National Museum of Women in the Arts

07/03/2025

Guerrilla Girls: Fighting Discrimination, One Poster at a Time

Since 1985, the Guerrilla Girls have broadcasted uncomfortable realities about gender and racial inequality in the arts through eye-catching posters

06/30/2025

We’re full of pride 365 days of the year here at NMWA. 🏳️‍🌈

We are proud to support the LGBTQIA+ community online and in-person through our collection, exhibitions, programs, and (of course) our staff! ❤️

[Image description: Two photos of several NMWA staff members in the museum’s Great Hall smiling and holding different pride flags.]

06/27/2025

Shop with with these products from our Museum Shop!

1. Remind everyone that love is love with the “amor es amor” tote bag. ❤️
2. Dive into a photographic celebration of q***r love and excellence with “Q***r Power Couples: On Love and Possibility.” 💑
3. Pick a film from “The Q***r Film Guide: 100 great movies that tell LGBTQIA+ Stories,” and enjoy a movie night in. 🎞️
4. Grab a set of Drag Queen Playing Cards to add a touch of glamour to game night. 👑
5. Browse through “The Pride Atlas” to learn about the best places and events the q***r world has to offer. 🌎

🛍️ Click the link in our bio to shop or visit shop.nmwa.org!

[Image descriptions: Six graphics showing five different pride month- related products in NMWA’s Museum Shop.]

06/26/2025

Happy 75th birthday to conceptual artist, !

Throughout her career, Jane Hammond has demonstrated a fascination with the ways in which recognizable images shape our understanding of the world. The center of “Untitled (141,257)” contains an example of an image that frequently appears in stock imagery, a familiar silhouette of a Victorian woman painting. In this work, Hammond explores how words and labels transform perceptions and can negatively impact women artists before anyone even sees their work.

Artwork credit: Jane Hammond, “Untitled (141,257),” 1989; © Jane Hammond

[Image description: A silhouette of a woman painting surrounded by words in red and black.]

06/25/2025

“Niki de Saint Phalle In Print” is open now on the first floor of the museum. 🖼️

Drawn from NMWA’s deep collection of works by Niki de Saint Phalle (1930 to 2002), this exhibition of 20 large-scale prints explores the artist’s captivating work as a printmaker, including the artist’s famous “Nana” figures (roughly equivalent to “sassy young women” in French slang) that challenge conventional ideals for women’s bodies. The scope of Saint Phalle's work offers soulful reflections on the dynamics of contemporary culture and the need for activism.

Photos by Kevin Allen for NMWA

[Image descriptions: Three installation photographs of brightly colored artworks on white gallery walls.]

06/23/2025

“The American Street Photographer Who Q***red the Victorian Era” - Hyperallergic

Alice Austen (1866 to 1952) documented New York City during the late 1800s and early 1900s, taking over 7,000 photographs during a pivotal time in the city. At the time, Austen lived in Staten Island but would venture into Manhattan to document immigrant and working-class women, wanting to capture life beyond restrictive Victorian expectations. This act alone defied gender norms of the time, as this would make Austen one of the first women to photograph outside of a studio. Austen’s photographs reflected her life as an openly q***r woman, depicting women in intimate settings.

“Egg Stand Group” is part of a recent gift of 25 works by Austen to enter NMWA’s collection, enabling the museum to share her art and story. The artist’s home in Staten Island, which she shared with her partner Gertrude Tate, has been turned into a historic site and vibrant cultural center, now known as the Alice Austen House, which is a nationally designated site of LGBTQIA+ history.

Artwork credit: Alice Austen, “Egg Stand Group,” 1895 (printed 1970s); © Alice Austen

[Image description: Black-and-white photograph from the 1800s of two women at an outdoor market.]

06/22/2025

Today is ! 🌧️

In honor of our 2025 campaign, which focuses on environmental justice and sustainability, we’re highlighting Graciela Arias Salazar’s “Creación del Amazonas (Creation of the Amazon),” that was featured in NMWA’s “New Worlds: Women to Watch 2024” exhibition.

Graciela Arias Salazar (b. 1978) portrays the celestial origin story of the Shipibo-Conibo, an Indigenous group in the Peruvian Amazon. Salazar visualizes their origin story in brightly colored scenes painted on ten machetes, a tool necessary for survival in the jungle. The Amazon inspires much of Salizar’s work: “The jungle is full of magic and mystery,... When I paint, I try to understand and convey what I experience through the jungle.”

Artwork credit: Graciela Arias Salazar, “Creación del Amazonas (Creation of the Amazon),” 2023; © Graciela Arias Salazar; Courtesy of the artist; Photo by Adrián Portugal

[Image description: Ten painted machetes portraying scenes in forests and water.]

06/20/2025

Happy ! ☀️

We’re soaking up the sunshine from L.C. Armstrong’s “Sunset Over Sea of Bliss,” new to the museum’s collection and now on view on the third floor of the museum. 🌻

L.C. Armstrong (b. 1954) is known for large-scale imaginary landscapes with luminous colors and enormous, looming flowers. With saturated hues and dramatic shifts in scale, her twelve-foot-wide triptych depicts a characteristic dream-like setting. An awe-inspiring sunset is dominated by colossal flowers while minute human figures blissfully swim in a distant sea.

L.C. Armstrong, “Sunset Over Sea of Bliss,” 2001; © L.C. Armstrong

[Image description: A landscape view of flowers overlaid against a sunset.]

06/19/2025

The star is an important symbol in the Juneteenth flag, but do you know why?

In the middle of the red and blue Juneteenth flag is a star surrounded by a bursting outline. The star represents Texas, the Lone Star state, as well as freedom for African Americans in all 50 states in the nation. The burst outline around the star is inspired by a nova, a term that astronomers use for new stars.

Latoya Hobbs (b. 1983) is an artist who uses symbols and figurative imagery in her work to address ideas of beauty, cultural identity, and womanhood as they relate to women of the African Diaspora. In “The Founder” on view on the third floor, she portrays Dr. Tanekeya W. Harris, who founded (BWoP), a supportive group for midcareer and established Black women printmakers. Hobbs often uses collage to create her figures’ adornments. When creating patterns, she frequently looks to West African “adinkra” symbols. The design collages on the shirt and block-printed in the background is “nsoromma,” which translates to “star.”

Artwork credit: LaToya M. Hobbs, “The Founder,” 2020; © LaToya M. Hobbs

[Image description: Mixed-media portrait of a Black woman on a star-patterned background.]

06/17/2025

An exhibition at the National Museum of Women in the Arts in Washington, DC, explores modern and contemporary women artists’ use of the uncanny as a feminist strategy and social critique.

An exhibition at NMWA in Washington, DC, explores modern and contemporary women artists’ use of the uncanny as a feminist strategy and social critique.