SAAM Stories

Media - 1985.66.374 - SAAM-1985.66.374_1 - 81446
George Catlin (about whom Eye Level has written before) composed naturalist paintings on the trail that necessarily required a quick touch.
Kriston
Media - 1906.9.18 - SAAM-1906.9.18_1 - 67215
08/05/2006
The prince and president, surrounded by various dignitaries, may be the focus of this group portrait, but it's the image of George Washington that makes this painting especially interesting. His profile is outlined in the clouds (hint: look in the middle of painting, between the two groups of trees), as if implying the first president's presence at the joint British/American visit to his tomb.
Cassie
LA Times discusses museum blogs
08/02/2006
For a behind-the-scenes look at museum blogging in general and Eye Level in particular, take a look at Now on exhibit, the blogger's view in Sunday's Los Angeles Times.
SAAM Staff
Blog Editor
Conserving Gene Davis's Two Part Blue
07/31/2006
Gene Davis's Two Part Blue was given to American Art in the ‘90s as part of the late artist’s estate. The painting came with a surprise: it seemed to have some white accretions on its surface.
SAAM Staff
Blog Editor
Proposed Parrish Art Museum
07/28/2006
From the NYT write-up of the new design for the Parrish Art Museum in Long Island:
Kriston
Color Field Gallery
07/24/2006
SAAM lighting designer, Scott Rosenfeld, gives us an inside look at the challenge of lighting artwork. Lighting the Color Field Gallery (3rd floor, West Wing), according to Scott, was an exciting endeavor:
SAAM Staff
Blog Editor
Kogod canopy
With our opening festivities complete we're turning our attentions upward —to the Robert and Arlene Kogod Courtyard being designed by renowned British architect Norman Foster and scheduled for completion by the fall of next year.
SAAM Staff
Blog Editor
Conservation: Woman with Gold Necklace
I spoke to conservator Ann Creager, who explained that she was removing the last patch of a layer of old varnish from the this portrait (circa 1850), Woman with Gold Necklace.
Cassie
Media - 1977.107.1 - SAAM-1977.107.1_2 - 116659
07/05/2006
Peer closely at Albert Bierstadt's Among the Sierra Nevada, California—you need to be standing up close and personal, because you won't find it even in a large image—and you will see, in the lower left-hand corner of the painting, hovering in a stream under the shadow of a rock outcrop, a trout.
Kriston
Museum Reopening Countdown Clock
07/03/2006
Rachel Allen, our Deputy Director, reminded us today of another milestone: "999 days ago, the museum started counting the days until reopening.
SAAM Staff
Blog Editor
Mr. Imagination
07/02/2006
From Eye Level's command center here in the recesses of the Luce Foundation Center yesterday, we were amazed at the surge of energy and people in our halls.
Cassie
SAAM opening day crowd
07/02/2006
There were 18,744 visitors to the Donald W. Reynolds Center yesterday on its opening day.
Joanna
Marilyn with Andy Warhol's Marilyn
07/01/2006
Visitors to The National Portrait Gallery can see Andy Warhol's famous portrait of Marilyn Monroe.
Joanna
Media - 2003.31A-X - SAAM-2003.31A-X_1 - 61338
07/01/2006
Offset from the modern/contemporary Lincoln Gallery is a dark room (the kind of museum space in which you might watch a video piece) where David Hockney's 1995–96 Snails Space With Vari-Lites, "Painting as Performance" is installed.
Kriston
The crowds await the opening of SAAM and NPG.
07/01/2006
A crowd of hundreds waited outside, everyone hoping to be the first to enter. Waving fans and folded papers, people were surely eager to escape the heat from today's bright sunshine. There was goofy entertainment aplenty; actors dressed as George and Martha Washington and Uncle Sam chatted up the crowd, and two people dressed as the iconic father and daughter from Grant Wood's American Gothic waved down from a portico.
Kriston
SAAM Reopening American Gothic
07/01/2006
Venerable American Art Icons Await the Opening of the Smithsonian American Art Museum.
SAAM Staff
Blog Editor
Media - 1989.83.3 - SAAM-1989.83.3_1 - 10822
06/30/2006
Performances, demonstrations, and talks will mark the opening of the museum tomorrow. Assuming you have some interest in also seeing the art that’s on display, here’s a list of works that deserve your attention:
Kriston
SAAM and NPG building
06/30/2006
Tomorrow, a really wonderful thing happens, and though we’ve thought about it for days and months and years, now that the moment is here it’s hard to know quite what to say.
Michael