Exhibitions

This exhibition explores the full scope of Dorothy Liebes' contributions as a designer, collaborator, mentor, public figure, and tireless promoter of American modernism.

Shelley Niro: 500 Year Itch celebrates more than a half century of Shelley Niro’s paintings, photographs, mixed-media works, and films.

The Portrait Gallery recently acquired all 75 portraits from the Pulitzer-Prize winning photographer’s series and is celebrating the acquisition with a two-part exhibition.

One Life: Maya Lin is the first biographical exhibition of the architect, sculptor, and environmentalist.

This exhibition features more than 25 photographs by Brian Lanker, the Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer.

This exhibition—through archival photography and documents, personal drawings and correspondence, news clippings and ephemera—chronicles the colorful lives and contributions of the dynamic sisters.

From the 1890s to the 1920s, Sophia Crownfield designed prints for some of the most prominent silk and wallpaper manufacturers in the United States.

The National Portrait Gallery presents the first major large-scale retrospective of work by Hung Liu, the internationally acclaimed Chinese-born American artist.

The exhibition features more than 35 original watercolor and gouache design drawings by Zuzek to reveal Zuzek’s artistic contribution to the iconic Pulitzer style.

Every Eye Is Upon Me is the first major exhibition to explore the historical significance of this prominent position through the mode of portraiture. 

This exhibition drawn from the NPG collection highlights twenty-four noted women writers from the past one hundred years.

Hearts of Our People: Native Women Artists, organized by the Minneapolis Institute of Art, is the first major thematic exhibition to explore the artistic achievements of Native women.

On view are more than 75 vibrant and varied personal statements from artists from 1976 and now that elucidate the contours of feminist art.

This exhibition examines the ways in which artists, concert promoters, and others wielded Marian Anderson's iconic likeness as a powerful symbol in the pursuit of civil rights.

The Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery recognizes the life and legacy of Leah Chase with a painting by Gustave Blache III.

On display is a newly commissioned painting of Julie Packard, a leading figure in science and ocean conservation and the executive director of the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

Pioneering feminist artist Yun Suk Nam (born 1939) uses portraiture to gain insights into the lives of women, past and present.

The Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery recognizes the life of acclaimed singer and musician Aretha Franklin.

The Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery recognizes the life of Henrietta Lacks with the installation of a 2017 portrait by Kadir Nelson.

Murder is Her Hobby: Frances Glessner Lee and The Nutshell Studies of Unexplained Death explores the unexpected intersection between craft and forensic science.