Release Date: May 25, 2007
See Old Masters in a New Way
The National Gallery of Art Presents Crosscurrents: American and European
Masterpieces from the Permanent Collection, through December 31, 2008
Jacques-Louis David
French, 1748-1825
The Emperor Napoleon in His Study at the Tuileries, 1812
oil on canvas, 203.9 x 125.1 cm (80 1/4 x 49 1/4 in.)
Samuel H. Kress Collection
National Gallery of Art, Washington
Washington, DC – Some of the most notable paintings from the National Gallery of Art’s American, British, Spanish, and 18th- and early 19th-century French collections are now on view in the central galleries of the West Building Ground Floor while their Main Floor galleries undergo renovation. Crosscurrents: American and European Masterpieces from the Permanent Collection will be on view through December 31, 2007.
The installation is sponsored by Siemens.
“We are fortunate to have corporate sponsors who understand our desire to make our collection as accessible to the public as possible,” said Earl A. Powell III, director, National Gallery of Art. “We are most appreciative that Siemens could help us find a way to show these beautiful paintings to an audience who cherishes them.”
The installation features many works from the French school such as Jacques-Louis David’s intense portrayal of The Emperor Napoleon in His Study at the Tuileries (1812), Jean Siméon Chardin’s The House of Cards (1735), and A Young Girl Reading (1776) by Jean-Honoré Fragonard. Among the most popular works from the British and American schools on display are James McNeill Whistler’s delicate Symphony in White, No. 1: The White Girl (1862), John Singleton Copley’s dramatic Watson and the Shark (1778), and Joseph Mallord William Turner’s moonlit harbor scene Keelmen Heaving in Coals by Moonlight (1835).
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