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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Honoré Daumier (1808-1879)
Closed November 25, 1979
The sculpture depicts a bust of a man with a detailed expression and a thick neck. The facial features are weathered and textured. The sculpture is made from a dark-colored material, likely bronze, giving it a slightly glossy and rugged appearance. There are variations in tone from deep browns to lighter shades due to the play of light on its uneven surface. The man has heavy eyelids, a pronounced nose, and a slightly open mouth. His hair and clothing are portrayed with rough, textured lines, adding to the overall life-like quality of the piece. The subject is displayed facing forward, with the details of the facial structure and textured exterior giving it a robust and heavy presence.
Spanish Sculpture of the Twentieth Century
Closed January 10, 1980
Mondrian
Closed September 16, 1979
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.”
The Art of the Pacific Islands
Closed February 7, 1980
Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century American Costumes
Closed September 3, 1979
Pablo Picasso
Closed September 3, 1979
Self-Portraits
Closed September 3, 1979
Cycladic Art
Closed January 6, 1980
French Romanticism
Closed September 9, 1979
A bearded man, a young man, and five monks stand in a cream-white hall hung with a map and paintings in this horizontal painting. The people all have pale, peachy skin. The scene is lit from windows lining the wall to our left, where three monks stand, presumably talking. They and the other two monks wear long white robes with marine-blue hoods and cloth panels that hang down the fronts of the cassocks. Two monks have their hoods up and the other two have their hair cut into rings around their heads. The bearded man, Christopher Columbus, stands to the right on the other side of the hall, looking at a map hanging there. He has chin-length, dark hair and wears a bronze-brown, knee-length jacket, dark blue, knee-length pantaloons, and golden yellow stockings. His right hand, closer to us, is planted palm out against his hip, and he holds a red hat in that hand. The other foot is perched on a long bench that stretches along that wall. The young man sits and leans back on the bench with one forearm along the bench’s armrest. His other hand rests on Columbus’s knee, and Columbus rests his hand on that. The boy has long brown hair and wears a red cap, a parchment-white robe over yellow sleeves, sage-green stockings, and laced, toeless boots. Two bundles and a long stick are against the wall on our side of the bench. An object on the floor next to Columbus’s standing leg is covered by a brown cloth. A gold chain and a pink hoof protrude from the blanket. One of the monks standing behind Columbus wears a tight-fitting blue cap. A rosary hangs over his cassock from his waist, and extra panels of blue fabric drape down over his shoulders. Four paintings in our view hang near the high ceiling of the hall, which has arched openings and a pink floor. Doors or oversized shutters swing into view at the far end of the hall. The artist signed and dated the painting in the lower left corner, “Eug. Delacroix. 1838.”
From Leonardo to Titian
Closed June 24, 1979

This loan of 11 paintings from the Hermitage Museum was dominated by the only work by Leonardo da Vinci in the USSR, the so-called Benois Madonna.

Grandma Moses
Closed April 1, 1979
Circus and Carousel
Closed February 25, 1979
This is a painting of a pig with a saddle and corn motif. The pig has exaggerated features, and the saddle is decorated with green and red drapery. The pig is shown in a leaping position.

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