Past Exhibitions | Smithsonian Institution

1983 Zoo Employee Art Show

Animal-oriented art in various media is on display in this annual exhibition of works created by Zoo and FONZ employees.

February 1, 1983 – February 28, 1983

National Zoo

Teaching aids from the nation's past include an early 19th-century cipher book, slates, geometric models, and more recent aids such as the B.F. Skinner prototype teaching machine, a slide rule, and a present-day hand-held calculator.

October 1, 1982 – February 28, 1983

American History Museum

U.S. World Helicopter Championships

View trophies and photographs of the United States Helicopter Team, which won the world championship competition in Poland in August 1981.

March 18, 1982 – February 28, 1983

Air and Space Museum

William Edmondson Sculpture

The Featured Acquisition of the Month: Crucifixion, an example of the black folk artist's mature work, is on view. Carved of limestone in the late 1930s, the piece is the gift of Elizabeth Gibbons-Hanson.

February 1, 1983 – February 28, 1983

American Art Museum

Fighting the White Plague: 75 Years of Christmas Seals

Trace the history of the fight against TB in this exhibit.

January 1, 1983 – February 28, 1983

American History Museum

Sojourner Truth Doll

View a porcelain doll, 17 inches long, a finely detailed figure of abolitionist Sojourner Truth made by San Francisco artist Cecilia Rothman.

February 1, 1983 – February 28, 1983

Anacostia Community Museum

American Picture Palaces

Revisit the grandeur of movie theaters built in the 1920s and 1930s through photos, posters, furnishings, and original artwork illustrating the extravagant architecture and sometimes gaudy designs of such buildings.

November 23, 1982 – February 27, 1983

Cooper Hewitt Design Museum

Black Women: Achievements Against the Odds

View twenty panels highlighting achievements of black women in 16 areas, such as education, politics, music, art, and sports.

February 1, 1983 – February 27, 1983

Natural History Museum

Synthetic Blues

See a hand-built, colored porcelain bowl created by Curtis and Suzan Benzle of Cleveland.

January 7, 1983 – February 27, 1983

Renwick Gallery

Joseph Cornell: An Exploration of Sources

View an exhibition that explores the visual and conceptual basis for Cornell's art with 50 boxes, collages, 3-D objects, dossiers, and designs on loan from private and public collections.

November 19, 1982 – February 27, 1983

American Art Museum

Black-tailed Deer: A Life Cycle

Follow the black-tailed deer's life cycle through 60 color photographs by Kenneth Herrington, most taken over the last 10 years on Herrington's Napa County, California, ranch.

December 23, 1982 – February 21, 1983

Natural History Museum

Chinese Art of the Warring States Period: Change and Continuity, 480-222 B.C.

See 151 examples of jade ornaments, lacquerware, bronze vessels and fittings, and other metalwork inlaid with gold and silver designs. Many of the objects have been re-dated, re-evaluated, or can be understood more fully because of new knowledge resulting from recent archaeological findings in the People's Republic of China.

October 1, 1982 – February 15, 1983

Asian Art Museum Freer Gallery

Boxed In: Japanese Ceramics and Their Storage Boxes

View 27 works from the Edo period (1616-1686), including teaware and other ceramic objects as well as the lacquer and wooden containers specially created for their safekeeping.

October 1, 1982 – February 14, 1983

Asian Art Museum Freer Gallery

Teabowls for the New Year

View 3 examples of Japanese ceramic bowls used at the first tea gathering of the New Year--an occasion of great auspiciousness for which the host chooses teabowls whose design conveys wishes for good fortune and longevity.

January 1, 1983 – January 31, 1983

Asian Art Museum Freer Gallery

Presidential Greeting Cards

See cards designed between 1953 and 1981 for seven presidents and their families. Although most are holiday greeting cards, other cards are included.

November 18, 1982 – January 31, 1983

American History Museum

Fashion Prints: 125 Years of Style

View more than 200 fashion prints drawn from the Cooper-Hewitt collection, mainly from the group of more than 9,000 assembled by Vyvyan Holland, the son of Oscar Wilde.

August 31, 1982 – January 30, 1983

Cooper Hewitt Design Museum

Prints and Collages

See some 30 examples from the HMSG collection.

November 11, 1982 – January 23, 1983

Hirshhorn Museum

John Stevens & Sons: A Family of Inventors

Celebrate the contributions to the development of steam transportation on land and sea by John Stevens and his sons, Robert Livingston and Edwin Augustus.

August 6, 1982 – January 20, 1983

Portrait Gallery

From the Life of the Artist: A Documentary View of David Smith

This exhibition, organized by the Smithsonian Archives of American Art, includes photographs, sketches, and letters from the David Smith Papers of the Archives.

November 4, 1982 – January 16, 1983

Hirshhorn Museum

David Smith: Painter, Sculptor, Draftsman

See 163 works including sculpture, paintings, drawings, etchings, photographs, and ceramics spanning Smith's 35-year career.

November 4, 1982 – January 16, 1983

Hirshhorn Museum

G. Washington: A Figure Upon the Stage

In honor of the 250th birthday of the first U.S. president, the first major exhibition on Washington in this century features more than 650 outstanding objects relating to Washington.

February 23, 1982 – January 9, 1983

American History Museum

Contemporary North American Indian Art

View some 100 paintings and sculptures by leading contemporary American Indian artists. The works are largely Indian in theme but Euro-American in style.

March 13, 1982 – January 3, 1983

Natural History Museum

1982 Trees of Christmas

Mark the 6th anniversary of this popular holiday display with 12 trees decorated in various styles.

December 16, 1982 – January 2, 1983

American History Museum

Rochester Folk Art

Admire and purchase objects created by members of the Rochester Folk Art Guild of New York, including musical instruments, turned bowls, toys and games, hats and vests, scarves, porcelain and stoneware teapots and containers, and one-of-a-kind glass bowls, vases, and paperweights.

November 1, 1982 – January 2, 1983

Renwick Gallery

Contemporary Paintings from Pakistan

View 43 paintings, mostly oil on canvas, by 9 women and 14 men, a cross-section of Pakistani art.

November 1, 1982 – January 2, 1983

Hirshhorn Museum