Descriptive Entry

These records document the planning, development, and installation of exhibitions by the Department of Painting and Sculpture, Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden (HMSG). Included are biographical and bibliographical research files on artists; correspondence with museums, galleries, and artists concerning loan of artwork; loan reports; shipment records; installation notes and photographs; budget and fundraising files; checklists, photographs, slides, and transparencies of artwork; and label copy and handouts for exhibitions. These records also contain catalogue production files, including draft and final versions of catalogue text, as well as galley proofs. Openings of exhibitions are documented with press releases and other publicity, photographs, invitations to openings, and reviews of exhibitions in newspapers and magazines. Files concerning lectures and seminars related to exhibitions are also included.

Major exhibitions represented by these records include: Inaugural Exhibition; Jesus Raphael Soto: A Retrospective Exhibition; The Sculpture and Drawings of Elie Nadelman; The Golden Door: Artist-Immigrants of America, 1876-1976; 14 Canadians: A Critic's Choice; The Noble Buyer: John Quinn, Patron of the Avant-Garde; Miro: Selected Paintings; Fernando Botero: A Retrospective Exhibition; Different Drummers; Alberto Giacometti 1901-1966; Artistic Collaboration in the Twentieth Century; and Francis Bacon: An Exhibition.

A small amount of general administrative files of the Department of Painting and Sculpture are also included, as is some correspondence of Inez Garson, Assistant Curator, 1971-1974, Curator for Archives, 1978-1981; and Phyllis Rosenzweig, Curatorial Assistant, 1974-1977, Associate Curator, 1978- . Records dating from before the 1974 opening of the Museum were created by members of the Department of Painting and Sculpture office in New York and mostly concern the selection of artwork for the Inaugural Exhibition.