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Painting
Art and Design


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Explore the Collections
African Art Museum African Art Museum
The National Museum of African Art exhibits the finest examples of traditional and contemporary art from the entire continent of Africa
Ask Joan of Art American Art Museum
Art information specialists at the American Art Museum will answer your questions
Freer and Sackler Galleries Freer and Sackler Galleries
Asian and a specialized collection of American art
Hirshhorn Museum Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden
Collects, promotes and displays modern and contemporary art from around the world
Portrait Gallery Portrait Gallery
The museum celebrates the extraordinary creativity of American artists, whose works are windows on the American experience
 
General
A Day in the Life: Diaries from the Archives of American Art
A look at the private thoughts of artists and others affiliated with the art world, through their personal diaries
American Art: James McNeill Whistler
This interactive explores the artist's life and art
Archive of African Artists
Twenty-one African artists, from eleven countries, illustrated through exhibition announcements and gallery brochures
Arte Latino
Celebrates the vitality of Latino art traditions from the 18th - 20th centuries
Director's Choice
American Art Museum Director Elizabeth Broun's personal favorites from the collection
Dream Worlds
Modern Japanese Prints and Paintings from the Robert O. Muller Collection
American Ashcan and Scene Painting
An Edward Hopper Scrapbook
A look at Hopper's life, his friends and his paintings
Metropolitan Lives: The Ashcan Artists and Their New York
Explores the urban vision of the six Ashcan artists
Scenes of American Life
Paintings of America during the 20th century
American Impressionism
Abbott Handerson Thayer
A look at the life and work of this "soul painter"
American Impressionism
Presents canvases full of light and color
The Gilded Age
American art before World War I
The Peacock Room
James McNeill Whistler transformed his patron's dining room into a landmark of interior design
American Portrait Painting
1846: Portrait of the Nation
To commemorate the 150th anniversary of the Smithsonian, this exhibition looks back at the America of 1846
A Brush With History: Paintings from the Portrait Gallery
A sample of the Gallery's holdings characterizing the diversity of its portraits
Breaking Racial Barriers: African Americans in the Harmon Foundation Collection
Selected portraits from the 1920s
Edith Wharton’s World: Portraits of People and Places
Portrays a fascinating segment of the American experience
Franklin and His Friends: Portraying the Man of Science in Eighteenth-Century America
Portraits of men who shared a passion for science
George and Martha Washington: Portraits from the Presidential Years
A look at the Washingtons from the perspective of their contemporaries
George C. Marshall: Soldier of Peace
Remembering Marshall and the leaders with whom he helped shape history for much of the twentieth century
George Washington: A National Treasure
An in-depth look at the famous Gilbert Stuart portrait
Hall of Presidents
Evoking the history of the nation's highest office and the individuals who have occupied it
Mr. President: Profiles of Our Nation's Leaders
Learn about the men who have held America's highest office
Native American Portraits
A gallery of influential Native Americans
Portraits of the Presidents
Evoking the history of the nation's highest office and the individuals who have occupied it
Rebels: Painters and Poets of the 1950’s
Portraits of poets anchored by their words
The Age of Revolution
Portraits of some key people in the American Revolution
The Amistad Case
Portraits illustrating this signal event to the Civil War
The Seneca Falls Convention
The first Woman's Rights Convention
Theodore Roosevelt: Icon of the American Century
A retrospective about the man whose progressive ideas significantly shaped our national character
Hudson River School and American Romanticism
Young America
Traces America's transformation from colonies to nationhood through its art
Landscape Painting
Panoramas: The North American Landscape in Art
Celebrates the diverse landscapes of North America
Modern and Contemporary Painting
A Concrete Vision: Oshogbo Art in the 1960s
Selected works by eleven early Oshogbo artists
American Kaleidoscope: Themes and Perspectives in Recent Art
A sampling of American art at the close of the 20th century
Chant Avedissian: A Contemporary Artist of Egypt
A look at the work of this renowned artist
Claiming Art/Reclaiming Space: Post-Apartheid Art from South Africa
Works of twenty-one South African artists
Encounters with the Contemporary
Selection of modern art from the African Art Museum Collection
Explore the Hirshhorn Collection
Online collection search
Lia Cook: Material Allusions
Textile painter
Modernism and Abstraction
Shows radical transformations of American art in the 20th century
Textures - Words & Symbol in Contemporary African Art
The interplay of word, image and space creates visual poetry in these contemporary installations
The Poetics of Line: Seven Artists of the Nsukka Group, Nigeria
Seven artists who have appropriated the traditional Igbo designs called uli
Transatlantic Dialogue: In and Out of Africa
Explores the varied ways that African and African American artists interpret their ideas and identities
Wayne Thiebaud: Memories and Delights
A celebration of the life and art of Wayne Thiebaud
Paintings of the American West
Lure of the West
Portraits and landscapes from the American west
Tracking the Buffalo: Stories from a Buffalo Hide Painting
This activity explores the role of the buffalo in the lives of the American Indians of the northern plains
Religious Painting
Devi: The Great Goddess
Six aspects of the Indian goddess Devi
Himalayas: An Aesthetic Adventure
World's finest examples of Himalayan art and sacred objects at the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery
Tibetan Healing Mandala
Documents the creation of a sacred sand painting for healing and protection
Self-Taught Painting
Contemporary Folk Art
Showcases self-taught American artists over the last 40 years
Paint by Number: Accounting for Taste in the 1950’s
Revisit the popular hobby from the vantage point's of creators, critics and consumers
Museums
African Art Museum
Collection, study and exhibition of African art
American Art Museum and its Renwick Gallery
Permanent collection and exhibitions of American art and crafts
Freer and Sackler Galleries
Asian and a specialized collection of American art
Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden
Collects, promotes and displays modern and contemporary art
Portrait Gallery
Portraits of distinguished Americans
Research
American Art Museum and Portrait Gallery Library
Collection of resource materials covering American art, history, and biography
Archives of American Art
The largest collection of documents on the history of the visual arts in the United States
Related Links
American History Museum
Works of art fill its collections and testify to the vital place of art in everyday American life
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