June Programs - Portrait Gallery's store is now open, our upcoming exhibitions and more

National Portrait Gallery

 

National Portrait Gallery

National Portrait Gallery's Shop Reopens

The museum's shop is now open! Shopping for a real book lover? Searching for that last perfect gift? Or maybe you just want to treat yourself? The Museum Shop features a variety of books and distinctive objects inspired by popular works from the museum’s permanent collection as well as works from special exhibitions.

Items include illustrated exhibition catalogues, art and art history books, biographies, artist-designed jewelry, silk scarves, home decor, and posters, as well as children’s books, art-inspired toys and games, and art kits. We also have notecards and postcards featuring our most popular portraits, as well as novelty T-shirts, pencils, and magnets.

 

Spotlight Programs

National Portrait Gallery

"We Starve Ourselves and Each Other": Hunger and Lesbian Self-Fashioning in 1970s America
Tuesday, June 8
5:00 p.m.
Online via Zoom

“Is death by famine worse than death by suicide?” asked the poet Adrienne Rich in “Hunger,” her 1974 poem to Audre Lorde. This talk explores the role of hunger and hunger strikes in 1970s activist communities in the United States, with a particular focus on lesbian poets and artists. As Rich, Lorde, and others in their circle reflected on the shared experience of hunger, both within and beyond the body, they fashioned it as a critical component of lesbian longing as well as an urgent political problem.

Free—Registration required

 

National Portrait Gallery

In Dialogue: Smithsonian Objects and Social Justice
Thursday, June 10
5:00 p.m.
Online via Zoom

This month, our conversation highlights two parallel stories of identity with respect to Native American objects in the collections of the National Portrait Gallery and the National Museum of Natural History. We’ll discuss how a portrait of Osage warrior and leader Shonke Mon-thi^ was used to obscure and later uncover an important narrative in U.S. history. The killer whale crest hat highlights a story of repatriation (a form of restorative justice) of a sacred object to a tribe or clan. Both objects offer insight into the ways museums have used Indigenous objects to further colonialism as well as the Smithsonian’s recent efforts at cultural restoration.

Free—Registration required

 

Coming Soon

National Portrait Gallery

One Life: Will Rogers
On view June 25, 2021–Ongoing

This is the National Portrait Gallery’s first exhibition to be presented exclusively on its website. Will Rogers (1879–1935) was a prolific political commentator with a career spanning vaudeville, silent films, “talkies,” radio, and newspaper. Born to a prominent Cherokee family on a ranch in Indian Territory near present-day Oologah, Oklahoma, Rogers could lasso anything. He was also a great intellect, who authored six books, appeared in seventy-one films, wrote 4,000 syndicated newspaper columns, and hosted a popular Sunday evening radio program.

 

National Portrait Gallery

"Warranted to Give Satisfaction": Daguerrotypes by Jeremiah Gurney
On view June 25–February 6, 2022

In 1840, Jeremiah Gurney (1812–1895) abandoned his career as a jeweler to establish one of New York City’s first daguerreotype studios. Gurney soon developed his reputation as a leading camera artist. He continued to make daguerreotypes until the close of the 1850s, when he fully transitioned his practice to paper print photography. “Warranted to Give Satisfaction” will feature a selection of daguerreotype portraits by Gurney from the Portrait Gallery’s collection alongside works from several private collections.

 

On View

National Portrait Gallery
Visionary: The Cumming
Family Collection (Part II)

On view through Oct. 31, 2021
National Portrait Gallery
Recent Acquisitions
On view through Oct. 23, 2022
National Portrait Gallery
Her Story: A Century of Women Writers
On view through Jan. 23, 2022
National Portrait Gallery
Storied Women of the Civil War Era
On view through Feb. 6, 2022

 

Portrait Gallery Spotlight: Toni Morrison

National Portrait Gallery

As a member of the National Portrait Gallery’s Teen Museum Council this year, I chose Robert McCurdy’s portrait of Toni Morrison (2006) as my favorite portrait for the Learning Lab Collection we created: "By Teens For Teens: Our Favorite Things." Toni Morrison is one of my favorite authors, and I love this portrait of her because she is depicted with such candor and frankness–demonstrated by McCurdy's attention to detail. The clean simple lines, the blank background, Morrison's set, serious expression, and her grounded stance are captivating.

The various elements of the portrait facilitate a silent dialogue between the viewer and the sitter, which I really enjoy because you can just look at the portrait and think without any guidelines or expectations.

Miriella Jiffar
Member of the National Portrait Gallery's Teen Museum Council

National Portrait Gallery

Episodes of PORTRAITS season three premiere bi-weekly on Tuesdays through June. Listen now on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, PRX, Radio Public, Spotify, Stitcher, and on our website.

 

Catalogues from the National Portrait Gallery by National Portrait Gallery, 2020. Adrienne Cecile Rich, by Joan E. Biren, inkjet print, 1981 (printed 2012). National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution. ©JEB (Joan E. Biren). Shonke Mon thi^, (Shunkamolah), Osage. Bust made April – Dec. 1904 by Frank Lemon. Photograph by Ken Gonzales-Day. Will Rogers at the mic of Radio KHJ in Hollywood (detail) by an unidentified photographer, gelatin silver print, c. 1930. Will Rogers Memorial Museum, OHS, Claremore, OK. Two Girls (detail) by Jeremiah Gurney, quarter-plate daguerreotype with applied color, c. 1852. Wm. B. Becker Collection. Al Gore (detail) by Chuck Close, 2009. Gift of Ian M. and Annette P. Cumming. © Chuck Close, courtesy of Pace Gallery. Louis Armstrong (detail) by Philippe Halsman, 1966 (printed 1998). Gift from the Trustees of the Corcoran Gallery of Art (Gift of Betsy Karel). © Philippe Halsman Archive. Lorraine Hansberry (detail) by David Attie, 1959. © David Attie. Mrs. JH Allen (detail) by Mathew Brady Studio, c. 1861. Untitled (Toni Morrison) (detail) by Robert McCurdy, 2006. Gift of Ian M. and Annette P. Cumming. © 2006 Robert McCurdy. PORTRAITS by the National Portrait Gallery, 2019.

All images belong to the National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, unless otherwise noted.

 

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