Past Exhibitions | Smithsonian Institution

Our Lives: Contemporary Life and Identities

This exhibition examines the identities of Native peoples in the 21st century, and how those identities—both individual and communal—are the results of deliberate, often difficult choices made in challenging circumstances.

September 21, 2004 – July 6, 2015

American Indian Museum DC

Artist Teacher Organizer: Yasuo Kuniyoshi in the Archives of American Art

Included in this exhibition are letters, photographs, writings, and rare printed materials documenting Yasuo Kuniyoshi’s life and work. This exhibition is organized in conjunction with The Artistic Journey of Yasuo Kuniyoshi exhibition at the Smithsonian American Art Museum.

March 30, 2015 – July 10, 2015

Archives of American Art

Mingering Mike's Supersonic Greatest Hits

See how self-taught Washington, D.C., artist "Mingering Mike" exercised his youthful fantasy of being a famous soul singer/songwriter in the late 1960s and the 1970s—and reflected the aspirations of countless other kids who dreamed of being discovered.

February 27, 2015 – August 2, 2015

American Art Museum

Black Box: Risto-Pekka Blom

Media artist Risto-Pekka Blom (Finnish, b. 1970, Mikkeli; lives and works in Tampere) is featured in the newest exhibition in the Black Box space. The exhibition consists of a single work, “Kurdrjavka [Little Ball of Fur]” (2013). It is the first U.S. museum presentation of the artist’s work.

April 27, 2015 – August 9, 2015

Hirshhorn Museum

TIME Covers the 1960s

See how Time magazine covered the people, trends, and happenings that defined the 1960s.

September 26, 2014 – August 9, 2015

Portrait Gallery

Special Installation of Nineteen American Masterworks

These masterworks from Gilded Age, Impressionist, and Ashcan School painters help to tell the story of the late 19th century and early 20th centuries in America, a “coming-of-age” period in American art.

April 17, 2015 – August 16, 2015

American Art Museum

Beyond Bollywood: Indian Americans Shape the Nation

Learn about the Indian American experience and their dynamic role in shaping American society.

February 27, 2014 – August 16, 2015

Natural History Museum

Hawaii by Air

In the early days of flight, getting to Hawaii, one of the most remote places on Earth, was a challenge. See how things have changed since then.

July 25, 2014 – August 23, 2015

Air and Space Museum

The Early Sixties: American Science

See some cutting-edge technology circa 1964, the year the National Museum of American History (originally the Museum of History and Technology) opened.

April 25, 2014 – August 23, 2015

American History Museum

The Early Sixties: American Culture

Experience the culture of the early 1960s, the era in which the National Museum of History and Technology, now the National Museum of American History, opened.

April 25, 2014 – August 23, 2015

American History Museum

The Artistic Journey of Yasuo Kuniyoshi

Some 70 of Yasuo Kuniyoshi's best paintings and drawings are on view in this first survey of the artist's work in 25 years.

April 3, 2015 – August 30, 2015

American Art Museum

A Room of Her Own: My Mother's Altar, an installation by Sandra Cisneros

Acclaimed author Sandra Cisneros has created an installation in the tradition of "Dia de Muertos" to honor her mother, Elvira Cordero Cisneros.

October 31, 2014 – September 7, 2015

American History Museum

Watch This! Revelations in Media Art

Artists have fearlessly engaged technological innovation to create an artistic revolution that continuously redefines how we imagine, receive, and understand our time. The exhibition includes forty-four works of art from 1941 to 2013, many of which were recently acquired by the museum.

April 24, 2015 – September 7, 2015

American Art Museum

Seasonal Landscapes in Japanese Screens

Cherry trees bloom in this selection of folding screen paintings from the Freer Gallery. These landscapes from the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries combine ink painting techniques assimilated from China with the vibrant color and gold of traditional Japanese painting in a new style and grand scale.

March 7, 2015 – September 7, 2015

Asian Art Museum Freer Gallery

Abbas Kiarostami: Five Dedicated to Ozu

From July to September 2015, the Freer|Sackler features a series of programs highlighting contemporary moving-image works from Iran. Presented as a single-screen projection, Five pays tribute to Yasujir? Ozu, the renowned Japanese filmmaker whose work has deeply influenced Kiarostami’s films.

July 3, 2015 – September 13, 2015

Asian Art Museum Sackler Gallery

Shirin Neshat: Facing History

In her mesmerizing films and photographs, Shirin Neshat examines the nuances of power and identity in the Islamic world.

May 18, 2015 – September 20, 2015

Hirshhorn Museum

Passion for the Exotic: Lockwood de Forest, Frederic Church

Paying homage both to de Forest and to his mentor, Frederic Church, Passion for the Exotic: Lockwood de Forest, Frederic Church evokes the fascination of late 19th-century America with the arts of India.

December 12, 2014 – September 26, 2015

Cooper Hewitt Design Museum

Mr. Wizard

Personal papers, files and other items belonging to the late Don Herbert—Mr. Wizard—the well-known TV science educator from the 1950s-80s, recently acquired by the museum, are on display.

July 1, 2015 – October 2, 2015

American History Museum

Portraits of Planet Ocean: The Photography of Brian Skerry

Captivating images by photojournalist Brian Skerry reveal the mystery and beauty of the undersea world.

September 17, 2013 – October 4, 2015

Natural History Museum

Alphabetilately: An Alphabet of Philately

This exhibition presents an alphabet of philately through 26 topics, in which each letter stands for some aspect of stamp collecting or the sending of mail.

September 26, 2008 – October 12, 2015

Postal Museum

Fine Impressions: Whistler, Freer, and Venice

In 1887, museum founder Charles Lang Freer purchased the entire Second Venice Set, twenty-six atmospheric etchings by James McNeill Whistler.

October 18, 2014 – November 1, 2015

Asian Art Museum Freer Gallery

Little Black Books: Address Books from the Archives of American Art

This exhibition showcases a selection of personal address books of influential American artists, from Jackson Pollock and Lee Krasner to Joseph Cornell and Ad Reinhardt. Like diaries, these pocket-sized books, their dog-eared pages grimy with tangled ink and pencil marks, reveal much about their owners.

August 7, 2015 – November 1, 2015

Archives of American Art

Recognize: Roberto Clemente

The museum’s historians and curators selected three players’ portraits for the public to choose from: Roberto Clemente, Babe Ruth or Sandy Koufax. Thousands of votes were cast on Smithsonianmag.com, and Charles “Teenie” Harris’ photograph of Clemente received the most votes for dipslay.

August 25, 2015 – November 1, 2015

Portrait Gallery

The Divine Comedy: Heaven, Purgatory, and Hell Revisited by Contemporary African Artists

This dramatic multi-media exhibition reveals the ongoing global relevance of Dante Alighieri’s 14th century epic as part of a shared intellectual heritage. Including original commissions and renowned works of art by some of the most dynamic contemporary artists from African nations and the diaspora.

April 8, 2015 – November 1, 2015

African Art Museum

Recent Acquisitions

New additions to the Portrait Gallery’s collection are installed in the hall leading from the G Street museum entrance.The pieces include paintings of Ted Turner, Maya Angelou, Marvin Hamlisch and William Dunlap, and photographs of B. B. King, Quincy Jones, and others.

November 7, 2014 – November 1, 2015

Portrait Gallery