Current Exhibitions
War Around Us: Soldier Artist Impressions
Creating art when surrounded by war seems contradictory. Artists Jean Lefort, Curtiney George Foote, Charles Thatcher Shellabarger, Myron Chapin and Jean Berne-Bellecour demonstrate several ways one can capture wartime experiences using the fields, villages, and people who witnessed the devastation of WWI. Exhibition open May 22, 2018 – January 13, 2019 in the Ellis Gallery.
Crucible Life and Death 1918
For the Doughboys on the Western Front, 1918 was their year. It was the crucible where the American land forces forged their fighting force. They fought alongside their main allies from Cantigny to Belleau Wood to the Champagne Region, the Piave River to the Marne to St. Mihiel to the Meuse Argonne to Vladivostok. This exhibition is not an illustration or timeline of how the 1918 battles were fought, rather it focuses on individuals and their lives and deaths in the crucible of 1918. Exhibition open April 3, 2018 – March 10, 2019 in Exhibit Hall.
John Singer Sargent Gassed
John Singer Sargent’s incredible masterpiece Gassed is truly one of the giants of the art world at more than nine feet tall by 21 feet long. The landmark painting is the focal point in this special centennial exhibition that also includes original maps of the dressing station where Sargent witnessed the scene he depicted and reproductions of many of his study drawings and featuring historical and contemporary objects on detection and protection from chemical warfare. Exhibition open Feb. 23 – June 3, 2018 in the Wylie Gallery.
Posters as Munitions
Soon after the outset of World War I, the poster was recognized as a means of spreading national propaganda with unlimited possibilities. Posters as Munitions showcases the depth and breadth of the collection through a series of works on exhibition for the first time at the Museum. Posters from France, Germany, Great Britain, Italy, the United States and more are featured, providing a sense of the global nature of this form of communication. Exhibition now open in Memory Hall.
Fields of Battle, Lands of Peace: The Doughboys 1917-1918
Michael St Maur Sheil’s portraits of WWI battlefields are featured in an outdoor photographic exhibition which tells of the healed scars of the First World War through our only remaining living witness: the fields of battle themselves. Once places of devastating violence, we now see landscapes of great beauty, testament to peace and remembrance. This exhibition is now traveling the United States.
The Volunteers: Americans Join World War I, 1914-1919
American volunteer organizations contributed immensely to the well-being and welfare of the American men and women serving the American military in WWI, but also to peoples in the war-torn countries around the globe. This special exhibition produced in collaboration with AFS Intercultural Programs shares their inspirational stories. This exhibition is now traveling the United States.