Art & Artists

Musician Lara Downes aims to highlight the work of composers like Harry T. Burleigh, photographed c. 1938.

How Black Composers Shaped the Sound of American Classical Music

A new project seeks to elevate artists like Harry T. Burleigh and Florence Price, whose work has been ignored by white audiences

Amelia Joe-Chandler, Hogan Teapot, 2013. Hammered copper and cast silver. 7.5 x 11 x 9cm. National Museum of the American Indian, 26/9781.

Smithsonian Voices

Learn the Powerful Story Behind This Handcrafted Diné (Navajo) Teapot

From the storage vaults of the National Museum of the American Indian, a small, copper sculpture points to a different sense of place

Admas. From left, clockwise: Abegasu Shiota, Henock Temesgen, Tewodros Aklilu, and Yousef Tesfaye.

Smithsonian Voices

Why the Newly Released 1980s Album 'Sons of Ethiopia,' by the Ethiopian D.C. Band Admas, Is Going Viral

Admas draws from and rearranges “golden era” Ethiopian music with then-fairly-new synthesizer and drum-machine rhythms.

Author, teacher and certified genealogical lecturer LaBrenda Garrett-Nelson will share best practices in using probate and other estate records to research enslaved ancestors.

Kick Off Black History Month With Ibram X. Kendi and Keisha N. Blain and a Host of Other Events

Join Smithsonian's NMAAHC for book talks, kid programs, artist meetups and a STEM Wikipedia Edit-a-Thon

Xavier Viramontes, Boycott Grapes, Support the United Farm Workers Union, 1973, offset lithograph on paper

Smithsonian Voices

Curators Weigh In on the Making of the Landmark Exhibition 'Printing the Revolution!'

Exploring the origins of the exhibition that combines innovative printmaking practices with social justice

"Yellowknife Flurry," a photograph by Nathan Myhrvold, captures the intricate structure of snowflakes.

These Are the Highest-Resolution Photos Ever Taken of Snowflakes

Photographer and scientist Nathan Myhrvold has developed a camera that captures snowflakes at a microscopic level never seen before

Robert S. Duncanson, Landscape with Rainbow, 1859, oil on canvas

Smithsonian Voices

A Curator Decodes the Powerful Messaging in This Landscape Painting

Curator Eleanor Harvey shares the story of Robert Duncanson and his artwork

Soil samples collected throughout the western United States show the wide variety of minerals and colors belowground.

Art Meets Science

Meet the Soil Scientists Using Dirt to Make Stunning Paints

Professors in California and Wyoming use the unique palettes to teach geology

George Peter Alexander Healy, Abraham Lincoln, 1887. Oil on canvas. Dimensions: 188 × 137cm (74 × 53 15/16"). National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution; transfer from the National Gallery of Art; gift of the A.W. Mellon Educational and Charitable Trust, 1942. This portrait is on view at the National Portrait Gallery, South Gallery 240.

Smithsonian Voices

A Scholar Takes a Deep Dive Into a Painted Homage to Abraham Lincoln

U.S. artist George Peter Alexander Healy’s presidential portraiture, conceived years after the sitter passed away

Scientists estimate this pig painting was drawn 45,500 years ago.

45,000-Year-Old Pig Painting in Indonesia May Be Oldest Known Animal Art

Ice Age cave painters flourished in Southeast Asia, where their work adorned rock walls

Bellerby & Co. is a studio in London that makes globes by hand.

Take a Peek Into One of the Last Studios Still Making Globes by Hand

Spinning a globe is one way to 'travel' the world during the pandemic

Every mark in Robert McCurdy’s portraits, above: Untitled (The 14th Dalai Lama, Tenzin Gyatso), is meticulously rendered from the baby hairs that frame his subjects’ temples to the crow’s feet that border their eyes.

Why Robert McCurdy's Photo-Realist Portraits Stop Viewers in Their Tracks

The key to these singular portraits of influential leaders of our time rests in the gaze and the exacting details of the clothing

The Aranui 5 is a passenger-freighter vessel that makes 14-day voyages between Tahiti and the Marquesas Islands.

This Polynesian Cruise Ship Has a Resident Tattoo Artist

Sailing between Tahiti and the Marquesas, Eddy Tata provides passengers with Polynesian-style tattoos based on their life stories

Still from the 1974 film Julie by Robert and Ingrid Wiegand

Women Who Shaped History

Women Artists Reflect on How They Helped Shape SoHo

A Smithsonian online event kicks off a new monthly series exploring the pioneering art films and videos made by women

Ory in November 1945, during his comeback after working as a janitor.

Kid Ory Finally Gets the Encore He Deserves

The childhood home of the musician who put New Orleans jazz on the map will soon open to the public

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Artisan America

Artisan America

A year-long celebration of craft in the United States

At the Totem Heritage Center in Ketchikan, Alaska, Nathan Jackson wears ceremonial blankets and a headdress made from ermine pelts, cedar, abalone shell, copper and flicker feathers.

Alaska

How Native Artisans in Alaska Bring Innovation and Humor to Their Craft

In Indigenous communities along the coast, a lively artistic movement plays with tradition

Cotton coverlet quilted in Texas, 19th century.

Artisan America

The State of American Craft Has Never Been Stronger

Today’s craft renaissance is more than just an antidote to our over-automated world. It renews a way of life that made us who we are

A mask and a wary eye reflects the current conditions of the global pandemic in the 2017 award-winning photograph Muerto Rico by ADÁL.

The Award-Winning Artist ADÁL Has Died. Read One of His Final Interviews

The Puerto Rican artist won the National Portrait Gallery's People’s Choice award for his devastating image 'Muerto Rico'

Woman With Flowers, oil and collage on canvas, 1972. A celebration of black beauty, the work alludes to both African sculpture and African American quilt making.

A New Survey of David Driskell, Artist and Scholar of African American Art, Comes to Atlanta

Spirituality, culture and memory come together in collages created by the esteemed curator

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