM is exhibiting Obata's Yosemite through June 1. Chiura Obata (1885–1975), a Japanese-American artist, visited Yosemite National Park and the Sierra Nevada in 1927 and made about 100 drawings in pencil, sumi ink and watercolor. Obata's Yosemite features 27 watercolors and prints and a series of some 21 progressive proofs. Joann Moser curated the exhibition.
The SAAM is exhibiting Color as Field: American Painting, 1950–1975 through May 26. The exhibition is the first full-scale examination of “the sources, meaning and impact of the Color Field movement.” Some forty paintings are being shown, including works by Gene Davis, Helen Frankenthaler, Morris Louis, Kenneth Noland and Jules Olitski. Joanna Marsh was the coordinating curator in Washington. Visit http://americanart.si.edu/collections/exhibitions.cfml#53
The Gallery at Flashpoint in downtown DC will present Tai Hwa Goh: Horizons Under the Surface, an exhibition of abstract prints, May 22-July 5. The Korean-born artist prints her work on thin Korean paper using aquatint and silkscreen techniques. She then irons thin sheets of beeswax onto the prints. The resulting works are often ironed or mounted onto wood, which imprints the wood grain onto the paper, giving it a more sculptural quality. Goh received an Masters in Fine Arts degree in printmaking and sculpture from University of Maryland in 2004.
Flashpoint in is exhibiting Lucy Hogg: Floating Faces through May 17. Ms. Hogg’s work “captures specific human facial expressions through the art of portraiture.” She “seeks understanding of how and why we as a society read portraits through the filter of our own ahistorical views and preconceptions.” Visit http://flashpointdc.org
At left, Aaron Douglas, Building More Stately Mansions 1944 - Oil on canvas, 54 × 42 in. - Fisk University Galleries, Nashville; and at center, Self-portrait, 1954 - Charcoal and conté drawing on paper, 24 15/16 × 18 7/8 in. - Spencer Museum of Art, The University of Kansas Museum purchase: Peter T. Bohan - Art Acquisition Fund, 1995.0042; and at right, Aspiration, 1936 - Oil on canvas, 60 x 60 in. - Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, Museum purchase from the estate of Thurlow E. Tibbs Jr., the Museum Auxiliary, American Art Trust Fund, Unrestricted Art Trust Fund, and private donations from the people of the Bay Area, 1997.84 - Images courtesy of the Smithsonian American Art Museum - Click to enlarge
Tai Hwa Goh: Horizons Under the Surface - Image courtesy of the Gallery at Flashpoint - Click to enlarge
Joe Shannon - “The Fisherman at Seneca Breaks,” 1983-86-93 - Oil on canvas - 60” x 58” - Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institution - Gift of the Artist in honor of the Smithsonian Institution’s 150thAnniversary, 1996 - The Katzen Arts Center - Click to enlarge
+Added May 2: The Katzen Arts Center at American University is exhibiting three shows through July 27. Joe Shannon is a major exhibition of paintings by the distinguished figurative artist. Shannon was born in Puerto Rico and raised in D.C. He studied at the Corcoran, but is largely self-taught. Shannon worked for many years at the Smithsonian as a designer and curator and now teaches at the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore. The exhibition’s catalogue features an interview with Joe Shannon conducted by James Demetrion, the former director of the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. To read more about the artist, visit www.joeshannonart.com/flash/
Noche Crist is a posthumous retrospective of Washington art’s “unofficial doyen of decadence for almost 60 years.” Crist (1909-2004) was born in Romania and moved to DC with her American husband, David Crist, an Air Force officer, just before the Communists took over her native country. Largely self-taught, her work was often inspired by her childhood in Romania. She worked with acrylics and other media, creating surreal two-and three-dimensional scenes. Crist created her own venue in DC, Gallery 10, where she fostered the work of young artists. Nefeli Massia features the work of the celebrated Greek-born Baltimore artist. The second floor of the museum is being used to exhibit “one of her dynamic and other-worldly environments.”
The Katzen will exhibit a show titled Multiplicitocracy, May 31-July 27. Jack Rasmussen, the museum’s director and curator, worked with students in American University’s Arts Management Program during the spring semester to plan exhibitions and performances for this summer in the museum and in the Abramson Family Recital Hall. The Katzen will exhibit Ladelle Moe, May 31-October 26. The South African-born artist creates out-sized concrete heads and bodies, some of which will be displayed in the museum's Sylvia Berlin Katzen Sculpture Garden. Visit www.american.edu/cas/katzen/museum/exhibitions08spring.cfm
American University’s (AU) Katzen Arts Center is exhibiting five new shows through May 18. Personal Landscapes: Contemporary Art from Israel coincides with the 60th anniversary of the founding of Israel. The Center for Israel Studies and the Naomi and Nehemiah Cohen Foundation has collaborated with the AU Museum in the exhibition, featuring works from fifteen emerging Israeli artists. Their goal is to
“reveal the physical, emotional and intellectual landscape of contemporary Israel.” Willem de Looper is a one-person show examining the Dutch artist’s contributions to color field abstraction over the past fifty years. The artist studied under Ben L. Summerford and Robert Gates at AU and was the curator of the Phillips Collection in D.C. To read more about de Looper, who emigrated to the U.S. in 1950, visit www.phillipscollection.org/american_art/bios/delooper-bio.htm Cosmosis Working displays works by artists Gillian Brown and Inga McCaslin Frick, who share an “interest in the mechanisms of consciousness and perception.” They “play with the confounding tangle of mind and world and our unending need to encompass the unencompassable.” To read more about the artists, who became colleagues in the 1980s, visit www.gillianbrown.com/
Student Exhibitions - presented by the AU Art Department - featuring works by MFA thesis students are on view through May 18. The exhibitions includes paintings, prints, sculptures, design and video installations.
Photos from the Prague Quadrennial 2007 is comprised of thirty-five photographs from the 11th International Competitive Exhibition of Scenography and Theatre Architecture. The exhibition is held every four years and features theatre and scenic design from sixty countries. The exhibition at AU shows how the celebration in June, 2007 transformed the city of Prague into “a living stage for a world theatre.”
The Phillips Collection is exhibiting The Great American Epic: Jacob Lawrence’s Migration Series through October 26. The 60-panel narrative painting depicts the exodus of African Americans from the rural South to the urban North in the 20th century. The colorful work is rarely seen in its entirety. Visitors can share their own stories of migration at a computer kiosk in the Phillips and on the museum web site. Lawrence (1917-2000), who was born in Atlantic City, N.J., painted his Migration Series when he was in his twenties.
The Phillips Collection is exhibiting Degas to Diebenkorn: The Phillips Collects through May 25. French artist Edgar Degas (1834-1917) considered himself a realist, while American-born Richard Diebenkorn (1922 -1993) was an abstract expressionist. The exhibition features the newest additions to the collection. Visit www.phillipscollection.org/html/exhibits.html#upcoming
Joe Shannon - “Fish Camp at Venus Mound, 1991” - Oil on masonite - 25” x 58 1/2” - Courtesy of the artist - The Katzen Arts Center - Click to enlarge
Jacob Lawrence (American, 1917-2000) The Migration Series (1940-41) Panel no. 1 “During World War I there was a great migration north by southern African Americans.” (title and text revised by the artist, 1993) casein tempera on hardboard, 12 x 18 in., The Phillips Collection, D.C., acquired 1942 - Click to enlarge
The Kreeger Museum, on Foxhall Road in NW Washington, is exhibiting Philip Johnson: Architecture as Art, through July 31. An internationally-known architect, Johnson (1906-2005) designed The Kreeger Museum. At the end of his career, Johnson produced architecture that was recognized as sculpture. Curator Hilary Lewis, who had a working relationship with Johnson, showcases his work in the 1990s and beyond. Ms. Lewis provides commentary on what has, until now, been an unpublicized period of his portfolio. The exhibition includes Johnson’s models, drawings, sculpture and photographs, plus works from his personal art collection, including works by Andy Warhol and Frank Stella. Visit http://kreegermuseum.org/programs/exhibitions.asp
The Corcoran Gallery of Art is presenting The American Evolution: A History Through Art through July 27. The exhibition features more than 200 objects from the gallery’s collection in an exploration of the evolution of American life and art over 250 years. Five themes that have shaped our culture will be featured: Money, Land, Politics, Cultural Exchange, and The Modern World. The Corcoran is exhibiting Chance Encounters: Photographs from the Collection of Norman Carr and Carolyn Kinder Carr through June 22. The Carrs began acquiring street photographs in 1978 and continued collecting for thirty years. The exhibition is comprised of sixty images from their private collection. Visit www.corcoran.org/exhibitions/exhibits_future_results.asp?Exhib_ID=216
The National Museum of African Art is exhibiting Treasures 2008 through August 17. The display showcases masterpieces from the museum’s collection and special loans from private collections throughout the United States. Many of the works have never been exhibited publicly in the U.S. Visit http://africa.si.edu/exhibits/upcoming.html
The National Museum of African Art is exhibiting El Anatsui: Gawu, large-scale metal “tapestries” and other sculptures by one of Africa’s leading contemporary artists, through September 7. The exhibition is El Anatsui’s first solo exhibition in the U.S., and he personally installed his works at the museum in early March. He has worked with a variety of media, but has focused recently on discarded metal objects, which he joins together to create works of art celebrating Africa’s cultural heritage. To read more about El Anatsui, visithttp://elanatsui.com/ Visitwww.nmafa.si.edu
The Ripley Center and International Gallery is exhibiting Artists at Work through May 18. The juried exhibition features 70 works by Smithsonian staff, fellows, interns, and volunteers. The show displays works in various media, including paint, canvas, paper, charcoal, pastel, ink, fabric, metal, stone, and clay. Visit www.si.edu/visit/whatsnew/ripley.asp
The Washington National Cathedral is exhibiting Dreamers and Believers: Cathedral Builders through October, 2008 in the Rare Book Library Exhibit Room. The exhibition is part of the celebration of the centennial of the laying of the Cathedral’s foundation stone in 1907. Visit www.cathedral.org/cathedral/programs/exhibits.shtml
The Mansion at Strathmore is exhibiting works by the Baltimore Watercolor Society through May 24. The show is juried by author and workshop instructor Skip Lawrence. Works by artists throughout the region are featured in the First Floor Galleries and in the Gudelsky Gallery Suite. To read more about the Society, which dates back to 1885, visit www.baltimorewatercolorsociety.org/ Visit www.strathmore.org/fineartexhibitions/exhibitions.asp#20293961
The Textile Museum is displaying an exhibition titled Blue through September 18. The The exhibition includes blue textiles which were produced from ancient times using natural indigo dyes - up to the present. The display features works of contemporary Japanese artist Hiroyuki Shindo and works by Venezuelans Maria Eugenia Davila and Eduardo Portillo. Visit www.textilemuseum.org/exhibitions/current/BLUE/exhibition_BLUE.htm
The Textile Museum is exhibiting The Finishing Touch: Accessories from the Bolivian Highlands through September 18. The museum recently acquired the accessories, which include woven and knitted belts, bags and other items, and they complement the museum’s collection of Bolivian textiles. Regional variations are reflected in the range of techniques, patterns and items in the exhibition and characterize the cultural wealth of the highlands. Visitwww.textilemuseum.org/exhibitions/upcoming.htm
The HirshhornMuseum & Sculpture Garden is presenting Directions -- Amy Sillman: Third Person Singular through July 6. The New York-based painter’s works “embrace abstraction without abandoning representation.” She first depicts figures in relationship to one another, but her work becomes, in effect, “sculptural,” as she overlaps and rearranges sections. Visit www.si.edu/visit/whatsnew/hmsg.asp
The Kreeger Museum, at top, and below, DaMonsta and the Children’s Museum, Guadalajara by Philip Johnson - Click to enlarge
An object from the exhibition titled "Treasures 2008" - Courtesy of the National Museum of African Art - Click to enlarge
Kimono, Japan, Honshu, Niigata Prefecture, Echigo, first half of the 20th century. Plain weave, weft-resist dyed (weft ikat), Asa (hemp or ramie). The Textile Museum - Click to enlarge
The National Building Museum is exhibiting Eero Saarinen: Shaping the Future through August 23. One of the most prolific and celebrated architects of the mid-20th century, Saarinen designed the St. Louis Gateway Arch, the terminal at Dulles International Airport, the sculptural ‘Tulip’ Chair and much more. The exhibition is the first full retrospective of Saarinen’s career and sheds new light on “the least-known famous architect of the 20th century.” The architect is seen “as a person” and in his relationships with family, colleagues, and the press. In addition to his iconic designs, designs for unbuilt works are being shown. Also, material from his archives can be seen for the first time, including sketches, documents, large-scale models, photographs, a full-scale façade mock-up, correspondence, original furniture samples, and a specially-commissioned documentary film. The Patron of the exhibition is Her Excellency Tarja Halonen, the President of the Republic of Finland. Visit www.nbm.org
The Arthur M. Sackler Gallery will present Yellow Mountain: China's Ever-Changing Landscape, May 31-August 24. Yellow Mountain is one of China’s most beautiful sights, with peaks soaring thousands of feet. The artist Xuezhuang (ca. 1646-1719), who was a monk, created 43 woodblock prints which popularized the mountain. The exhibition will present ten leaves from his album, plus some hanging scrolls and a 20-foot-long handscroll dated 1704. Painter Hongren (1610-1664), who was also a monk, was equally fascinated by the Yellow Mountain range, which he painted with “angular brushstrokes and the repetitive use of overlapping rectilinear forms.” Joseph Chang, associate curator of Chinese art at the Freer and Sackler Galleries, curated the exhibition.
The Sackler Gallery is exhibiting MURAQQA: Imperial Mughal Albums from the Chester Beatty Library, Dublin, through August 3. The exhibition begins a year of "Inspired by India" programming at the Sackler and Freer Galleries. Muraqqa is the Persian word for lavish imperial albums which were commissioned by emperors of the Mughal Empire of India from the 16th through the 19th centuries. The albums illustrated the private lives of the imperial family, Sufi saints, mystics, history, courtier and allies. The greatest Mughal artists of the era produced paintings for the albums. Sir Alfred Chester Beatty, an American industrialist and philanthropist, began collecting Mughal paintings at the start of the 20th century and established a library in Dublin, Ireland in 1954. The exhibition is comprised of 86 of the jewel-like paintings, plus works from the Freer’s collection of Mughal paintings. The Muraqqa exhibition was curated by Elaine Wright, curator of the Islamic Collections at the Chester Beatty Library. Debra Diamond, associate curator of south and southeast Asian art at the Freer and Sackler galleries, coordinated the exhibition. To read more about the Chester Beatty Library, visit www.cbl.ie/About-Us/The-Chester-Beatty-Library.aspx
The Sackler Gallery is presenting Perspectives: Y.Z. Kami through October 26. The exhibition features three new works by the artist. Two large portraits depict individuals in meditation, while a third combines poetry and religious architecture using collage and verses from the Mathnawi of Jalaluddin Rumi (1207-1273). Visit www.si.edu/visit/whatsnew/sga.asp
The Freer Gallery of Art is exhibiting Tea for Everyone: Japanese Popular Ceramics for Tea Drinking through September 7. The focus is on the time when powdered tea (matcha) became popular among less aristocratic Japanese, e.g., artisans, townspeople, and farmers. The exhibition features containers used by people of modest means for sharing tea: tea-leaf storage jars, water jars, tea bowls, cups, and pots. Visit www.si.edu/visit/whatsnew/fga.asp
The Freer Gallery is exhibiting Tales of the Brush Continued: Chinese Paintings with Literary Themes through July 27. Chinese artists have always found inspiration in literature for their paintings and calligraphy. For centuries, they have depicted mythical scenes, illustrated historical events, and interpreted poems and stories. Visit http://www.asia.si.edu/exhibitions/future.htm
At left, Landscapes for Mr. Liweng - Xuezhuang (Chinese, (d. ca. 1646-1719) - China, Qing dynasty, December 18, 1695 - Album of eighteen leaves; Ink and color on paper—22.5X29.2 cm - Freer Gallery of Art, Smithsonian Institution, Gift of Charles Lang Freer and at right, Cloudy Valley Retreat in the Yellow Mountains - Hongren (1610-1664) China, Qing dynasty, mid 17th century Ink on paper 232.3 x 61.9 - Freer Gallery of Art, Smithsonian Institution, Gift of Charles Lang Freer - Click to enlarge
A Garden Gathering with a Prince in a Green Jama - A single folio from the Minto Album - Bichitr, c. 1615-20 - Colored pigments and gold on paper - Chester Beatty Library, Dublin, Ireland - Courtesy of The Sackler Gallery - Click to enlarge
The Meridian International Center is displaying a new exhibition, Jam Session: America’s Jazz Ambassadors Embrace the World, through July 13. Jazz legends including Dizzy Gillespie, Louis Armstrong, Dave Brubeck, Duke Ellington, and Benny Goodman toured more than 35 countries as cultural diplomats during the Cold War. The exhibition includes nearly 100 photographs of their performances, plus documents which chronicle the tours. Visit www.meridian.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=230&Itemid=15
The National Portrait Gallery is exhibiting Zaida Ben-Yusuf: New York Portrait Photographer through September 1. The British-born Ben-Yusuf (1869-1933) became a leading pictorialist photographer in late 19th- and early 20th-century New York. She was the first woman to build a successful career by photographing prominent Americans. To read more about Ben-Yusuf, visit www.si.edu/opa/insideresearch/articles/V16_PortraitPhotographer.html
Edith Warton by Zaida Ben-Yusuf - Platinum print, c.1901 - Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University - Images courtesy of the National Portrait Gallery - Click to enlarge
The National Portrait Gallery will exhibit Ballyhoo! Posters as Portraits, May 19-March 1, 2009. Some sixty posters, which function as portraits, will be shown. They range from the late 19th century to the present. The subjects depicted include many American icons, e.g., General Pershing, “Buffalo Bill” Cody, Joe Louis, Judy Garland, and others. The posters convey varied messages, from selling war bonds, to announcing the circus arrival, to advertising products, to publicizing films and concerts. The point is made that the posters “invariably project the public image, enhancing, promoting, exploiting, or upgrading the information we subconsciously absorb about celebrity figures.” Visit www.npg.si.edu Please see the HISTORY column for information about another Portrait Gallery exhibition, Herblock’s Presidents: “Puncturing Pomposity,” which is on display through November 30.
The National Portrait Gallery is exhibiting Edward Steichen: Portraits through September 1. The exhibition features fifty images drawn from the Gallery’s collection of Steichen photographs. Steichen (1879-1973) was a painter, art gallery and museum curator as well as a pictorialist photographer. The focus is on his work created between 1923 and 1936, when he was the chief photographer for Vanity Fair magazine. The National Portrait Gallery is exhibiting New Arrivals through January 4, 2009. The rotating exhibition highlights newly-acquired objects in the gallery’s collection, including paintings, drawings, sculptures, posters, prints, and photographs. Among the new acquisitions are a portrait of Judy Garland by Andy Warhol, portraits of Robert Oppenheimer and Albert Einstein by Alfred Eisenstaedt, and Carolina Herrera by Robert Mapplethorpe. The National Portrait Gallery is exhibiting RECOGNIZE! Hip Hop and Contemporary Portraiture through October 26. The popular and influential musical form called Hip Hop emerged in the 1970s. The exhibition features works by artists who have explored Hip Hop, including photographs by David Scheinbaum, portraits by Kehinde Wiley, and poems by Nikki Giovanni, which are “interpreted artistically” by artist Shinique Smith. The National Portrait Gallery is exhibiting "One Life: Katharine Hepburn,” through October 5, 2008. The exhibition includes her Oscar statues, images from her career and personal life, and a video of film clips from her performances in films and on television and from interviews. Visit www.npg.si.edu
The Ann Loeb Bronfman Gallery in the Washington DCJCC is exhibiting 'L(A)ttitudes' 31° 71' N 35° 10' W through June 2. Ten contemporary artists "explore mapping, borders and boundaries of Israel and Palestine." Visit http://washingtondcjcc.org/center-for-arts/gallery/
The Popcorn Gallery and the Art Glass Center at Glen Echo Park will present an exhibition of art glass sculpture and vessels titled Perspectives, May 31-June 29. The ten resident and studio artists participating will be Michaela Borghese, Awie Botes, Diane Cabe, Christine Hekimian, Sue Hill, Wendy Jarcho, Bev and Zayde Sleph, Laurie Tompkins, and Bobbi Vischi. They come from all over the world and from many walks of life, and they share a love for the beautiful art of glass making. Visit www.glenechopark.org/
BOOKS & CONVERSATIONS: The Folger Shakespeare Library will present poet Lucille Clifton in a conversation moderated by poet Sonia Sanchez on Tuesday, May 13. Ms. Clifton’s first book Good Times, was published in 1969, and like her subsequent work, it “binds deceptively simple language with an emotional punch.” In addition to reading some of her own poetry, she will read her favorites by other poets. Ms. Clifton was elected a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets in 1999 and has served as Poet Laureate for the State of Maryland. She is now a Distinguished Professor of Humanities at St. Mary's College of Maryland. Sonia Sanchez is a distinguished African American poet who has authored several books of poetry, plays and children's books. Visit www.folger.edu/woSummary.cfm?wotypeid=4&season=c&woid=410#dtls
+Added May 5:The Washington DCJCC and Nextbook will present author Amy Bloom, who will be interviewed by journalist and book reviewer Bethanne Patrick, at the Washington DCJCC on Tuesday, May 20. A practicing psychotherapist, Amy Bloom has written two novels and two collections of short stories.Her new novel, Away, is about a young woman who flees a pogrom in Lithuania to a new, but perilous, life in the Lower East Side of New York.An epic adventure, it’s also a story of self-invention, love and survival. Nextbook, a non-profit organization, commissions books on Jewish themes; sponsors public lectures, readings, and performances; and publishes an online magazine. Visit www.nextbook.org/localprograms/eventdetail.html?id=239&market=DC
