Videos from the Center

Videos related to Center programs and people, including program recordings and stories about art and its histories.

Stories from our collection

Aruna D'Souza

Playlist :  5 Pictures for a New World

Aruna D’Souza (2022 Edmond J. Safra Visiting Professor) discusses works in the National Gallery’s collection that, to her, hold a promise for a better future.

To our left, a young woman sits facing us on a low stone wall at the base of the vertical, black bars of an iron fence and a young girl stands facing away from us to our right in this horizontal painting. Both have pale skin. The woman looks directly at us with dark eyes as she holds an open book, a closed red fan, and a sleeping brown and white puppy in her lap. Her long auburn hair falls down over her shoulders. Her navy-blue dress is accented with white piping on the skirt, collar, and sleeves, and has three large, white buttons down the front and her black hat is adorned with two red poppies and a daisy. The girl wears a sleeveless white, knee-length dress belted with a marine-blue sash tied in a large bow at her back. The girl’s blond hair is pulled up and tied with a black ribbon. She raises her left hand to grasp the bar of the fence she faces. A bunch of green grapes lies on the low wall to our right. A plume of steam fills much of the space beyond the black fence, which spans the width of the painting and extends off the top edge. A few details can be made out beyond the fence, including a stone-gray building with two wooden doors to our left and a bridge along the right edge.

Playlist :  Reflections on the Collection

This video series explored iconic works in the National Gallery’s collection with the Center’s Edmond J. Safra Visiting Professors from 2011 to 2021.

Video:  “Agrippina and Germanicus” with Mary Beard

Center alum Mary Beard explores the story of “Agrippina and Germanicus” by Sir Peter Paul Rubens.

Perspectives on American art

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Video:  Latinx Art and the Intimacy of Dislocation

Wyeth Lecture in American Art presented by Roberto Tejada (2023)

Video:  Prioritizing Indigenous Communities and Voices: Curating in This Time

Wyeth Lecture in American Art presented by Patricia Marroquin Norby (2021)

Video:  The African American Art World in 20th-Century Washington, DC

Held on March 17, 2017, eight distinguished artists discuss their careers and relationships as members of the Washington, DC, art world.

Video:  Art Is an Excuse: Conceptual Strategies, 1968–1983

Wyeth Lecture in American Art presented by Kellie Jones (2019)

Six bunches of harvested corn close to us lead back to two people planting fields, which in turn lead back to a red barn and white house in this horizontal landscape painting. The shocks of corn are tied into rounded, pyramidal shapes on a ground streaked with brown dirt and green growth. In the center of the composition and in the distance, a person on a horse-drawn wagon hands a sack or other object down to a person standing at the back of the wagon. Vibrant green hills roll back to red and white structures to the left and a row of dark green trees on the horizon to the right. In the top third of the painting, a wave of white clouds seems to crest against a jewel-blue sky. The curves of the land are slightly exaggerated, giving the painting a stylized look. The artist signed and dated the painting in the lower left corner, “Benton 48.”

Video:  The Panorama and the Globe: Expanding the American Landscape in World War II

Wyeth Lecture in American Art presented by Cécile Whiting (2017)

A white man in military uniform rides a horse in front of a regiment of five rows of Black troops in this sculpture, which is painted entirely in gold. The artist created a shallow, stage-like space with an arched top so the men are sculpted in three dimensions, though they become more compressed as they move back in space. The men and horse face our right in profile in this view. The man on the horse has a pointed, straight nose and a goatee. He wears a cap with a flat top and narrow brim, a knee-length coat, gloves, and knee-high boots with spurs. He holds a thin sword down by the side of the horse with his right hand and holds the reins of the horse with his left. The horse’s head is pulled upward by the short reins, and its mouth is open around the bit. About twenty soldiers are lined up in rows beyond the horse, and they march in unison. They carry blankets rolled atop knapsacks, canteens, and rifles resting on their right shoulders. However, the details of how their uniforms bunch up around their equipment and the way their caps have been molded and fit is unique to each person. Their ages also vary from young and cleanshaven to bearded, older men. Two men carry furled flags near the back, to our left, and a drummer boy plays at the head of the regiment, to our right. All the men look straight ahead, their lips closed. A woman in a billowing robe floats above them under the arched top of the sculpture with her eyes closed. Her left arm is outstretched, and she holds a laurel branch and poppies close to her body with her right arm. An inscription in the upper right corner is created with raised capital letters: “OMNIA RELINQVIT SERVARE REMPVBLICAM.” A longer inscription is carved into the base along the bottom edge of the memorial, also in all caps: “ROBERT GOVLD SHAW KILLED WHILE LEADING THE ASSVLT ON FORT WAGNER JVLY TWENTY THIRD EIGHTEEN HVNDRED AND SIXTY THREE.” The artist’s signature is inscribed In the lower right corner, in smaller letters: “AVGVTVS SAINT GAVDEN M-D-C-C-C-L X X X X V I I I.”

Video:  The Art of the Name: Soldiers, Graves, and Monuments in the Aftermath of the Civil War

Wyeth Lecture in American Art presented by Kirk Savage (2015)

Take a deep dive with the Mellon Lectures

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Video:  America’s Architecture of Freedom and Unfreedom

The A. W. Mellon Lectures in the Fine Arts presented by Mabel O. Wilson (2025)

Video:  Chasing That Which Is Not Me / Chasing That Which Is Me

The A. W. Mellon Lectures in the Fine Arts presented by Anna Deavere Smith (2024)

Video:  Vital Signs: The Visual Cultures of Maya Writing

The A. W. Mellon Lectures in the Fine Arts presented by Stephen D. Houston (2023)

This painting displays a central five-pointed red star with an ampersand in the middle, surrounded by abstract shapes and lines. The rest of the painting features bold colors like yellow, blue, orange, and purple, with scribble-like marks resembling city graffiti. Layered textures and patterns create a mixed media collage effect, and some places appear to have handwritten or printed text.

Video:  Colorstruck! Painting, Pigment, Affect

The A. W. Mellon Lectures in the Fine Arts presented by Richard J. Powell (2022)

The image consists of horizontal lines of varying thickness and spacing, forming an abstract pattern across the surface. The lines create a visual effect like television static or an optical illusion, with variations in line thickness hinting at a hidden image underneath the distortion. The overall composition is abstract, lacking a clear representation but suggesting shapes like undulating waves or wood grain.

Video:  Contact: Art and the Pull of Print

The A. W. Mellon Lectures in the Fine Arts presented by Jennifer L. Roberts (2021)

Video:  End as Beginning: Chinese Art and Dynastic Time

The A. W. Mellon Lectures in the Fine Arts presented by Wu Hung (2019)

New findings on Italian art

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Video:  The Confounding Glance: Meraviglia, Attraction, and the Invention of Love at First Sight

Sydney J. Freedberg Lecture on Italian Art presented by Emanuele Lugli (2026)

Video:  Blood Joining Blood: The Immersive in Caravaggio’s Malta

Sydney J. Freedberg Lecture on Italian Art presented by Keith Sciberras (2024)

Video:  Sofonisba Anguissola: Recent Discoveries and Debates

Sydney J. Freedberg Lecture on Italian Art presented by Michael Cole (2023)

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The Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts is the National Gallery’s research institute. 

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