“Hide/Seek: Difference and Desire in American Portraiture” Named Best Thematic Museum Show Nationally by AICA-USA

The Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery’s exhibition, “Hide/Seek: Difference and Desire in American Portraiture,” has been awarded Best Thematic Museum Show Nationally by the U.S. section of the International Association of Art Critics.

The association announced March 15 that “Hide/Seek: Difference and Desire in American Portraiture,” which was on view at the museum Oct. 20, 2010, through Feb. 13, 2011, was awarded first prize for the category titled Best Thematic Museum Show Nationally. The exhibition curators, David C. Ward, National Portrait Gallery historian, and Jonathan D. Katz, director of the doctoral program in visual studies, State University of New York at Buffalo, will receive the award at a ceremony April 2.

“The National Portrait Gallery has long been dedicated to tracing the rise and expansion of civil rights in America and the extension to all its people of the promises made in the Declaration of Independence,” said Martin E. Sullivan, director of the National Portrait Gallery. “It is the first exhibition to chronicle the import of lesbians, gays and other sexual minorities in the making of American culture, and I am pleased that it has been awarded such a fine recognition.”

The AICA-USA announced 24 winners in first and second places in 12 categories; the winners were selected from more than 100 finalists. The exhibition has been reconstituted by The Brooklyn Museum and the Tacoma Art Museum in Tacoma, Wash. It just opened at the Tacoma Art Museum, its only West Coast stop.

The Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery

The Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery tells the history of America through the individuals who have shaped its culture. Through the visual arts, performing arts and new media, the Portrait Gallery portrays poets and presidents, visionaries and villains, actors and activists whose lives tell the American story.

The National Portrait Gallery is part of the Donald W. Reynolds Center for American Art and Portraiture at Eighth and F streets N.W., Washington, D.C. Website: npg.si.edu. Smithsonian Information: (202) 633-1000.

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