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Open 10:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m.

National Gallery of Art

  • Visit

    • Plan Your Visit
    • Accessibility
    • Visiting with Kids
    • Food and Drink
    • Tours and Guides
    • Explore the Campus

    Admission is always free

    6th and Constitution Ave NW 
    Washington, DC 20565

    East building

    Must-Sees at the National Gallery

    Make the most of your visit

    Learn more

  • Exhibitions & Events

    • Exhibitions
    • Calendar
    • Kid-Friendly Events

    America’s 250th

    Celebrating American art and artists

  • Art & Artists

    • Artworks
    • Artists
    • Stories
    • Fun and Games
    • Educational Resources
    • Research

    Open Call

    Artists Reimagining the Collection

    Meet the 50 makers selected from more than 1,600 submissions

Utility

  • Support
  • Shop
  • Become a Member

  • Visit

    • Plan Your Visit
    • Accessibility
    • Visiting with Kids
    • Food and Drink
    • Tours and Guides
    • Explore the Campus

    Admission is always free

    6th and Constitution Ave NW 
    Washington, DC 20565

    East building

    Must-Sees at the National Gallery

    Make the most of your visit

    Learn more

  • Exhibitions & Events

    • Exhibitions
    • Calendar
    • Kid-Friendly Events

    America’s 250th

    Celebrating American art and artists

  • Art & Artists

    • Artworks
    • Artists
    • Stories
    • Fun and Games
    • Educational Resources
    • Research

    Open Call

    Artists Reimagining the Collection

    Meet the 50 makers selected from more than 1,600 submissions

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  • Shop
  • Become a Member

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    3. T. E. Kirby
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    T. E. Kirby

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    A view across a wide, brightly lit field scattered with broken pieces of stone is framed to the left and right by crumbling stone temples in this horizontal painting. The sunlight is infused with a soft pink glow, which warms the cream-white stone with a pale blush. The temple on our left sits on a low rise, and a row of at least nine columns topped with an entablature faces our right. Several of the columns are broken off, and part of the entablature and the entire roof is missing, from what we can see. Fragments of pediments and wheel-like sections of columns tumble down from its front steps and back along its side, cascading into and across most of the field before us. The rocky terrain is carpeted in celery-green growth speckled with sage green and areas of rust red in the lower left and right corners. Barely visible in the center of the field, are two men, barely taller than the fragments they inspect. One man wears an apricot-orange suit and bowler hat over blond hair. He kneels with his back to us as he writes or sketches on a piece of paper. A second man stands to his right, also with his back to us, dressed in a long pleated, white tunic with a red cap, jacket, and knee-high boots. To our right and farther back than the other temple, a brick-red tower stands next to another columned arcade. A third temple there, or perhaps another part of that building complex, has columns carved into the shape of six identical, robed women, facing our left. Beyond the ruins, the field slopes down to a peach-colored plain that ends at a wide, topaz-blue body of water with mountains in the far distance along the low horizon line. A petal-pink haze rises from the water and mountains and almost fills the blue-gray sky above. The artist has signed and dated the painting in the lower left, “S.R. Gifford 1880.”
    Sanford Robinson Gifford, Ruins of the Parthenon, 1880, oil on canvas, Corcoran Collection (Museum Purchase, Gallery Fund, 1881), 2014.79.20

    Ruins of the Parthenon

    Ruins of the Parthenon

    Sanford Robinson Gifford · 1880 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  2014.79.20

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