Past Exhibitions

Learn about past exhibitions going back as far as 1941 when the National Gallery of Art first opened to the public.

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The Urban Scene: 1920–1950
Closed August 6, 2017
The image depicts a cityscape viewed from ground level, surrounded by tall skyscrapers. The buildings dominate the scene, showing a style characterized by strong lines and shading. The architecture is rendered with meticulous pencil or ink lines creating depth. The color palette is primarily black, white, and shades of grey, emphasizing light and shadows. People and vehicles are present, and roads curve into the distance among the buildings. In the background, smoke or clouds drift skyward above the city. A flag prominently waves from a building on the left, adding movement to the scene.
Della Robbia: Sculpting with Color in Renaissance Florence
Closed June 4, 2017

This exhibition will present some 40 works by Luca della Robbia, his nephew Andrea, Andrea’s sons, and the competing Buglioni workshop. Sculptural types such as reliefs, portraits, architectural decorations, household statuettes, and active full-scale figures will be on display.

Exhibition: Rineke Dijkstra
Closed July 16, 2017
The image shows two individuals standing side by side, capturing their full bodies from head to toe. The person on the left stands with his hands tucked into his pockets, wearing a serious expression. He has closely shaved black hair and is dressed in a green jacket layered over a Timberland sweatshirt with light-colored jeans and black shoes. The person on the right stands with one hand in his pocket and the other at his side. He has short black hair and is wearing a black Reebok tracksuit with white detailing, along with white sneakers. This individual is also wearing a black waist bag and a ring on one finger. The background is a plain, light-colored wall with a wooden floor.
Stuart Davis: In Full Swing
Closed March 5, 2017

Davis assimilates the imagery of popular culture, the aesthetics of advertising, the lessons of cubism, and the sounds and rhythms of jazz into works that hum with intelligence and energy. This exhibition includes his 1921 tobacco package paintings through five decades to his last canvas.

Alfred Stieglitz and His Circle
Closed April 11, 2017

Best known as an early promoter and practitioner of photography as a fine art, Alfred Stieglitz was also a champion of modern painting and sculpture. Between 1908 and 1917 his gallery, 291 (named for its address on Fifth Avenue), introduced New York audiences to almost every new European art movement and to many of the American artists on view in this room — including Georgia O’Keeffe, whom he married in 1924.

Pools of sapphire, aquamarine, and cobalt-blue watercolor puddle and bleed together in this abstract painting on paper. Most of the horizonal sheet is taken up with a dark blue form reminiscent of a hill. The upper corners of the sheet are painted powder blue, suggesting sky. The sheet is edged with the white of the paper, and the darker and lighter blue areas are also mostly separated by a thin white line.
Los Angeles to New York: Dwan Gallery, 1959–1971
Closed January 29, 2017

This exhibition will trace Virginia Dwan's activities and the emergence of an avant-garde gallery in an age of mobility, when air travel and the interstate highway system linked the two coasts and transformed the making of art and the sites of its exhibition.

In the Tower: Barbara Kruger
Closed January 22, 2017

A focused exhibition of Kruger’s conceptual work of related images of faces and figures in profile over which striking phrases and figures of speech are superimposed. Active verbs and personal pronouns contrast with selected images of side-glancing figures, receiving and averting the viewer’s gaze.

A grainy black and white photograph showing a close-up of a woman’s profile is overlaid with three horizontal red bands with white text at the top, center, and bottom edges of this horizontal composition. The woman seems to lie down and look up at a metal instrument, perhaps a piece of medical equipment, with a long, eye-dropper-like tube extending close to her face. Her cheeks and profile appear between the central and bottom bands of text. Lit from our left, she has dark eyebrows and eyelashes, a straight nose, and her lips are closed. She seems to have pale skin and her hair is covered by a fold of fabric, perhaps a hat. The eye we see is open and the metal instrument points to the bridge of her nose, seeming to close in on her right eye. Light colored fabric behind her could be the uniform of a person standing opposite us. The red bands have white lettering saying, “Know nothing” across the top; “Believe anything” across the center; and “Forget everything” across the bottom.
Damien Hirst: The Last Supper
Closed November 27, 2016
This is a painting of a medication label with the word "Chicken" featured. The painting showcases a design reminiscent of a pharmaceutical label. It prominently displays the word "Chicken®" in black font. Below it, in black and red text, the painting states "Concentrated Oral Solution Morphine Sulphate" with a dosage of "20mg/ml" and volume "120ml". The design includes blocks of orange and blue lines at the top, and the artist's name "Damien Hirst" printed at the bottom. The painting conveys a clinical yet playful tone, reflecting Hirst's interest in medical themes.

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