The crowds await the opening of SAAM and NPG. Photo by Jeff Gates.
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. More than a few people fanned themselves with today's copy of the Washington Post: a retired couple from Minnesota, a forestry conservation specialist named Paige, and an attorney from Pennsylvania each told me that they were alerted to the museum's opening by Jacqueline Trescott's front-page article.
Having walked through this museum so many times during its restoration, it's now entirely strange to see "real" people browsing the galleries. There is a crowd clustered in the Luce Center's cafe, eating tasty-looking salads near the room where I'm typing. Through the wall I can hear a very loud bluegrass hootenanny shaping up, and I'm going to investigate a basket-weaving demonstration. Actual basket weaving! It's quite a party.
