Qualla: National Portrait Gallery (United States)

National Portrait Gallery (United States): Introduction

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit ZeWrestler, CC BY-SA 3.0. The building that houses the National Portrait Gallery was originally something else entirely. The Old Patent Office Building, completed in 1867 after thirty years of intermittent construction, was where Thomas Jefferson's drawings of inventions were kept and where Civil War wounded were laid out in long rows during the spring of 1862. Walt Whitman walked these halls reading to dying soldiers. Clara Barton worked here as a nurse. The Patent Office continued operating in the building until 1932, the Civil Service Commission moved in afterwards, and by 1953 D.C. businessmen were lobbying to tear the whole thing down for a parking garage. President Eisenhower signed legislation in 1958 transferring the building to the Smithsonian for use as a national art museum. The National Portrait Gallery, established by Congress in 1962, opened inside on October 7, 1968. Through the Greek Revival sandstone porticos modeled on the Parthenon, visitors now walk past Gilbert Stuart's Lansdowne portrait of Washington and Kehinde Wiley's portrait of Barack Obama.

Image: ZeWrestler | CC BY-SA 3.0

National Portrait Gallery (United States): Eighty Years of Lobbying

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit ZeWrestler, CC BY-SA 3.0. The idea of a federal portrait gallery dates to 1886, when Robert Winthrop, president of the Massachusetts Historical Society, returned from a visit to London's National Portrait Gallery and began campaigning for an American equivalent. The campaign moved slowly. In 1919, the Smi...

Image: ZeWrestler | CC BY-SA 3.0

National Portrait Gallery (United States): The Lansdowne Drama

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Gilbert Stuart, Public domain. Gilbert Stuart painted the Lansdowne portrait of George Washington in 1796 - an eight-foot canvas commissioned by Senator William Bingham as a gift to British Prime Minister William Petty FitzMaurice, the Marquess of Lansdowne. The painting passed through British noble families u...

Image: Gilbert Stuart | Public domain

National Portrait Gallery (United States): The Cracked Plate

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Toohool, Public domain. In February 1865, photographer Alexander Gardner photographed Abraham Lincoln in his studio at the corner of 7th and D Streets in Washington. The glass-plate negative cracked during development - a long horizontal fissure running across the top of Lincoln's head. Gardner made one...

Image: Toohool | Public domain

National Portrait Gallery (United States): Foster's Glass Canopy

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit 19h00s, Public domain. The Old Patent Office Building closed for renovation in January 2000. The renovation was projected to take two years and cost $42 million. It took seven years and cost $283 million. The most prominent addition was a glass-roofed canopy by Norman Foster spanning the interior court...

Image: 19h00s | Public domain

National Portrait Gallery (United States): The 2025 Removals

Sun, 31 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Toohool, Public domain. In July 2025, painter Amy Sherald withdrew her solo exhibition American Sublime from the National Portrait Gallery. The gallery had been in discussions with Sherald about possibly removing one piece - her portrait of the Statue of Liberty depicted as a Black transgender woman - a...

Image: Toohool | Public domain