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Traveling Exhibitions

The Smithsonian American Art Museum’s traveling exhibition program has circulated hundreds of exhibitions since it was established in 1951. Below are our current offerings.

On The Road

  • Many Wests: Artists Shape an American Idea

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    Ideas about the American West, both in popular culture and in commonly accepted historical narratives, are often based on a past that never was, and fail to take into account important events that actually occurred. The exhibition Many Wests: Artists Shape an American Idea examines the perspectives of 48 modern and contemporary artists who offer a broader and more inclusive view of this region, which too often has been dominated by romanticized myths and Euro-American historical accounts.

    National Tour

    Boise Museum of Art
    in Boise, Idaho
    –
    Whatcom Museum of Art
    in Bellingham, Washington
    –
    Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art
    in Eugene, Oregon
    –
    Utah Museum of Fine Art
    in Salt Lake City, Utah
    –
    Smithsonian American Art Museum
    in Washington, DC
    –

  • Kara Walker: Harper’s Pictorial History of the Civil War (Annotated)

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    This exhibition of prints from SAAM’s collection features the artist’s provocative take on the Civil War.

    National Tour

    Smithsonian American Art Museum
    in Washington, DC
    –
    The Rockwell Museum
    in Corning, New York
    –
    The Trout Gallery, Dickinson College
    in Carlisle, Pennsylvania
    –
    New-York Historical Society
    in New York, New York
    –

  • African American Art in the 20th Century

    Media - 1995.22.1 - SAAM-1995.22.1_1 - 65784

    The Smithsonian American Art Museum is home to one of the most significant collections of African American art in the world. Highlights from this collection are traveling to several cities across the United States in the exhibition African American Art in the 20th Century.

    National Tour

    Dubuque Museum of Art
    in Dubuque, Iowa
    –
    Cornell Fine Arts Museum
    in Winter Park, Florida
    –
    The Westmoreland Museum of American Art
    in Greensburg, Pennsylvania
    –
    Wichita Art Museum
    in Wichita, Kansas
    –
    Hudson River Museum
    in Yonkers, New York
    –

Will be on Tour

  • Sargent, Whistler, and Venetian Glass: American Artists and the Magic of Murano

    An artwork image of a woman

    October 8, 2021 — May 8, 2022

    Smithsonian American Art Museum (8th and G Streets, NW)

    This exhibition brings to life the Venetian glass revival of the nineteenth century on the famed island of Murano and the artistic experimentation the city inspired for artists such as John Singer Sargent and James McNeill Whistler.

    National Tour

    Amon Carter Museum of American Art
    in Fort Worth, Texas
    –

  • ¡Printing the Revolution! The Rise and Impact of Chicano Graphics, 1965 to Now

    Media - 2012.53.1 - SAAM-2012.53.1_1 - 82036

    November 20 - November 22, 2020 and May 14, 2021 - August 8, 2021

    Smithsonian American Art Museum (8th and G Streets, NW)
    In the 1960s, activist Chicano artists forged a remarkable history of printmaking that remains vital today. Many artists came of age during the civil rights, labor, anti-war, feminist and LGBTQ+ movements and channeled the period’s social activism into assertive aesthetic statements that announced a new political and cultural consciousness among people of Mexican descent in the United States. ¡Printing the Revolution! explores the rise of Chicano graphics within these early social movements and the ways in which Chicanx artists since then have advanced innovative printmaking practices attuned to social justice.

    National Tour

    Amon Carter Museum of American Art
    in Fort Worth, Texas
    –

  • Fighters for Freedom: William H. Johnson Picturing Justice

    Media - 1983.95.53 - SAAM-1983.95.53_1 - 75140
    William H. Johnson's Fighters for Freedom series in the mid-1940s as a tribute to African American activists, scientists, teachers, and performers as well as international heads of state working to bring peace to the world. The exhibition Fighters for Freedom: William H. Johnson Picturing Justice is drawn entirely from the collection of more than 1,000 works by William H. Johnson given to the Smithsonian American Art Museum by the Harmon Foundation in 1967 and reminds us that individual achievement and commitment to social justice are at the heart of the American story.

    National Tour

    Gibbes Museum of Art
    in Charleston, South Carolina
    –
    Smithsonian American Art Museum
    in Washington, DC
    –

Are you a museum looking for available exhibitions? See what we are offering currently through our traveling exhibition program.