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At the Smithsonian / Exhibitions

“I felt that I was always connected to the world and the people of the world, and that activism was in me from a very young age,” Ono says.

The Long and Winding Road of Yoko Ono’s Art

A Hirshhorn exhibition of four works opens the same week Ono is credited, 46 years later, as a co-writer of the chart-topping ballad “Imagine.”

The Treaty of Medicine Creek

Medicine Creek, the Treaty That Set the Stage for Standing Rock

The Fish Wars of the 1960s led to an affirmation of Native American rights

Zelt 46—dithyrambisch (Tent 46—Dithyrambic) by Markus Lüpertz, 1965

It Takes Two Museums to Cover the Work of this Prolific German Neo-Expressionist

Europe’s celebrated Markus Lüpertz has a huge appetite for creativity. He’s also a poet, writer, set designer and jazz pianist

Firemen March 6 1985 by Donald Sultan, 1985

This Artist’s Worldview Drips With Unending Pessimism

“Man is inherently self-destructive, and whatever is built will be destroyed,” says painter Donald Sultan of his “Disaster Paintings”

The View From the Big Top

Aerialist and this year’s Folklife Festival performer Dolly Jacobs didn’t have to run away to join the circus; she lived it

"We saw kids who created hands that had solid, non-moving opposable joints," says Tim Pula (left) from the Smithsonian’s Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation .

The Innovative Spirit fy17

The Next Generation of Military Prosthetics Is Breaking New Ground

At the Smithsonian’s Military Invention Day, visitors experienced how military innovation is helping society

65 East 125th Street, Harlem by Camilo José Vergara, 1977

Watch How One Harlem Storefront Changes Over Nearly Four Decades

The Smithsonian American Art Museum’s new exhibition goes “Down These Mean Streets”

The First Couple head to the inauguration ceremony, Washington, DC, January 20, 1961

JFK’s Presidency Was Custom Made for the Golden Age of Photojournalism

A new exhibition at the Smithsonian American Art Museum concentrates on the White House’s most photogenic couple

"This book was representative of an era during which colonialism and the associated conversion to Christianity oppressed the indigenous population in often violent ways,” says curator Gabriela Pérez-Báez.

The Innovative Spirit fy17

A Rare Public Display of a 17th-Century Mayan Manuscript

With the book newly digitized, scholars are reinterpreting a story of native resistance from within its pages

First day of Memphis integration, TN by Dr. Ernest C. Withers, 1961

For Black Photographers, the Camera Records Stories of Joy and Struggle

The African American History Museum showcases for the first time signature photographs from its new collections

Fiber artist Lenore Tawney (1907–2007) crafted a postcard collage and sent it to photographer and artist Maryette Charlton, March 18, 1980.

Cats Had Clout Long Before the Internet

For artists, cats prove to be more than elegant studio companions, but inspirations as well, says a new exhibition

After the war, the contents of Pershing's office, including his desk, were shipped back to the U.S. and delivered to the Smithsonian.

World War I: 100 Years Later

From This Desk, 100 Years Ago, U.S. Operations in World War I Were Conceived

Germany’s defeat could be traced to pins in a map now on display at the Smithsonian’s American History Museum

The National Portrait Gallery commissioned a poem from the Pulitzer Prize winning poet Yusef Komunyakaa for the museum's new exhibition, "The Face of Battle."

A New Poem is Commissioned to Honor the Soldiers Who Fight America’s Wars

Pulitzer Prize winning poet Yusef Komunyakaa writes “After the Burn Pits” for the National Portrait Gallery

On the Wire, by Harvey Thomas Dunn (oil on canvas, 1918)

When Artists Became Soldiers and Soldiers Became Artists

A rare opportunity to see works by the American Expeditionary Force’s World War I illustration corps, and newly found underground soldier carvings

Muse with Violin Screen (detail), 1930. Rose Iron Works, Inc. (American, Cleveland, est. 1904). Paul Fehér (Hungarian, 1898–1990), designer. Wrought iron, brass; silver and gold plating

The Innovative Spirit fy17

How Jazz, Flappers, European Émigrés, Booze and Cigarettes Transformed Design

A new Cooper-Hewitt exhibition explores the Jazz Age as a catalyst in popular style

Peter Voulkos in his Glendale Boulevard Studio in Los Angeles California

The Ceramicist Who Punched His Pots

Influenced by avant-garde poets, writers and Pablo Picasso, Peter Voulkos experimented with the increasingly unconventional

Wife Stands by Babe and Defies Accuser by Underwood & Underwood, 1925

Would the Legendary Babe Ruth Still Be a Star if He Played Today?

Award-winning sportswriter Jane Leavy says the Bambino would be as big a personality as he was in his own time

An American aid worker in France writes a letter back home for a wounded soldier in 1918.

World War I Letters From Generals to Doughboys Voice the Sorrow of Fighting a War

An exhibition at the National Postal Museum displays a rare letter from General John Pershing

Snow at Fukagawa by Kitagawa Utamaro (1753–1806), Japan, Edo period, ca. 1802–6

This Rare Display of a Japanese Triptych is Only Usurped by the Great Mysteries Surrounding It

Don’t miss this singular showing of Kitagawa Utamaro’s three works reunited at the Sackler Gallery

A poster by artist Edward Penfield promotes The Woman’s Land Army of America, created to encourage women to step into agricultural jobs after men were called into military service.

These Powerful Posters Persuaded Americans It Was Time to Join the Fight

The Smithsonian offers a rare opportunity to see an original iconic Uncle Sam “I Want You” poster, among others, of the World War I era

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