Past Exhibitions | Smithsonian Institution

Althea Gibson

Smithsonianmag.com voters choose between portraits of Gibson, Eleanor Holm and Helene Madison, and Duke Kahanamoku to go on view. Gibson’s photograph received the most votes.

June 3, 2016 – June 5, 2016

Portrait Gallery

From Token to Ornament: Indian Peace Medals and the McKenney-Hall Portraits

Beginning with George Washington’s administration, presidential portrait medals were created to promote peace and friendship between Euro-Americans and Native Americans. This exhibition features 21 objects, including photographs, prints, and peace medals.

June 19, 2015 – June 5, 2016

Portrait Gallery

Perspectives: Lara Baladi

Egyptian-Lebanese artist Lara Baladi (born 1969) experiments with the photographic medium, investigating its history and its role in shaping perceptions of the Middle East—particularly Egypt, where she is based.

August 29, 2015 – June 5, 2016

Asian Art Museum Sackler Gallery

Fragile Beauty: The Art & Science of Sea Butterflies

Through larger-than-life sculptures, learn how some of the smallest creatures in the ocean—ocean pteropods (“sea butterflies”)—are faring in the face of increasing ocean acidification.

September 17, 2013 – May 31, 2016

Natural History Museum

In Memoriam: Prince

The Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery recognizes the life and accomplishments of Prince Nelson with a photograph by Lynn Goldsmith. The image was taken in 1993.

April 22, 2016 – May 31, 2016

Portrait Gallery

The Lost Symphony: Whistler and the Perfection of Art

As part of Peacock Room REMIX, this related installation reconstructs how Whistler’s unrealized quest for “the perfection of art” intersected with less-rarified concerns about patronage, payment, and professional reputation.

January 16, 2016 – May 30, 2016

Asian Art Museum Sackler Gallery

One Life: Dolores Huerta

One Life: Dolores Huerta highlights the significant role of this Latina leader in the California farm workers movement of the 1960s and 70s.

July 3, 2015 – May 15, 2016

Portrait Gallery

Mathew Brady's Photographs of Union Generals

Studio portraits of Union military leaders from George McClellan and Ambrose Burnside to William Tecumseh Sherman and Ulysses Grant by photographer Mathew Brady are on view.

March 30, 2012 – May 8, 2016

Portrait Gallery

Hart-Celler Act

The display marks the 50th anniversary of the Act with a selection of Latino-related artifacts. The Hart-Celler Act had far-reaching effects upon immigration to the United States by opening the possibility of coming to this nation for many people from around the world.

October 2, 2015 – May 5, 2016

American History Museum

At the Hub of Things: New Views of the Collection

A dramatic new installation of postwar masterworks from the Hirshhorn's permanent collection, rehung in the museum's newly renovated 3rd-Level collection galleries.

October 16, 2014 – April 24, 2016

Hirshhorn Museum

Speculative Forms

Drawing upon the Hirshhorn’s expansive sculpture collection, this exhibition collapses such conventional art historical divisions as figuration vs. abstraction; volumetric vs. stereometric sculpture; still vs. kinetic forms; and illusionary vs. unitary objects.

June 16, 2014 – April 17, 2016

Hirshhorn Museum

Making Design

Some 360 objects, including furniture, lighting fixtures, tableware, clothing, jewelry, books, and posters, providing an overview of five key elements of design: color, form, line, pattern, and texture.

December 12, 2014 – April 17, 2016

Cooper Hewitt Design Museum

Celebrate: Gregory Peck

In honor of the 100th anniversary of his birth, the Portrait Gallery honors his life and legacy with his portrait by Everett Raymond Kinstler on our “Celebrate” wall.

April 1, 2016 – April 10, 2016

Portrait Gallery

Part File Score

"Part File Score" (2014) is a recently aquired large-scale multimedia installation by Susan Philipsz. The installation is based on the life and work of film composer Hanns Eisler, a German Jew who immigratred to the United States after his music was banned by the Nazis, only to become an early victim of the infamous Hollywood blacklist of supposed Coummunist sympathizers.

January 22, 2016 – April 10, 2016

Hirshhorn Museum

Crosscurrents: Modern Art from the Sam Rose and Julie Walters Collection

Crosscurrents features stellar paintings and sculpture by major American artists Alexander Calder, David Hockney, Roy Lichtenstein, Georgia O’Keeffe, Wayne Thiebaud and others alongside European giants such as Pablo Picasso and Joan Miró.

October 30, 2015 – April 10, 2016

American Art Museum

George Sidney: Creativity and Innovation in Golden Age Hollywood

This Archives Center case explores the career and innovation of award-winning Hollywood director George Sidney, whose classic films include Bathing Beauty, Anchors Aweigh, and The Harvey Girls.

January 19, 2016 – March 31, 2016

American History Museum

In Memoriam: Nancy Reagan

A photograph by Aaron Shikler (1922–2015) taken for the January 14, 1985 cover of Time magazine is on view.

March 7, 2016 – March 28, 2016

Portrait Gallery

Robert Motherwell: A Centennial Celebration

This exhibition, guest curated by the artist Tim Clifford, marks the 100-year anniversary of the birth of painter Robert Motherwell (1915-1991), through letters, photographs, and rare printed material from collections in the Archives of American Art.

November 21, 2015 – March 27, 2016

Archives of American Art

Irving Penn: Beyond Beauty

Some 160 photographs by Irving Penn demonstrate his legacy as a modern master and place him in the context of the contemporary moment.

October 23, 2015 – March 20, 2016

American Art Museum

Dark Fields of the Republic: Alexander Gardner Photographs 1859-1872

Alexander Gardner created dramatic and vivid photographs of battlefields, which included images of the recently dead. After the war, Gardner went west, creating unforgettable pictures of western landscape and portraits of American Indians. This exhibition also includes the iconic cracked-plate portrait of President Abraham Lincoln taken on February 5, 1865.

September 18, 2015 – March 13, 2016

Portrait Gallery

Freedom Just Around the Corner: Black America from Civil War to Civil Rights

A chronicle of the African American experience told from the perspective of stamps and mail.

February 12, 2015 – February 15, 2016

Postal Museum

Directions: Shana Lutker: Le 'NEW' Monocle, Chapters 1-3

New sculptural work by contemporary American artist Shana Lutker based on historic fistfights involving surrealist artists.

October 29, 2015 – February 15, 2016

Hirshhorn Museum

Marvelous Objects: Surrealist Sculpture from Paris to New York

This exhibition brings together more than 100 three-dimensional works created by more than 20 artists.

October 29, 2015 – February 15, 2016

Hirshhorn Museum

David Adjaye Selects

The exhibition features 14 West and Central African textiles from the museum’s textile holdings, including an Asante kente cloth from Ghana, a bògòloanfini mud cloth from Mali, a Dyula ikat wrapper from Ivory Coast, a Yoruba indigo dyed wrapper from Nigeria and men’s hats from the Democratic Republic of Congo, Angola and Cameroon.

June 19, 2015 – February 14, 2016

Cooper Hewitt Design Museum

The Americans with Disabilities Act, 1990-2015

As part the Smithsonian's commemoration of the 25th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act, this display features objects from the national collections that capture the significance and legacy of the ADA through the stories of four people.

July 20, 2015 – January 31, 2016

American History Museum