It seems to me that when I was in Washington in 1964 I went to the National Portrait Gallery. I don’t remember where it was. But I think I remember seeing lots of portraits of George Washington and many now forgotten members of the early congress. It was the kind of exhibition that can make you think that American history is dull. With that in mind I had no intention on this visit to see it again or to visit the American Art Museum. Knowing that the Smithsonian was once referred to as the nation’s attic, I imagined that the collection would be nothing more than the rejects from other museums. But I wanted to see this museum specifically to see the glass canopy that Norman Foster, Foster and Partners, had designed and built over the courtyard, 2007. Having seen that I decided to give the museum a little attention. In making my plans I had left Sunday open in the event that I wanted to see one of the other museums a second time and after spending five hours here on Saturday I returned and gave it another five hours on Sunday: this museum is a great discovery!
The building, originally the Patent Office, is Greek revival and was built in four stages. It has National Landmark status. It is almost two city blocks long and one city block wide. During the Civil war it was used as a hospital for the injured troops. Walt Whitman worked here as a nurse. He called this the noblest building in the city. It is indeed grand. Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Ball was held on the third floor.
The Courtyard canopy and the public space created beneath it are wonderful. But I have read that other public organizations have subsequently engaged Foster and Partners to do the same for their buildings. I am always flabbergasted that this country is such a land of conformists and that art museums, of all places, represent the high end of this will to conformity. Why can’t one canopy be enough?
Historic architecture is that which has both original design and original engineering. Almost every building that Frank Lloyd Wright designed was considered historic architecture from the moment it was completed. He designed over 600 buildings. While each of them bears the stamp of his genius, no two are alike. Let’s see the current crop of contemporary starchitects step to the plate! But first, let’s see museums and public institutions demand buildings that are original works of art! …as is this lovely canopy!
The canopy is one of those art works that is experienced and felt rather than analyzed and comprehended. It is modern art with traditional values. While it is an overhead cover it is at the same time embracing. Sitting in the courtyard I could feel my spirit rise …not high or into another time dimension…it simply rose above the situation and hovered. “Oh, the achieve of …the thing!”
This museum is huge. The woman at the information desk told me that if you just walk through all the galleries it is the equivalent of walking 16 blocks. I figure that is probably a little over a mile. Imagine art works on the walls on both sides. That is a lot of art. The literature claims that 7,000 artists are represented in paintings, sculptures, drawings, photography, folk art, and crafts. And these are not left over’s or also ran’s; the whole who’s who of American art is represented and on display.
In the third floor contemporary galleries Louise Nevelson’s Sky Cathedral can be seen. It too is huge, about thirty feet long and ten feet high. Next to it, and holding its own, at about eight feet high and three and one half feet wide is Jesus Moroles’ Granite Weaving, a wall mounted construction in gray granite with a wonderful texture. I have seen Moroles’ work in public settings and in several museums outside New York and I think he is one of the very best 20th Century American sculptors. He works always in granite, which he loves, usually rose granite, and his work always glows with his love of his medium and his material. Another of his works, smaller but equally impressive, is on the first floor. I am tone deaf when it comes to sculpture but his work always rings with a note of purity.
At the G Street entrance there is Vaquero, the Luis Jimenez larger than life-sized bucking bronco with the vaquero hanging on for dear life with a pistol high over head blasting the silence. I had seen this outside the El Paso Art Museum. Jimenez is another unknown great American sculptor, a master of form, a latter day Rodin. He works in fiberglass and color. Bravo!
Down the hall there are works by Grace Hartigan, Joan Mitchell, Milton Avery, and one of the best Larry Rivers paintings: Identification Manual. …then the Raphael Soyers’s, the Paul Cadmus’s, and the Jess’s. As well there are the William de Kooning’s, the Joe Smith’s and the John Doe’s. Arranged beautifully in galleries in chronological order on three floors it is nothing so much as an encyclopedia of American art. And rather than having my fear of seeing second rate works realized, I came to discover that there are works here one cannot see in any other American Art museum.
The National Portrait Gallery is for the most part in the south section of the building but portraits are mixed in with the other paintings in the American section. When I last saw it there were 500 works in the collection. Now there are thousands and for the modern tourist there are sections on movie stars and sports figures. Prominently displayed in front of a large and wonderful Katherine Hepburn portrait, circa 1957, are her four Oscars. Not only did she not go to the awards ceremonies to receive them, I guess she had no desire to keep them.
A particularly nice gallery is the American Experience. In this gallery almost all of the works are great works by well known artists, Georgia O’Keefe, Milton Avery, Diebenkorn, Hockney, Arthur Dove, Martin Puryear, Noguchi … a moderately sized gallery but really stunning in it’s impact.
In addition to displaying an incredibly large number of works from the collection, the museum has sufficient space for several special exhibits as well. At the present time there are nine. On the Portrait Gallery web site there were two exhibitions listed of photographs on the Old West.
Because it was at the front door I began to wander through the exhibit, William T. Wiley. Wiley is described as a hip California artist and although he is a superior draftsman and obviously loves to draw, the repetition of his funky mindset, as represented by fifty years work, was more funk than I cared to experience, not being charmed by it in the first place. But I was fascinated by the size of the exhibition …88 often large works…it meandered for what seemed to me several city blocks. As I turned to walk away I said to the attendant: “Looks like this guy worked 24/7”. “He kept at it”, he replied.
In an exhibit one floor above that, 1934, A New Deal for Artists, over two hundred paintings from the collection made under the sponsorship of the WPA program were shown. Almost without exception these were representational works in the regionalist style …there were strong hints of Grant Wood, Thomas Hart Benton, and John Steuart Curry. At the University of Arizona Art Museum in Tucson I saw an exhibition of etchings from the WPA program and what is so remarkable about both the etchings and the paintings is that all of the artists were masters of their craft and made artworks that met all the requirements for the achievement of fine art. But in contrast to the march of the modern art vanguard, theirs was a lesser fame. I can well understand why someone like Benton could be embittered by this. It is sad to realize that very accomplished and talented persons receive so little recognition and esteem. It is also interesting that these works of regionalism are considered secondary art works whereas the photography of Walker Evans, Dorothea Lange, Ben Shahn, et al, covering the same period and subjects, are considered first rank fine art contemporary photography.
Next door was an exhibition of American folk art, including what I thought were some good examples of obsessive/compulsive outsider art. To emphasize again the size of this museum, there were three hundred works displayed here. But all of the works were dynamic, creative, sincerely felt, and tremendously inspiring. The highlight of course was James Hampton’s Throne of the Third Heaven…only a portion of this was shown, perhaps 25 of 180 pieces, but enough of it to define the tradition!
The great discovery though was on the third floor of the west wing, The Luce Foundation Center. This is set up as a museum storage area. Large sculptures are on the main floor and above this on two levels of mezzanines are areas similar to the stacks in libraries and in each of which hang paintings, small sculptures, and the museum’s collection of twentieth century crafts. There are ten-pull out drawers of handmade jewelry. Every item here has the title, the artist’s name, and the acquisition number. Computer terminals spaced throughout can be used to search the object’s history and provide a biography for the artist. In this, granted, very large room, there are three thousand five hundred works. I saw them all.
I discovered this room late on Saturday and it was the reason I decided to return the next day and spend a longer time here. I was well rewarded. The Smithsonian’s Craft Collection is on view in the Renwick Gallery, across from the White House. I saw that the first day after leaving the Phillips Collection. I have to say I was disappointed. Many of the items from the permanent collection appeared to have been removed because of special exhibits of contemporary crafts …those works that attempt to break down the boundaries between art and craft and fancy themselves on the art side. Usually I disagree and in this case I did. Here in the Luce Gallery I was able to see about ten vitrines with the permanent works and look into all those drawers close up. Works for me!
I was also able to see one of Marsden Hartley’s first paintings, a decidedly Bleu Reiter influenced work …also one of his last, Maine Lobster: so simple but pure magic!
Sharing the third floor is an art preservation workshop with floor to ceiling glass walls so that the visitors can observe what goes into caring for works of art. This was closed on the weekend but it seemed to me a great idea to foster an appreciation of the arts.
This museum is not a wing or a section of a larger museum; it is a whole museum with the whole spectrum of American art. While that might not pique the curiosity of some, the vastness of this collection and the sheer numbers of the works on display will completely change your perceptions about American art. The United States does have a fine art tradition and it is far more vibrant and alive than I had thought it to be. This is the first American Art museum to bring that achievement to my awareness, perhaps because of what I perceive as an emphasis on all of the 20th century artists and the way that is blended with the better known, and lesser known, 18th or 19th century names, giving each movement and school equal importance.
It is a welcome change from the usual American art museum practice that satisfies itself by showing one work each of only about fifty different artists, and in all of those museums the same artists doing similar work, most of them habitués of the New York art scene. How nice to see all of these others. It could almost make you believe there is indeed a real America out there inhabited by real Americans.
The web site feels pretty antique. There are few photographs of the art works, although some entries have links to Flickr …look for that. I find the search engine for the art works impossible. Apparently you need the acquisition number to find them. You will be directed sometimes to an Advanced Search, but I don’t find it. I wrote to them and received a lengthy reply as to all the bells and whistles I had to tweak to get results. Why not just upgrade the system? But, yes, it’s a matter of budgetary constraints. So just go see the museum. You will NOT be disappointed! Overwhelmed, yes, but not disappointed.
The Museum web site:
http://americanart.si.edu/
The Courtyard:
http://americanart.si.edu/visit/about/architecture/kogod/
History of the Collection:
http://americanart.si.edu/visit/about/history/
Throne of the Third Heaven:
http://americanart.si.edu/collections/search/artwork/?id=989
The National Portrait Gallery: see current exhibitions for The Old Westhttp://www.npg.si.edu/exhibit/current.html
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