February 2017

To celebrate Black History Month, SAAM has just launched an online exhibition of Edmonia Lewis' sculpture on Google Arts & Culture. And to promote the exhibition, Google has made Lewis and her sculpture, The Death of Cleopatra, its Google Doodle for today!

This year, SAAM was delighted to host our annual celebration of the Chinese New Year on the first day of the year, Saturday, January 28. So many friends and families (all 7,000 of you!) turned out to enjoy the activities and performances in the Kogod Courtyard.

The cultural efflorescence that was the Harlem Renaissance is captured in a series of portraits currently on view in the exhibition Harlem Heroes: Photographs by Carl Van Vechten.

Our Luce Unplugged series has been pairing art and music together since 2010. Typically highlighting the work of local musicians, we're excited to present a special pop-up performance with visiting artist Lonnie Holley at the Luce Foundation Center on Friday, February 10, from 5:30-7 p.m. Join us for an art talk and music concert!

At SAAM, we're always connecting people with our artworks. On Valentine's Day, we thought we'd explore one of the more interesting sections of many print and online publications these days: the often poetic, always interesting urban haiku of missed connections. Please check out our Instagram feed for more artful missed connections.

Each month, the Luce Foundation Center partners with neighboring Flashpoint Gallery to bring local artists to speak about their artwork and how it relates to SAAM's collection. This Sunday, we welcome Sparkplug Collective, eight local artists from the D.C. Arts Center, to discuss how collaboration and continued education help local artists thrive.

For our February Luce Unplugged show, we teamed up with D.C. Music Download to welcome brushes, a rock 'n' roll band from the District, to the Luce Foundation Center.

The Smithsonian American Art Museum is inviting independent video game developers to show their work at the museum's annual SAAM Arcade this August 5-6, 2017.