<p>In this lesson, students will use close-looking to learn more about Experimental Physicist, Dr. Chien-Shiung Wu and discuss the contributions of women to science, technology, engineering, art and mathematics (STEAM) fields. </p> <p>This lesson plan was written by NPG Gallery Educator, Erin Koester-Tussell.</p>

<p>How can the past inform our future?  Imagine you are living in the U.S. in 1899. In this era of rapid expansion and increasing tensions many Americans are asking "what kind of nation do we want to be?" Across the United States, people are talking about what that means for themselves and for their country. For this lesson, students will imagine they are gathered in an issue forum. This guide  is meant to provide a framework for student deliberation by offering three approaches to the complex question: "what kind of nation do we want to be?" Each option is accompanied by possible actions to be taken and notes possible drawbacks.</p> <p>#NPGteach</p>

<p>The National Portrait Gallery tells the story of the United States by portraying the people who shape the nation’s history, development, and culture. These individuals understand who we are and remind us of what we can aspire to be.</p> <p>In this guide, you will discover how to teach students to spot visual clues in portraits and then analyze them, similar to dissecting a historical document. Teaching students to use close reading skills with portraiture will produce a rich and memorable investigation of both the sitter and the artist. Use the close looking strategies in this collection as a springboard for classroom conversations. Portraits present insights into history and biography, prompt writing in the classroom, inspire students to create self-portraits, and even offer great ties to science and mathematics.<br></p> <p>The Learning to Look strategies in this guide offer unique ways to engage in close looking and portraiture with your students. The Elements of Portrayal provide more guiding questions to help you and your students learn how to read portraiture.</p> <p>#NPGteach</p> <p>#SummerSessions<br></p>

<p>What is our relationship to the rest of the natural world, and what are our responsibilities toward it? How do scientific, political, social, economic, aesthetic, and moral considerations factor into our decisions? In this collection learn about key people—scientists, politicians, activists, writers, and artists—whose work has influenced attitudes toward the environment in the United States.</p> <p>This collection includes portraits from <a href="https://npg.si.edu/exhibition/forces-nature-voices-shaped-environmentalism-0"></a><em><a href="https://npg.si.edu/exhibition/forces-nature-voices-shaped-environmentalism-0">Forces of Nature: Voices that Shaped Environmentalism</a></em> on view at the National Portrait Gallery October 20, 2023 - September 2, 2024.</p>

<p>In this collection students will learn how to research and document their communities through photographs and oral histories. Students will gain a deeper understanding of the social, cultural, political, and historical contexts of their own communities and develop important research, communication, and critical thinking skills.</p> <p>This collection, was created project collaborators from the following Smithsonian museums: Smithsonian American Art Museum (Elizabeth Dale-Deines), National Museum of American History (Orlando Serrano, Eden Cho), and National Portrait Gallery, (Briana Zavadil White, Jocelyn Kho).</p>

<p>This Learning Lab complements the National Portrait Gallery's student program, Be the Curator. <br></p> <p>Students will learn about the exhibition process, by touring and reviewing exhibitions, uncovering the roles of curators and exhibition designers, finding themes in exhibitions, and writing museum label text. The program culminates in a hands-on project where students will create their own thematic exhibition from objects in the National Portrait Gallery's collection.<br></p> <p><strong>Objectives:</strong></p> <ul><li>Understand the roles of the museum curator and the exhibition designer in a museum </li><li>Work to relate artworks to one another and find a common theme </li><li>Write museum labels that clearly communicate ideas to an audience </li><li>Estimate, measure, and calculate scale </li></ul> <p>#NPGteach</p>

<p>This Learning Lab Collection complements the National Portrait Gallery student program Portrait Conversations.</p> <p></p> <p>Through this discussion based program students will compare and contrast visual elements in portraits across different historical eras, paying particular attention to differences in style and media and to the variety of historical contributions represented. Students will read portraiture by identifying and analyzing the elements of portrayal to learn about the biography of the sitter.</p> <p></p> <p>#NPGteach</p>

<p>Explore portraiture through storytelling and creative writing! Writing Hour with the National Portrait Gallery is a space where writers can create, connect, and draw inspiration from the museums collection.  We recommend you spend some time reading your chosen portrait before writing. New to reading portraiture? Learn about interpreting portraiture through the elements of portrayal in <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7xU8wC7sQl8&list=PLoiUVJmnCbmCsHkQlMj1Lr4YOfEh27OML&index=6">this video</a>. </p> <p>This Learning Lab collection features writing prompts created by literary host, Willona Sloan. Discover new portraits through writing by joining us virtually every Tuesday from 5:00pm-6:00pm EST for Writing Hour with the National Portrait Gallery. Register <a href="https://www.eventbrite.com/e/virtual-writing-hour-with-the-national-portrait-gallery-tickets-99411309904">here</a>.</p> <p>#NPGteach<br></p>

<p>Follow the clues to uncover the mysteries of the Lansdowne portrait at the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery. Each correct answer will help you learn something about George Washington and the portrait!</p> <p>#NPGteach</p>

<p>How do we teach a balanced, comprehensive, and complex history of the United States? In this collection, explore themes of civil rights, American imperialism, Native histories, the ethics of medicine, and more. Through document analysis and reading portraiture strategies, uncover previously unknown stories and consider the pressures and motivations that shaped historical controversies. <br></p> <p>This Learning Lab collection has been created in conjunction with the Teaching Difficult Histories Through Portraiture and Primary Sources professional development workshop, co-hosted by the National Portrait Gallery and the National Archives and Records Administration, in August 2023.<strong></strong><strong></strong></p> <p>#NPGteach</p>

<p>This collection focuses on a life-size, hand-cut silhouette representing Flora (1777–1815), a woman who was enslaved in Connecticut, and the bill of sale that transferred her ownership on December 13, 1796, when she was nineteen years old. Her life story invites us to consider the period from the American Revolution to the close of the War of 1812 from a rarely considered perspective—that of an enslaved woman. Flora is emblematic of vast numbers of enslaved women whose likenesses and histories have gone unrecorded.</p> <p>Her silhouette was traced at life-size directly from her cast shadow, lending a tangible sense of human presence to her portrait. But who made it? And for what purpose? We will explore these questions through consideration of the few facts known about Flora's life; the regional differences that distinguished the experiences of enslaved women in the North and in the South; the social conventions of silhouette-making; and the history of representing African American women in late eighteenth and nineteenth-century American portraiture.</p> <p>This project received support from the Smithsonian American Women's History Initiative.</p> <p>#NPGteach</p>

<p>Explore portraits from "Kinship" at the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery in this Learning Lab collection.</p> <p>"Kinship" features the work of eight contemporary artists who illuminate the complexities of our closest interpersonal relationships through portraiture. Njideka Akunyili Crosby, Ruth Leonela Buentello, Jess T. Dugan, LaToya Ruby Frazier, Jessica Todd Harper, Thomas Holton, Sedrick Huckaby, and Anna Tsouhlarakis poignantly visualize the nuances of this theme within and outside of family units. Through painting, photography, sculpture, and performance, the artists reveal how kinship, by its very nature, embraces contradictions. They also highlight the crucial role that storytelling and memories have in connecting different generations, encompassing both the living and the dead.</p> <p>When we started working on this project in 2018, there was no way we could have predicted that its core concepts were about to be tested on a global scale. The separation and overwhelming loss resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic, the renewed calls for social and environmental justice, and recent armed conflicts have deepened the resonance of the exhibition’s themes. Vulnerability, intimacy, privacy, community, familiarity, and recognition have all been questioned and realigned, underscoring how portraiture provides a shared space for empathy and understanding.</p> <p>Kinship <em>is the latest in the museum’s </em>Portraiture Now<em> series, which was established in 2006 to highlight contemporary artists whose work focuses on portraiture or figurative art.</em></p> <p><em>...<br></em></p> <p><em>Parentescos presenta a ocho artistas contemporáneos que abordan a través del retrato las complejidades de nuestras relaciones interpersonales más estrechas. Njideka Akunyili Crosby, Ruth Leonela Buentello, Jess T. Dugan, LaToya Ruby Frazier, Jessica Todd Harper, Thomas Holton, Sedrick Huckaby y Anna Tsouhlarakis visualizan con emotividad los matices de este tema dentro y fuera de las unidades familiares. En pintura, fotografía, escultura o performance, los artistas revelan que el sentido de parentesco —sea por afecto, afinidad o sangre— acoge contradicciones por su propia naturaleza. Asimismo destacan el rol crucial de los relatos y recuerdos en cuanto conectan a las generaciones, a los vivos y los muertos.<br><br>Al iniciar este proyecto en 2018, no anticipamos que sus conceptos medulares pronto serían puestos a prueba a escala global. La separación y la abrumadora pérdida causadas por la pandemia de COVID-19, el renovado reclamo de justicia social y ambiental y los recientes conflictos armados han exaltado la resonancia de los temas de esta exposición. Las nociones de vulnerabilidad, intimidad, privacidad, comunidad, familiaridad y reconocimiento han sido todas cuestionadas y reajustadas, poniendo de relieve el retrato como espacio compartido de empatía y comprensión.<br></em></p> <p><em><br></em></p>