Past Exhibitions

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

Filter Results

1212 results found

Results

April 13 - July 13, 2003
Frederic Remington
March 2 - June 1, 2003
Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, 1880-1938
February 9 - May 11, 2003
Thomas Gainsborough, 1727-1788
January 19 - April 20, 2003
Édouard Vuillard
A screen made up of five tall, rectangular panels, set side by side and each surrounded by a gold frame, is painted as a single scene showing a tree-lined sidewalk curving around a park in a city. The scene is loosely painted with short, rounded brushstrokes. The top two-thirds to three-quarters of most of the panels are filled with the lime and olive-green leaves of the trees that line the sidewalk and park. In the leftmost panel, the sidewalk and road lead back to a row of caramel-brown building façades. The sidewalk is pale taupe, and the street is painted with dashes of the same taupe against terracotta brown, suggesting cobblestones. Spindly trees are spaced in a row along the sidewalk in round holes covered with smoke-gray metal grates. A black fence, painted with thin, sometimes broken black lines encloses the park beyond, which has a path around plantings and the vivid green lawn. Touches of pink on a sage-green tree to our left in the park suggest flowers. A gray statue on a high plinth is partially lost in the break between the two rightmost panels. Men, women, and children, painted with a few strokes of black, gray, or marine or periwinkle blue, walk along the sidewalk and the garden path, or sit at the base of the fence or on benches spaced along the sidewalk. The women seem to wear long dresses and the men dark clothing and hats. Two carriages are pulled up on the street near a lamp post alongside the sidewalk near the lower left. In the leftmost panel, horse-drawn carriages move along the road leading back to the buildings, and more people seem to be gathered on the sidewalk near the left edge of the panel in the distance. The artist signed the work with brown paint in the lower right corner: “E. Vuillard.” The panels of the screen have been set up so the panels rest on a platform or on the floor in a shallow zig-zag pattern, in a room with an off white wall and bisque-brown molding along the floor.
November 27, 2002 - March 2, 2003
Drawing on America's Past
November 10, 2002 - May 5, 2003
Italian Drawings from the Armand Hammer Collection
October 13, 2002 - March 2, 2003
Deceptions and Illusions
Two pieces of paper money, two coins, and a small black and white photograph of a bearded man seem to be affixed to a dark surface surrounded by a wide wooden frame, to which several stamps have been affixed in the lower left corner. A dollar bill with frayed edges is stuck to the black background across the center, and the lower left corner lifts up. The dollar bill has a portrait of George Washington in an oval at the center with “UNITED STATES” above. The serial number “Z143091888” appears in red to the left and is repeated in the upper right corner, and “ONE DOLLAR WASHINGTON DC” is printed in black to the right. Overlapping the top left of the dollar bill, another bill about half the size is printed with a portrait of a cleanshaven, light-skinned man in a high-necked coat and frilled collar, angled to our right but looking at us over a long, hooked nose and wide lips. To our right, the bill reads, “UNITED STATES FRACTIONAL CURRENCY,” and, below a seal, “FIFTY CENTS.” Above the dollar bill, a worn, copper-colored coin is held to the panel by three small prongs. The coin has the head of a person facing our left in profile. An inscription around the edge reads, “AUCTORI CONNEC.” A small photograph showing the head and shoulders of a bearded, balding man wearing glasses and a dark suit seems to have been tucked into the lower left corner between the dark background and the wood frame. Slightly behind the photograph, a silver coin resting on the ledge of the frame has a six-pointed star with a striped crest at the center, and is inscribed around the edge, “UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 1853.” Above the photograph is a dark circular stamp stuck with a pin. Attached to the bottom left corner of the wood frame are several different colored, cancelled stamps, some of them torn. In the bottom center, a piece of paper with the typed words “J. Haberle” seems to have been pasted onto the frame. The painting is inscribed in the upper right with red against the black field: “J. HABERLE NEW HAVEN, CT. 1887.” Upon closer inspection, we notice the edge of the wood frame is actually rough canvas. There also does not seem to be a gap between the painted picture and the wood frame. We eventually realize that all of it—the money, photograph, stamps, and frame—are all painted to create an illusion.

Loading Results