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A tall woman with pale white skin and a shorter man with brown skin stand on a terrace in this vertical, full-length portrait. At the center, the woman wears a voluminous, long-sleeved, black dress with a row of gold buttons down the bodice. She has a wide, gray ruffled collar at her neck and red ruffled cuffs at her wrists. Her brown hair is pulled back under a cap ornamented with rows of white pearls. She looks at us close-lipped down the bridge of her straight nose. She holds a sprig of orange blossoms in her right hand, on our left. The second person leans into the space from our right as he reaches to hold a crimson-red parasol over and behind the woman’s head. He is cleanshaven with short, dark hair and brown eyes. He wears an amber-yellow garment over a white shirt. Fluted columns rise along the right edge of the composition, and the terrace is enclosed with a low balustrade. Plants surround the woman's feet, and a distant landscape below a blue sky is visible to our left.
Sir Anthony van Dyck, Marchesa Elena Grimaldi Cattaneo, 1623, oil on canvas, Widener Collection, 1942.9.92
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Rectangles and bands of saturated colors are stacked agasint a golden yellow field in this abstract, vertical painting. About a quarter of the way down the composition a thin strip of vibrant orange rests on a thicker, wider band of deep plum purple, which almost spans the width of the canvas. Just below and as wide as the purple band, the largest, velvety black rectangle takes up at least a third of the composition. A narrower rectangular area below was painted with copper green over rusty orange. The edges of all of the forms are soft and blended.
Mark Rothko, Untitled, 1949, pigmented hide glue and oil on canvas, Gift of The Mark Rothko Foundation, Inc., 1986.43.138
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A pale turquoise footbridge arching over a pond lined with tall grasses and filled with petal-pink and butter-yellow waterlilies spans this horizontal landscape painting. The scene is loosely painted with touches of vibrant color. In the top third of the composition, the shallowly arched bridge nearly touches the top edge of the canvas, and it extends off each side. The shadows on the bridge are painted with eggplant purple. Bands of waterlilies gently zigzag into the distance on the surface of the water. The spring and emerald-green grasses growing along the banks fill the space around and over the pond, and they blend into a screen of trees beyond that enclose the scene. The green of the grasses and trees is reflected in the surface of the water, as is the underside of the bridge. The artist signed and dated the work with dark paint in the lower right corner: “Claude Monet 99.”
Claude Monet, The Japanese Footbridge, 1899, oil on canvas, Gift of Victoria Nebeker Coberly, in memory of her son John W. Mudd, and Walter H. and Leonore Annenberg, 1992.9.1
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Black lines and one small, black triangular shape stand out against patches of color, in indigo and sky blue, pumpkin orange, butter yellow, emerald green, and ruby red, against a white background in this vertical, abstract painting. The paint seems thinly applied, resembling watercolor. Near the lower right corner, the black shape is roughly triangular and has five curving, parallel lines emanating from the bottom. Given the title of this painting, Improvisation 31, Sea Battle, the black lines could represent tall masts and outlines of sails amid areas of vibrant color that make up a boat and water around it.
Wassily Kandinsky, Improvisation 31 (Sea Battle), 1913, oil on canvas, Ailsa Mellon Bruce Fund, 1978.48.1
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Four people with black skin are squeezed into a narrow boat on bright, turquoise-colored water that nearly fills this stylized, square painting. All four sides of the unstretched canvas are lined with six gromets spaced along each edge. The boat approaches a carnival-like tunnel near the upper right corner. Cartoon ghosts loom at the tunnel entrance and a translucent, veil-like ghost hovers over the left half of the painting. The horizon comes almost to the top of the canvas, where white clouds float against an azure-blue sky. A long, lemon-yellow line curls back and forth in a tight, curving zigzag pattern that widens out from a tiny sun setting on the horizon. A red cross on a white field floats near the upper left. At the top center, the word “WOW” appears in white letters within a crimson-red, bursting speech bubble with long trailing tendrils, like an exploded firework. Below the boat and against the water to our right, the word “FUN” has been overlaid with a white square so the tall, white letters are barely visible. The words “GREAT AMERICA” appear in a curling banner across the bottom half of the painting.
Kerry James Marshall, Great America, 1994, acrylic and collage on canvas, Gift of the Collectors Committee, 2011.20.1
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This abstract, geometric painting has been tipped on one corner to create a diamond form rather than a square. The surface of the canvas is crisscrossed by an irregular grid of black lines running vertically and horizontally like offset ladders. The black lines create squares and rectangles of different sizes, and the width of the lines vary slightly. One complete square sits at the center of the composition and is painted white. Other rectangles are incomplete, their corners sliced by the edge of the canvas, and each is a different shade of white with hints of pale blue and gray. The black grid creates triangular forms where it meets the angled edge of the canvas in some places, and some of these are filled with flat areas of color. A tomato-red triangle is placed to the left of the top center point, and a vibrant yellow triangle is to the left of the lower center point. A black triangle is next to it at the bottom center, and a cobalt-blue triangle is situated just below the right point. The painting is signed with the artist’s initials at the lower center: “PM.”
Piet Mondrian, Tableau No. IV; Lozenge Composition with Red, Gray, Blue, Yellow, and Black, c. 1924/1925, oil on canvas, Gift of Herbert and Nannette Rothschild, 1971.51.1
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A violin, bow, and at least two pages of sheet music hang from a dark, forest-green, wooden door in this vertical painting. The string holding the violin hangs from a nail at the top center of the composition. The violin takes up the top two-thirds of the painting. The wood body of the instrument is a deep chestnut brown alongside the fingerboard, and it lightens to tawny brown at the corners. White powder coats the strings near the bridge and gathers on the instrument beneath it, where the strings are played. The bow hangs to our right, and it and the violin overlap sheets of music, which curl at the corners. Several pins or nails are pounded into the wooden door, and a few small holes and vertical cracks mar its surface. The door’s handle is a metal ring hanging at the center to our left, and bracket-shaped arms of two rusty hinges nearly span the width of the painting from the right edge. A bolt is missing from the top hinge, and the rightmost section of the bottom hinge has been broken off. A scrap of newspaper is pasted on the door just below the violin, to our left, but the text is illegible. Finally, the corner of a pale blue envelope has been tucked into the edge of the painting near the lower left. A black and white postage stamp with the number 25 is affixed to the upper right corner, and the envelope has been stamped several times. Cursive writing of the address reads, “W. M. Harnett 28 East 14th St New York.” The word “Chargé” has been penned in the lower left corner of the envelope. A circular cancelation stamp near the postage stamp locates and dates the envelope: “PARIS 3 27 AVRIL 86.”
William Michael Harnett, The Old Violin, 1886, oil on canvas, Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Richard Mellon Scaife in honor of Paul Mellon, 1993.15.1
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Four people with pale skin are gathered to our right in a landscape, their heads bowed down toward an infant who lies on a white cloth on the ground in this horizontal painting. The nude baby has a rounded belly, chubby limbs, and short blond hair. To our right and near the edge of the panel, a woman kneels with her hands in prayer, looking toward the baby so she faces our left in profile. She wears a lapis-blue robe over a rose-pink dress, and a white cloth covers her head and shoulders. Behind her and to our left, a man with a white beard, wearing a golden yellow robe, sits or kneels next to a rock at the mouth of a cave cut into a rocky outcropping that extends off the top of the composition. To the left of the baby and at the center of the foreground, a pair of men wear tattered clothing and hold shepherd’s staffs. The man closer to us kneels with his hands pressed together in prayer as the man behind him bends his knee as if to kneel. The landscape recedes deep into the distance on the left half of the painting with a winding river, houses and other buildings, grassy hills, and mountains beneath a blue sky. A small winged angel wearing white looks down on the scene from the upper left corner.
Giorgione, The Adoration of the Shepherds, 1505/1510, oil on panel, Samuel H. Kress Collection, 1939.1.289
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This tall, abstract, bronze, free-standing sculpture is made up of five thin, elongated geometric shapes stacked vertically. The surface of the bronze is dark, pewter gray, and it is photographed against a lighter gray background. The sculpture stands on a square, plate-like, silver-colored base. Starting at the bottom, the first section is a tall, narrow, rectangular column with a pitted surface and irregular edges, as if the corners had been hammered. The next vertical section is a slender, smooth, leaf-shaped object that swells at the top and tapers to a point where it meets the column below. A wide, narrow sliver balances horizontally across the leaf-like object, and it tapers to points to our left and right. Above, a vertical capsule-shaped form is painted with two small, vertical, wavy lines in white. Finally, another horizontal form with a hammered surface tops the structure. It is pinched at the center and swells slightly to either side before tapering to points. The leaf form and capsule shapes are about the same height. The topmost horizontal piece is slightly wider than the lower one.
Louise Bourgeois, The Winged Figure, 1948, cast 1991, bronze, Gift of Louise Bourgeois, 1992.101.1
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This shield-shaped painting shows a young man with pale, peachy skin and curling brown hair standing astride the severed head of a man with dark hair and tanned skin. The painting is wider at the top and tapers like a pint glass to a narrower base. The young man, David, holds the end of long red slingshot with his right hand. The slingshot is weighted by a rock and swings behind his body. His sleeveless rust-red garment is cinched at his waist over a long white shirt. Both garments skim David’s thighs and his legs and feet are bare. Long, curling brown hair frames the ashen and bloodied upturned face of the head at David’s feet. A palm-sized stone is embedded in that forehead. The landscape background is made up of gray boulders, a meandering river, and low palm-like trees. Frothy white clouds sweep across an azure-blue sky.
Andrea del Castagno, David with the Head of Goliath, c. 1450/1455, tempera on leather on wood, Widener Collection, 1942.9.8
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This nearly square painting shows an industrial area with buildings, storage silos, a smokestack, and railroad tracks. A mound of brown dirt or other material is in shadow in the lower left corner of the painting. Next to the mound, railroad tracks extend diagonally from the lower center of the painting into the distance to our right. The tracks end at a white building with staggered gray rooflines to our right in the distance. A tall terracotta-red smokestack rises high beyond the white building, smoke pouring out of its top and blending into the clouds above. Just beyond the mound of dirt, piles of white material, perhaps in unseen bins, line the railroad track to our left and lead back to a row ten interconnected, coral-orange silos. The horizon comes about halfway up the painting, and it is lined with a row of long white and gray warehouses. The artist signed and dated the work with brown paint in the lower right corner: “Sheeler 31.”
Charles Sheeler, Classic Landscape, 1931, oil on canvas, Collection of Barney A. Ebsworth, 2000.39.2
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A cup carved from stone is mounted in gold fittings to create a jeweled chalice with handles that curl up each side and a tall, flaring foot below. The stone of the cup is swirled with shell pink and rust brown, and carved to create vertical ridges. The gold rim around the lip flares outward and is set with a band of alternating pairs of small, white pearls and mostly garnet-red stones, though one stone to our right is a muted blue. In this photograph, the handles curve up each side from the base of the stone cup to the gold lip, where the handle divides into two scrolling tendrils on either side of a teardrop shaped center, like curling petals. The base and foot are as tall as the stone cup and gold lip. A knob-like form just below the stone cup is set with deep red and jade green stones around its center, and rows of small pearls around the narrow top and bottom of the knob. The knob is chased to create a pattern of scrolling vines, like tracery. The flaring foot below is also chased with the same pattern, surrounding gold, oval medallions set at regular intervals in the foot. In our view, the medallion to the left shows a bunch of grapes and the center is a portrait of a bearded man with a halo, holding his right hand up with his first two fingers raised. The details on the medallion to our right are difficult to make out but it could be a sheaf of wheat. Small, round jewels are set above and below each medallion, and between each one.
French 12th Century, Alexandrian 2nd Century B.C., Alexandrian 1st Century B.C., Chalice of the Abbot Suger of Saint-Denis, 2nd/1st century B.C. (cup); 1137-1140 (mounting), sardonyx cup with heavily gilded silver mounting, adorned with filigrees set with stones, pearls, glass insets, and opaque white glass pearls, Widener Collection, 1942.9.277
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A band of indigenous Americans ride horses toward and through a herd of buffalo, which spreads along a river that winds through plains to mountains in the deep distance in this horizontal landscape painting. The scene is lit with golden light that warms the browns and harvest yellow of the landscape. Several dead or injured buffalo lie across the ground close to us, along with the body of one hunter, barely visible between the bodies of two animals. Just beyond the corpses, one hunter rides a rearing white horse as he lifts a spear lined with feathers high over a charging buffalo to our right of center. Facing away from us, the rider has light brown skin and a feather headdress over long dark hair. He wears a pumpkin-orange loincloth and red and orange bands encircle the ankle, thigh, wrist, and upper arm facing us. Sage-green grass grows in tufts on the dirt ground, which is littered with several animal skulls around the charging buffalo and rider. A smaller buffalo looks on from our left, and a prairie dog pokes its head out of hole in the ground in the lower left corner. A little distance away to our right, along the edge of the canvas, seven hunters gallop into the scene, leaning forward over their horses’ necks. The dozen or so buffalo nearby, as well as a fox and two deer, move away from the hunters, headed to our left. Hundreds of buffalo dot the landscape along the banks of the winding river and some wade in the water. A few trees rise on the plain but the land is mostly flat until it reaches the mountains and cliffs along the horizon, which comes halfway up this composition. Forms along the horizon could be a line of clouds or snow-covered moutains in the deep distance. A few wispy white clouds float across the watery blue sky above. The artist signed the work in the lower right corner: “Albert Bierstadt.”
Albert Bierstadt, The Last of the Buffalo, 1888-1889, oil on canvas, Corcoran Collection (Gift of Mary Stewart Bierstadt [Mrs. Albert Bierstadt]), 2014.79.5
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A woman with pale skin and dressed in white sits on a couch gazing into the distance to our left as she raises one arm to stroke a black cat perched on her shoulder in this vertical portrait. Shown from the lap up, the woman’s dress has voluminous, puffed, elbow-length sleeves and a high collar, and her narrow waist is cinched with a white sash. Her dark brown hair is parted down the middle and tied back, and she has pale blue eyes and pink lips. She reaches up to the cat with her left hand, on our right, and her other hand, farther from us, rests flat in her lap. The black cat looks at us with greenish-yellow eyes as it almost disappears into the dark brown background above the white couch, which is decorated with a blue pattern. The artist signed the work with dark letters in the lower left corner: “Cecilia Beaux.”
Cecilia Beaux, Sita and Sarita, c. 1921, oil on canvas, Corcoran Collection (Museum Purchase, William A. Clark Fund), 2014.79.1
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We look slightly down into a lime-green and white rowboat carrying a woman holding a baby and a man in this nearly square painting. The man wears midnight-blue shoes, pants, jacket, and soft, floppy cap. He sits with his back to us, bending forward to row the boat, which is cropped by the bottom edge of the canvas. The left side of his ruddy face is visible over his left shoulder. The woman and baby both have pale skin. The woman and baby sit across from the man, facing us to our left in the bow. The woman’s long-sleeved, sky-blue dress is crosshatched with pink lines. The baby leans back in the woman’s arms, and wears a pink dress, blue socks, and brown shoes. The wide-brimmed hats on both the woman and baby are painted pale celery green. They gaze toward or just past the man. The corner of the boat’s sail, also painted pale green, is pulled taunt by the wind to our left. Azure-blue water surrounds the boat up to the high horizon line, which brushes the top edge of the painting. The shoreline in the distance is lined with trees and dotted with white houses with red roofs.
Mary Cassatt, The Boating Party, 1893/1894, oil on canvas, Chester Dale Collection, 1963.10.94
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A uniformed policeman standing in front of a dense crowd of men holding protest signs in English and Japanese nearly fills the height of this vertical black and white photograph. The policeman either has a ruddy complexion or his face might be in shadow. He stands with his body facing us but he turns his head to our left in profile. His hands are crossed over his chest and one thumb is hooked into his jacket between two of the eight brass buttons down the front. A seven-pointed star reflects light on his chest and his flat-topped hat has a short, shiny brim angled down over his eyes. The jacket comes to his knees and his pants are lined with gold or other light material down the side. His feet are widely planted, and he wears dark shoes. The men in the crowd behind appear to be light skinned. Many wear button-down, collared shirts with ties tucked into long coats. Many also wear fedora hats and look off to our left, the same direction as the policeman. One man to our right wearing a floppy cap and glasses looks out at us with his hands in his jacket pockets. Some of the legible English words on the protest signs read “UNION,” “AMERICAN PRESS SLANDER against the,” and “JA.”
Dorothea Lange, Street Demonstration, San Francisco, 1934, gelatin silver print, Diana and Mallory Walker Fund and Robert Menschel and the Vital Projects Fund, in Honor of the 25th Anniversary of Photography at the National Gallery of Art, 2015.183.1
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Shown from the knees up, a woman with brown, wrinkled skin, wearing a white blouse, apron, and black skirt is shown in front of a pale gray background in this vertical portrait painting. Straight-backed, she faces and looks at us with her hands resting in her lap. Her wavy, iron-gray hair is parted in the center and pulled back from her face. Her eyebrows are slightly raised, and her face is deeply lined down her cheeks and around her mouth. She wears a heart-shaped brooch with a red stone at its center at her neck and a gold band on her left ring finger. The light coming from our left casts a shadow against the wall to our right. The artist signed and dated the painting in the lower right corner: “A.J. MOTLEY. JR. 1922.”
Archibald John Motley Jr., Portrait of My Grandmother, 1922, oil on canvas, Patrons' Permanent Fund, Avalon Fund, and Motley Fund, 2018.2.1
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Theaster Gates, Ground Rules (black line), 2015, wood flooring, Gift of the Collectors Committee, 2018.11.1
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A young man sets out in a golden boat on a river that winds from the bottom right corner of this horizontal painting across a lush landscape and into the distance before disappearing beyond two rocky outcroppings far off to our right. Hazy in the distance, the jagged peaks of a barren red mountain rise into an almost cloudless blue sky. To our left, a semi-transparent, white palace looms above and beyond the mountain, filling most of the upper left quadrant of the composition. Hills and valleys leading from the mountain and palace are dotted with trees and carpeted with grass. A winged and haloed angel wearing a white robe stands on the bank of the river under a towering palm tree in the foreground, in the bottom right corner of the canvas. The angel has pale skin and long golden hair. One hand is lifted toward the palace or a young man in a boat in the river nearby. The small boat is angled away from the riverbank to our left and toward the palace. The boat is ornately decorated and at its bow, a winged, golden figure holds an hourglass aloft above her head. The young man has pale skin, shoulder-length brown hair, and he wears a red and gold tunic. A profusion of flowers and trees line the riverbank.
Thomas Cole, The Voyage of Life: Youth, 1842, oil on canvas, Ailsa Mellon Bruce Fund, 1971.16.2
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This horizontal tapestry is divided into three vertical sections by architectural columns and arches. The center column is a little wider than those to either side, but all three sections are packed with people, all with ivory-white skin. In the center column, a crowned Jesus is seated on a throne at the top center. His elaborately patterned robe falls in folds down past his feet. He hovers above a landscape view, which is flanked in the foreground by groups of men and women. About a dozen people are clustered on each side, many of them looking up at Jesus, and most of them wearing religious garments that range from monks and nuns to cardinals and bishops. Two crowned men kneel to our right in the center panel, their hands pressed together in prayer. Each column on either side of the central panel is divided so there is a smaller vignette above taller vignettes below. Large groups of people gather in each scene. Much of the tapestry’s surface is now brown, but it is punctuated throughout with patches of rust red, sky blue, and pale yellow.
Netherlandish 16th Century, The Triumph of Christ ("The Mazarin Tapestry"), c. 1500, tapestry: undyed wool warp; dyed wool, silk, and silver-gilt- and silver-wrapped silk weft, Widener Collection, 1942.9.446
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This square portrait shows the head and shoulders of a young woman in front of a spiky bush that fills much of the background except for a landscape view that extends into the deep distance to our right. The woman's body is angled to our right but her face turns to us. She has chalk-white, smooth skin with heavily lidded, light brown eyes, and her pale pink lips are closed. Pale blush highlights her cheeks, and she looks either at us or very slightly away from our eyes. Her brown hair is parted down the middle and pulled back, but tight, lively curls frame her face. Her hair turns gold where the light shines on it. She wears a brown dress, trimmed along the square neckline with gold. The front of the bodice is tied with a blue ribbon, and the lacing holes are also edged with gold. A sheer white veil covers her chest and is pinned at the center with a small gold ball. The bush fills the space around her head with copper-brown, spiky leaves. A river winds between trees and rolling hills in the distance to our right. Trees and a town along the horizon, which comes about halfway up the painting, is pale blue under an ice-blue sky.
Leonardo da Vinci, Ginevra de' Benci [obverse], c. 1474/1478, oil on panel, Ailsa Mellon Bruce Fund, 1967.6.1.a
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A young woman with pale, peachy skin, wearing a long, flowing white dress, stands in front of a white curtain in this vertical portrait painting. Her auburn-red hair cascades down over and behind her shoulders. She looks to our left with green eyes, and her pink, full lips are closed. Her dress has puffed shoulders above a white-on-white striped pattern on the long sleeves. She stands on an animal pelt; it is not clear whether it is a wolf or a bear. The pelt spans the width of the painting and overlaps a blue patterned carpet. The animal’s mouth gapes to show sharp teeth. Its glassy eyes are wide open, and it seems to look at us. The edges of the animal skin are red. The woman holds a white lily by her side in her left hand, while yellow and purple flowers lie scattered on the pelt.
James McNeill Whistler, Symphony in White, No. 1: The White Girl, 1861-1863, 1872, oil on canvas, Harris Whittemore Collection, 1943.6.2
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A young woman with pale skin sits at a table in a darkened room in this vertical painting. Long chestnut-brown hair drapes over her shoulder and her deep, cream-colored, long-sleeved garment is open at her neck. She rests her chin in her right hand, farther from us, as her left reaches for a skull placed on a thick book on the table in front of her. The scene is lit by a single candle mostly out of sight behind the skull. Shown in profile, she looks into a small mirror next to the skull, which reflects that object and the book.
Georges de La Tour, The Repentant Magdalen, c. 1635/1640, oil on canvas, Ailsa Mellon Bruce Fund, 1974.52.1
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