United States historic place
The
Renwick Gallery
is a branch of the
Smithsonian American Art Museum
located in
Washington, D.C.
that displays
American craft
and
decorative arts
from the 19th to 21st century. The gallery is housed in a
National Historic Landmark
building that was opened in 1859 on
Pennsylvania Avenue
and originally housed the
Corcoran Gallery of Art
. When it was built in 1859, it was called "the American
Louvre
", and is now named for its architect
James Renwick Jr.
History
[
edit
]
19th century
[
edit
]
Corcoran Gallery in the late 19th century, showing the lost sculpture niches and the gallery's historic first floor windows
The Renwick Gallery building was originally built to be
Washington, D.C.
's first
art
museum
and to house
William Wilson Corcoran
's collection of
American
and European art.
The building was designed by
James Renwick Jr.
and completed in 1874.
[3]
[4]
The gallery is located at 1661
Pennsylvania Avenue
NW.
[5]
Renwick designed it after the Louvre's
Tuileries
addition.
[6]
At the time of its construction, it was known as "the American
Louvre
".
[7]
[8]
The building was near completion when the
Civil War
broke out and was seized by the U.S. Army in August 1861 as a temporary military warehouse for the records and uniforms for the Quarter Master General's Corps.
[9]
In 1864, General
Montgomery C. Meigs
converted the building into his headquarters office.
[9]
On May 10, 1869, the building was returned to Corcoran, and, on January 19, 1874, the
Corcoran Gallery of Art
opened to the public.
[3]
[9]
The gallery quickly outgrew the space and relocated to a new building nearby in 1897.
[10]
Starting in 1899, the building housed the federal
Court of Claims
.
[3]
20th century
[
edit
]
By the 1950s, in need of more space, the Court of Claims proposed to demolish the building, however, it was saved from demolition by First Lady
Jacqueline Kennedy
in 1963.
[4]
[6]
[8]
In 1965,
President
Lyndon B. Johnson
and Secretary of the
Smithsonian
S. Dillon Ripley
, proposed that the building be turned over to the Smithsonian.
[3]
[9]
[11]
In 1965, President
Lyndon Johnson
signed an executive order transferring the Renwick building to the
Smithsonian Institution
for use as a "
gallery
of
arts
,
craft
and
design
."
[3]
After a renovation under the direction of
Lloyd E. Herman
[12]
it opened in 1972 as the home of the Smithsonian American Art Museum's contemporary craft program.
[3]
[11]
The Renwick Gallery is now a branch of the Smithsonian American Art Museum, housing the museum's collection of decorative art and crafts.
[4]
[6]
21st century
[
edit
]
A
soft sculpture
by
Janet Echelman
, viewed in 2015
Renwick Gallery closed December 9, 2013, in order to permit a major renovation of the historic structure. The building was slightly damaged during the 2011 Washington D.C. earthquake, and the construction process required reworking of the original infrastructure.
[13]
The museum reopened on November 13, 2015 with an exhibition entitled Wonder featuring site-specific installation by nine artists.
[14]
[15]
The architectural renovation was led by Westlake Reed Leskosky, a
Cleveland, Ohio
?based architecture and engineering firm
[16]
and construction was overseen by Consigli Construction Co. of
Milford, Massachusetts
.
[16]
Fundraising for the renovation began in 2013, and was completed in June 2014 when local financier and philanthropist David Rubenstein donated $5.4 million toward the project. Smithsonian officials renamed the gallery's Grand Salon in Rubenstein's honor.
[16]
The renovation included replacing all
HVAC
, electrical, plumbing, and fire-suppression systems; upgrades to security, phone, and data systems (including
Wi-Fi
installation throughout the building); restoring the original window configuration; restoring two vaulted ceilings on the second floor; reconfiguring the basement for staff offices and workshops;
[16]
and adding
LED lighting
throughout the building.
[14]
The Renwick's Grand Salon was also renovated to create a more contemporary event space.
[2]
[7]
[14]
Applied Minds was chosen to create potential concepts for the Grand Salon.
[17]
The four other firms which competed for the renovation job and made it to the final round but were not selected were
Marlon Blackwell Architect
,
Studio Odile Decq
,
Vinci Hamp Architects
, and
Westlake Reed Leskosky
(now
DLR Group
).
[2]
[18]
Reopening
[
edit
]
The Renwick Gallery opened its doors after renovation on Friday, November 13, 2015. Admission is free. The gallery is open daily from 10:00 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.
[19]
The first-floor gallery typically featured temporary exhibits that rotated about twice a year.
[20]
One commentator said, the crafts displayed "are high art, not everyday objects."
[20]
Historically, the second floor
Grand Salon
has been one of the most famous art-filled rooms in Washington. For much of the museum's history, it was hung with 70 paintings by 51 American artists, most of them artworks created between 1840 and 1930, including landscapes, sentimental portraits, and classical themes, as well as portraits of tribal Native Americans by
George Catlin
. Since November 2015, the paintings are no longer on display, and the formal curtains, red carpeting, and red velvet furniture have all been removed. A number of the paintings were moved to the
Smithsonian American Art Museum
.
[21]
Exhibitions
[
edit
]
Volume
by
Leo Villareal
, viewed in 2015
A work by
Patrick Dougherty
, viewed in 2016
Michelle Obama
viewing a sculpture in 2016
In 2012, the Renwick Gallery hosted an exhibition called "40 Under 40: Craft Futures", which featured 40 artists in "boundary-pushing interpretations of glass, fiber, ceramic, wood and other materials challenge the traditional process-oriented notion of the craft medium by incorporating performance, interactivity and politics."
[22]
[23]
The gallery's visitors have almost doubled due to the popularity of the "Wonder" exhibition.
[24]
In November 2015, "Wonder" opened in celebration of the completion of a two-year renovation of the Renwick Gallery. The exhibition featured nine major contemporary artists invited to install site-specific works on the theme of wonder in the nine exhibition spaces of the gallery. The artists chosen were
Jennifer Angus
,
Chakaia Booker
,
Gabriel Dawe
,
Tara Donovan
, Patrick Dougherty,
Janet Echelman
, John Grade,
Maya Lin
, and
Leo Villareal
.
[25]
The artists were given freedom to create their installations.
Angus' piece, "In the Midnight Garden," featured over 5,000 bugs ? beetles, moths, and cicadas
? in various patterns in a pink room.
[27]
Booker's "Anonymous Donor" was made up of old tires and stainless steel.
[28]
Dawe's "Plexus A1" weaved a rainbow into the middle of one of the Renwick's rooms.
[29]
Donovan made her installation out of thousands of index cards.
[29]
Dougherty made his installation, "Shindig," out of willow branches.
[30]
Echelman based her piece off of images from the
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
that showed the impact of waves during the
2011 Japan tsunami
.
Grade reassembled a mold of a hemlock tree over a century year old. The piece is called "Middle Fork."
[29]
Lin chose to map out the
Chesapeake Bay
using marbles.
[27]
Villareal's LED chandelier hangs from the top of the Renwick ceiling.
[30]
Since January 2016, over 176,000 people have visited the gallery.
[29]
The "Wonder" exhibition is popular on social media,
[31]
and the Renwick has been tagged over 20,000 times on
Instagram
by users.
[29]
Wonder closed after eight months and drew 732,000 viewers.
[32]
It was criticized for being inconsistent with the Renwick's commitment to American craft.
[33]
The Renwick Craft Invitational is a biennial assessment of contemporary fine craft.
[34]
The 2016 exhibition featured works by Steven Young Lee,
Kristen Morgin
,
Jennifer Trask
, and Norwood Viviano.
[35]
Disrupting Craft: Renwick Invitational 2018
featured works by
Tanya Aguiniga
,
Sharif Bey
, Dustin Farnsworth, and
Stephanie Syjuco
.
[36]
Since 2011, the Renwick has hosted a quarterly "Handi-hour," a crafting-themed happy hour event, inspired by the DIY movement. In addition to craft activities for patrons, the 21+ event features craft beers selected by Greg Engert of the ChurchKey restaurant and pub in Washington, D.C.
[37]
In 2019, the Renwick hosted an
augmented reality
exhibition by
glass artist
Ginny Ruffner
and digital collaborator Grant Kirkpatrick titled
Reforestation of the Imagination
.
[38]
In 2023, the tenth Renwick Invitational,
Sharing Honors and Burdens
, opened and features
Native American artists
:
Joe Feddersen
,
Erica Lord
,
Geo Soctomah Neptune
,
Maggie Thompson
,
Lily Hope
, and
Ursala Hudson
.
[39]
Notable artists in the collection
[
edit
]
A number of well-known, critically acclaimed artists had works in the Renwick Gallery's collection; as of the November 2015 reopening most are no longer on display. Among them are:
- Margaret Boozer
's
Eight Red Bowls
Maryland terra cotta and pine sculpture.
[40]
- Wendell Castle
's
Ghost Clock
cloaks time with trompe l'oeil.
[3]
[4]
- Dale Chihuly
's famous glass globules float in their sandbox sanctuaries.
[3]
- Arline Fisch
's silver
Body Ornament
[3]
- Larry Fuente
's
Game Fish
made from a mounted sailfish and game accessories, such as dice, poker chips, domino tiles, Scrabble letters, yo-yos, badminton shuttlecocks and Ping-Pong balls.
[3]
[4]
- Sam Maloof
's furniture
[3]
- Maria Martinez
- Albert Paley
- Ginny Ruffner
's
Reforestation of the Imagination
(with Grant Kirkpatrick), an augmented reality exhibition.
[38]
- Judith Schaechter
's
A Little Torcher
, a stained-glass creation depicting pyromania.
[41]
- Kim Schmahmann
's 1993?1999
Bureau of Bureaucracy
, which is a "wooden cabinet full of cupboards to nowhere, bottomless drawers, drawers within drawers, hidden compartments, and more, a wonderful metaphor for the labyrinthine workings of government".
[7]
See also
[
edit
]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
"National Register Information System"
.
National Register of Historic Places
.
National Park Service
. January 23, 2007.
- ^
a
b
c
"Grand Salon gallery space inside the Renwick Gallery"
. Daily Art
. Retrieved
18 July
2013
.
- ^
a
b
c
d
e
f
g
h
i
j
k
Yardley, William.
"Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian American Art Museum"
.
Washington Post
. Archived from
the original
on 12 February 2011
. Retrieved
18 July
2013
.
- ^
a
b
c
d
e
"Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian American Art Museum"
. Frommers
. Retrieved
18 July
2013
.
- ^
Hours and Directions
.
Smithsonian American Art Museum
. Retrieved September 9, 2013.
- ^
a
b
c
Boyle, Katherine (February 18, 2013).
"Renwick modeled it after the Louvre's Tuileries addition"
.
Washington Post
. Retrieved
18 July
2013
.
- ^
a
b
c
"Renwick Gallery Review"
. Fodors
. Retrieved
18 July
2013
.
- ^
a
b
"Smithsonian Plans Overhaul of D.C.'s Renwick Gallery"
. The Associated Press. February 19, 2013
. Retrieved
18 July
2013
.
- ^
a
b
c
d
"Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian Institution"
. US Natipnal Park Service
. Retrieved
18 July
2013
.
- ^
Reed, Robert (1980).
Old Washington, D.C. in Early Photographs: 1846?1932
. Dover Publications. p.
127
.
ISBN
9780486238692
.
- ^
a
b
"Architectural History of the Renwick Gallery"
Archived
2008-06-06 at the
Wayback Machine
- ^
"Oral history interview with Lloyd e. Herman, 2010 Sept. 21"
.
- ^
"Inside the High-Tech Makeover of America's Oldest Art Museum Building"
.
Bloomberg.com
. 9 November 2015
. Retrieved
2016-05-03
.
- ^
a
b
c
Boyle, Katherine (18 February 2013).
"Starting in 2014, the Renwick Gallery underwent major two-year renovations"
.
Washington Post
. Retrieved
2013-11-10
.
- ^
"Renwick Gallery Reopening Announced by Smithsonian American Art Museum"
.
Newsroom of the Smithsonian
. Smithsonian Institution
. Retrieved
8 July
2015
.
- ^
a
b
c
d
Echols, Tucker (June 24, 2014).
"David Rubenstein Gives $5.4M for Renwick Gallery Renovation"
.
Washington Business Journal
. Retrieved
June 24,
2014
.
- ^
"Applied Minds Renwick design"
. Daily Art
. Retrieved
18 July
2013
.
- ^
Pipa, Meghan (2021-08-17).
"MOSH Selects DLR Group for MOSH Genesis Project | Jacksonville's Museum of Science and History"
. Retrieved
2022-05-18
.
- ^
"Visit the Renwick Gallery"
.
- ^
a
b
Yardley, William.
"Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian American Art Museum"
.
Washington Post
. Archived from
the original
on 12 February 2011
. Retrieved
18 July
2013
.
- ^
"Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian American Art Museum"
. Frommers
. Retrieved
18 July
2013
.
- ^
"40 Under 40: Craft Futures"
.
Washington Post
. July 20, 2012. Archived from
the original
on July 18, 2013
. Retrieved
18 July
2013
.
- ^
O’Sullivan, Michael (January 18, 2013).
"Craft Futures Handi-Hour"
.
Washington Post
. Archived from
the original
on July 18, 2013
. Retrieved
18 July
2013
.
- ^
Kelly, Hillary (2016-02-05).
"What the Heck Is Going on With the Renwick Gallery?"
.
Washingtonian
. Retrieved
2016-05-03
.
- ^
Calos, Katherine (17 April 2016). "Sense of Wonder:Nine artists capture the imagination of visitors to Washington's Renwick". Richmond Times-Dispatch. p. G17.
- ^
a
b
Bowley, Graham (2015-11-12).
"Smithsonian's Renwick Gallery Reopens With a New Focus"
.
The New York Times
.
ISSN
0362-4331
. Retrieved
2016-05-03
.
- ^
"Take a Look Inside the Renwick Gallery's Bewildering Reopening Exhibition"
.
Washingtonian
. 2015-11-04
. Retrieved
2016-05-03
.
- ^
a
b
c
d
e
Judkis, Maura (2016-01-07).
"The Renwick is suddenly Instagram famous. But what about the art?"
.
The Washington Post
.
ISSN
0190-8286
. Retrieved
2016-05-03
.
- ^
a
b
"Watch now: WETA Around Town | Wonder | WETA Video"
.
PBS Video
. Retrieved
2016-05-03
.
- ^
"The D.C. Art Exhibit That's Blowing Up on Instagram"
.
Garden & Gun
. 2016-02-13
. Retrieved
2016-05-03
.
- ^
Capps, Kriston (18 August 2016).
"Art Blanche:D.C.'s museums have embraced big splashy social media-friendly exhibitions. But is that good for art?"
.
washingtoncitypaper.com
. Retrieved
2016-11-03
.
- ^
Capps, Kriston (13 November 2015).
"
"Wonder" at the Renwick Gallery, Reviewed"
.
washingtoncitypaper.com
. Retrieved
2016-11-03
.
- ^
O'Sullivan, Michael.
"Renwick Craft Invitational: Boger, Yuh, Newport, Van Cline"
.
washingtonpost.com
. Retrieved
2016-11-03
.
- ^
"Visions and Revisions: Renwick Invitational 2016"
.
americanart.si.edu/
. Retrieved
2016-11-03
.
- ^
"Disrupting Craft: Renwick Invitational 2018"
.
Smithsonian American Art Museum
. Retrieved
2019-10-08
.
- ^
"Handi-Hour: Q&A with Katie Crooks"
.
Eyelevel
. Smithsonian American Art Museum. April 26, 2011
. Retrieved
9 July
2015
.
- ^
a
b
"Ginny Ruffner: Reforestation of the Imagination | Smithsonian American Art Museum"
.
americanart.si.edu
. Retrieved
2021-09-11
.
- ^
Ault, Alicia.
"Six Native Artists and Their Works Receive Major recognition"
. Retrieved
23 January
2023
.
- ^
"Eight Red Bowls"
.
Collections
.
Smithsonian American Art Museum
. Retrieved
19 July
2013
.
- ^
John Kelly and Craig Stoltz.
"Renwick Gallery of the Smithsonian American Art Museum"
.
Washington Post
. Archived from
the original
on 12 February 2011
. Retrieved
18 July
2013
.
Further reading
[
edit
]
External links
[
edit
]
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