National Gallery of Art

National Gallery of Art A place where everyone is welcome to explore and experience art, creativity, and shared humanity. Mellon in 1937. Pei, and the verdant 6.1-acre Sculpture Garden.
(12419)

FREE ADMISSION

About the Gallery:
Masterworks by the most renowned European and American artists, including the only painting by Leonardo da Vinci in the Americas and the largest mobile ever created by Alexander Calder, await visitors to the National Gallery of Art, one of the world's preeminent art museums. The Gallery’s collection of paintings, drawings, prints, photographs, sculpture, medals,

and decorative arts traces the development of Western art from the Middle Ages to the present. Open to the public free of charge, the Gallery was created for the people of the United States of America by a joint resolution of Congress accepting the gift of Andrew W. The Gallery’s campus includes the original neoclassical West Building designed by John Russell Pope, which is linked underground to the modern East Building designed by I.M. Temporary special exhibitions spanning the world and the history of art are presented frequently.

06/02/2026

They were lowkey fighting for their lives. Meanwhile they’re hype because they just found out our sculpture garden hours are extending til 8pm this summer 👀 Here's your official permission slip to touch grass longer: https://bit.ly/4fYgMx2

05/31/2026

This transformation is actually unreal 😭 Artist Jo Steel reimagined Rembrandt by literally becoming him, turning into the artist’s self-portrait through makeup, costume design, and hand-painted sets.

What inspired one of the best cosplays we’ve ever seen? 

“Since childhood, I’ve wanted to be an artist and I’ve never swayed from that path. While at first, I envisioned myself creating art in the more traditional sense, the necessity for an income shifted my focus towards content creation. I became the canvas. Still to this day, I see myself in artists like Rembrandt, so it was only natural to become him in a more literal sense. I became the Portrait of Rembrandt, and in doing so, I became the embodiment of my childhood dreams. 

In making this video, I challenged myself in ways I haven’t before. While gender-bending is a signature style of mine, hand-painting the costume and backdrop were new and inspiring ways to test my own capabilities. 

Being featured in the National Gallery of Art is one of my life’s greatest achievements. As I am facing serious health concerns, I’m honored to make my mark on the world in the way I’ve always envisioned.”

The National Gallery’s Open Call is a campaign spotlighting the work of talented artists across the country. This video will also be featured in temporary display inside the museum. 

05/29/2026

Chat, the snatched girlie has returned to her regularly scheduled programming. And today’s lore drop? The Top Creators selected for the National Gallery’s Open Call 👀

See the full roster of rizzlers: https://www.nga.gov/open-call

⭐️ Alison Luchs, National Gallery of Art, Curator of Early European Sculpture and Deputy Head of Sculpture

During WWII, a team of National Gallery employees took part in the greatest treasure hunt in history: recovering stolen ...
05/26/2026

During WWII, a team of National Gallery employees took part in the greatest treasure hunt in history: recovering stolen art from the N***s. (Yep, the staff lore here is honestly unmatched.)

Uncover their story ⬇️

Long before World War II began, Hi**er had planned the systematic looting of museums and private collections throughout Europe.

During the war, N**i Germany seized over 6 million artifacts, hiding some for personal use and destroying others they deemed "degenerate."

To guard against N**i plunder, the US government recruited 335 museum curators, historians, archaeologists, and conservators from 13 countries to go to the front lines and help recover the stolen art. These men and women were called the Monuments Men.

Among them were several employees from the National Gallery: Lamont Moore, Charles P. Parkhurst, John D. Skilton Jr., Craig Hugh Smyth, E. Parker Lesley, and Perry Cott.

These individuals were not trained soldiers but found themselves in the midst of combat zones.

To recover art stolen throughout the continent, the Monuments Men had to conduct on-the-ground investigations. They traveled to suspected hiding places—such as mines, castles, and abandoned buildings. They risked capture and enemy fire, and two Monuments Men lost their lives while on duty.

One of their most famous missions was the discovery of a vast cache of art hidden in the Altaussee salt mine in Austria. This mine contained thousands of artworks and cultural objects that the N***s had planned to use for the Führermuseum, a massive museum Adolf Hi**er intended to build in Linz, Austria.

Thanks, in large part, to the Monuments Men, about five million artworks were returned to their countries and rightful owners. To this day, many stolen objects are still being found throughout Europe. The restitutions happening now are the continued legacy of the Monuments Men program.
📷 National Gallery of Art Archives. Manuscript Collections, World War II Monuments Men. Edith A. Standen Papers - Photographs

📷 National Gallery of Art Archives. Manuscript Collections, World War II Monuments Men. Frederick Hartt Papers - Wartime Photographs

📷 National Gallery of Art Archives. Manuscript Collections, World War II Monuments Men. Frederick Hartt Papers - Florence Flood Photographs

📷 National Gallery of Art Archives. Manuscript Collections, World War II Monuments Men. Edward E. Adams Papers - Photographs

📷 National Gallery of Art Archives. Manuscript Collections, World War II Monuments Men. Craig Hugh Smyth Papers - Photographs

05/22/2026

the museum clears the club so hard it’s not even funny.

📍 National Gallery of Art, DC
Art in video:
🖼 Gian Antonio Guardi and Francesco Guardi, “Erminia and the Shepherds,” 1750/1755, oil on canvas, 99 x 174 1/8 in., Ailsa Mellon Bruce Fund
📍 West Building, Main Floor, North Stair Landing West

🖼 Carlo Pittaluga, “Nymph of the Woods,” 1915, marble, 168.3 × 58.3 × 50.8 cm, 504 lb., Gift of the Honorable W.S. Stuckey, Jr.
📍 West Building, Ground Floor, Gallery G45

🩰 Edgar Degas, “Little Dancer Aged Fourteen,” 1878-1881, pigmented beeswax, clay, metal armature, rope, paintbrushes, human hair, silk and linen ribbon, cotton faille bodice, cotton and silk tutu, linen slippers, on wooden base, Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon
📍 West Building, Ground Floor, Gallery 3

🖼 Leonardo da Vinci, “Ginevra de’ Benci [obverse],” 1474/1478, oil on panel, 15 x 14 in., Ailsa Mellon Bruce Fund
📍 West Building, Main Floor, Gallery 6

05/17/2026

Georgia O’Keeffe was a woman before her time.

She took abstraction and made it personal. She found beauty in the small, the imperfect—in the curves of a flower, the vastness of a desert. But despite her profound talent, she faced skepticism from male critics who dismissed her work as overly feminine, sexualized, or decorative.

They failed to recognize the depth and complexity of her artistic vision. But O’Keefe persevered.

She refused to let gender norms and societal expectations define her art. She continued to assert her identity as a painter of unparalleled skill and vision.
📷 Alfred Stieglitz, “Georgia O’Keeffe,” 1929/1932, gelatin silver print, 4 x 3 in., Alfred Stieglitz Collection

🌺 Georgia O’Keeffe, “Jack-in-the-Pulpit No. 3, 5, and IV,” 1930, oils on canvas, Alfred Stieglitz Collection, Bequest of Georgia O’Keeffe

Dressed in black Saint Laurent with a towering top hat that looks like a pirate ship, nods to Carrington’s "The Temptat...
05/05/2026

Dressed in black Saint Laurent with a towering top hat that looks like a pirate ship, nods to Carrington’s "The Temptations of Saint Anthony Fragment II."

Carrington was born rich in England and was supposed to follow the rules, Catholic school, debutante balls...but she wasn’t interested.

She was into fairy tales, strange stories, and building her own reality. She got pulled into the Surrealist scene in the 1920s, but never really played by their rules either, especially not the part where women were just muses.

In the early 1900s, André Breton, who led the Surrealist movement, was drawn to the idea that women were naturally emotional and erotic. So artists like Carrington often got boxed into the role of muse, there to inspire men instead of being taken seriously.

But Carrington wasn’t having that. She once said, “I didn’t have time to be anyone’s muse…I was too busy rebelling against my family and learning to be an artist.”

In 1942, she moved to Mexico City, where her creativity was valued among a growing community of expatriate artists, writers, and photographers, including Varo, Benjamin Péret, Kati and José Horna, and her new husband, Emerico “Chiki” Weisz.

She stayed there for the rest of her life, and went deeper into her own creative world filled with painting, writing, mythology, and cooking. When the Surrealist movement put her into a box, she decided to make her own world instead.

🖼️ Leonora Carrington, "The Temptation Of St. Anthony. Fragment II," 1945, 122×91 cm

In this painting, René Magritte does what he does best: he takes our familiar world, breaks it into pieces, and then rea...
05/01/2026

In this painting, René Magritte does what he does best: he takes our familiar world, breaks it into pieces, and then reassembles it…

As one of the leading figures of the surrealist movement in 1920s Paris, Magritte’s approach mirrors one of the group’s fundamental principles. The surrealist manifesto, a multi-page written declaration drawn up by André Breton in 1924, states their aim was to “liberate the mind by subverting rational thought and giving free reign to the unconscious.”

That’s why the figure and horse in this painting are somewhat familiar to us: Magritte ingeniously distorts what would be an ordinary scene by creating an optical illusion. He tricks your eye by combining separate elements into one complete image, transforming a horseback rider into a dreamlike vision. 😵‍💫💫

In doing this, Magritte not only takes us out of our world, but exposes how absurd our everyday world can be.
__

🖼 René Magritte, “The Blank Signature,” 1965, oil on canvas, 32 x 25 in., Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon

Have you ever experienced a moment so perfect you wanted to hold onto it forever? Claude Monet did with this family port...
05/01/2026

Have you ever experienced a moment so perfect you wanted to hold onto it forever?

Claude Monet did with this family portrait.

Monet’s 1875 painting Woman with a Parasol feels like an interruption of a casual family stroll. He painted from an unconventional point of view to capture this breezy moment—looking upward at Camille Doncieux, his beloved first wife, and Jean, their first son.

Monet worked quickly to convey the warmth, the movement, the feeling of the outing. He sketched the sky in chaotic strokes of blue and gray, leaving splotches of canvas exposed in his haste. His loose brushwork pulls you further into the moment—you can almost hear the wind tugging at the tall grass and catching Camille's skirt.

Camille posed for her husband countless times during their nine-year marriage. Their relationship wasn’t easy, starting with Monet’s family’s disapproval and continuing through the couple’s poverty and Camille’s illness. Yet, despite it all, Camille and Claude remained by each other’s side.

Time was precious for the Monets. Camille was only 32 years old when she died after battling uterine cancer, leaving Monet shattered.

In the spirited brushstrokes of Woman with a Parasol, their love lives on today.
__

🖼 Claude Monet, “Woman with a Parasol - Madame Monet and Her Son,” 1875, oil on canvas, 39 x 31 in., Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon
📍 West Building, Main Floor, Gallery 85

04/22/2026

Our collection belongs to the American people. That’s why we’re sending some of our artworks out of DC, directly into communities across the country.

We’re excited to continue our Across the Nation program, a long-term loan initiative bringing masterpieces from the National Gallery to a museum near you. Our goal is to make art more accessible than ever before.

Recently, some of the most celebrated works from our collection took a special journey to the Figge Art Museum in Davenport, Iowa, where young artists can now study and savor them in person. This program is made possible through the generous support of the Mitchell P. Rales Family Foundation, which will bring works of art like these to Americans around the country for generations to come. 💙

Address

6th And Constitution Avenue NW
Washington D.C., DC
20565

Opening Hours

Monday 10am - 5pm
Tuesday 10am - 5pm
Wednesday 10am - 5pm
Thursday 10am - 5pm
Friday 10am - 5pm
Saturday 10am - 5pm
Sunday 10am - 5pm

Telephone

+12027374215

Website

Alerts

Be the first to know and let us send you an email when National Gallery of Art posts news and promotions. Your email address will not be used for any other purpose, and you can unsubscribe at any time.

Shortcuts

Share

Category