Exhibitions in Washington, DC
September 2025
September 2025 at a glance: 0 exhibitions opened, 0 closed, and 11 more were on view across the city.
Was on view in September
Simone Leighto 13 SeptGlenstone MuseumFreePast
Bronzes by Simone Leigh in Room 1 of the Pavilions: Sentinel (Mami Wata), the portrait Sharifa, and Last Garment, installed in the Water Court and visible from the gallery.
Revolutions: Art from the Hirshhorn Collection, 1860–1960to 1 NovHirshhorn Museum and Sculpture GardenFree
A century of upheaval across the second-floor outer ring: hundreds of works by Bacon, Dubuffet, Krasner, Lawrence, O'Keeffe and Pollock, rotated periodically and threaded with contemporary responses.
Shahzia Sikander: The Last Postto 8 NovSmithsonian American Art MuseumFree
A ten-minute animation in which a British East India Company man dissolves into shifting Indo-Persian miniatures, scored by Pulitzer-winning composer Du Yun.
Adam Pendleton: Love, Queento 3 Jan 2027Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture GardenFree
Pendleton's first solo show in Washington, DC fills the second-floor inner ring with new and recent paintings plus a single-channel video, staged for the museum's circular galleries.
Back and Forthto 3 Jan 2027National Gallery of ArtFree
Four paintings across six centuries — Titian, Cezanne and Rozeal. — hung together to show how artists answer the art history they inherit.
Spirit in the Dark: Religion in Black Music, Activism and Popular Cultureto 31 Mar 2027National Museum of African American History and CultureFree
Black religious life seen through Johnson Publishing Company photographs from Ebony and Jet, where the holy and the profane meet in music, protest and pop culture.
Portrait of Lloyd Pattersonto 31 Mar 2027Hillwood Estate, Museum & Gardens
A long-term loan portrait of Lloyd Walton Patterson, who travelled to Soviet Russia in 1932 for the film Black and White and stayed, opening up the history of Black Americans in the USSR.
Remix: The Collectionto 16 Jan 2028National Museum of Women in the Arts
The museum-wide collection installation, rejecting chronology for themes like Photo Credit, Seeing Red and Objectified across six continents and six centuries of women artists.
Nation to Nation: Treaties Between the United States and American Indian Nationsto 17 Jan 2028National Museum of the American IndianFree
Original treaties on loan from the National Archives, wampum belts and peace medals tell the story of US–Native diplomacy from the colonial era to the present.
Meserve Collection Highlights: Modern Prints from Mathew Brady's Portrait Negativesto 14 May 2028National Portrait GalleryFree
Nine modern prints struck from Mathew Brady's original Civil War-era negatives — Lincoln, Hawthorne, Grant and Emma, Queen of Hawai'i — shown with a glass plate and Brady's wooden storage box.
- Do Ho Suh: Public Figuresto 29 Apr 2029
National Museum of Asian ArtFree
On the Freer plaza facing the National Mall, a monumental empty plinth held aloft by hundreds of small striding figures, questioning who monuments are for.
Image credits
10
- Simone LeighGlenstone Museum
- Revolutions: Art from the Hirshhorn Collection, 1860–1960Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institution
- Shahzia Sikander: The Last Post© 2025 Shahzia Sikander, courtesy the artist and Sean Kelly; Smithsonian American Art Museum
- Adam Pendleton: Love, QueenPeio Erroteta / Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institution
- Back and ForthTiziano Veceliio / Wikimedia Commons, Public domain
- Spirit in the Dark: Religion in Black Music, Activism and Popular CultureCourtesy of National Museum of African American History and Culture
- Portrait of Lloyd PattersonHillwood Estate, Museum & Gardens
- Remix: The Collection© Estate of Jaune Quick-to-See Smith; Courtesy of the Estate of Jaune Quick-to-See Smith and Garth Greenan Gallery, New York
- Nation to Nation: Treaties Between the United States and American Indian NationsCourtesy of National Museum of the American Indian
- Meserve Collection Highlights: Modern Prints from Mathew Brady's Portrait NegativesNational Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution
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