A photograph of Alex Man by Libby Weiler.

Alex Mann

Former Curator (Prints and Drawings)

Crawford Alexander Mann III was curator of prints and drawings at the Smithsonian American Art Museum from April 2017 until October 2021. Mann’s responsibilities included research, exhibitions, and acquisitions related to the museum’s collection of approximately 25,000 prints, drawings, and watercolors dating from the eighteenth century to the present. His research interests included Italian-American artistic exchange on the Grand Tour, artists of the American South, the impact of East Asian watercolor and printmaking traditions on American art, and the evolving visual constructions of masculinity, femininity, and gender. He organized Sargent, Whistler, and Venetian Glass: American Artists and the Magic of Murano (2021).

Exhibitions

  • An artwork image of a woman
    Sargent, Whistler, and Venetian Glass: American Artists and the Magic of Murano 
    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.
    October 8, 2021 – May 8, 2022
  • A watercolor image of Grand Canyon.
    Chiura Obata: American Modern
    Japanese-born artist Chiura Obata’s seemingly effortless synthesis of different art traditions defies the usual division between “East” and “West.” This exhibition presents the most comprehensive survey of his rich and varied body of work to date, from bo
    November 27, 2019 – March 13, 2020

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