Art - Overview
The National Museum of American History is not an art museum. But works of art fill its collections and testify to the vital place of art in everyday American life. The ceramics collections hold hundreds of examples of American and European art glass and pottery. Fashion sketches, illustrations, and prints are part of the costume collections. Donations from ethnic and cultural communities include many homemade religious ornaments, paintings, and figures. The Harry T Peters "America on Stone" collection alone comprises some 1,700 color prints of scenes from the 1800s. The National Quilt Collection is art on fabric. And the tools of artists and artisans are part of the Museum's collections, too, in the form of printing plates, woodblock tools, photographic equipment, and potters' stamps, kilns, and wheels.
"Art - Overview" showing 75 items.
Page 5 of 8
Engraved woodblock of hand signs for the letters 'S' through 'Y'
- Description
- This engraved woodblock shows hand signs for the letters "S" through "Y." The illustration was used in a publication relating to the gesture-signs and signals of the North American Indians by Garrick Mallery; it was prepared and printed by the Government Printing Office in Washington, D.C. for the Bureau of American Ethnology in about 1880.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- ca 1880
- publisher
- Bureau of American Ethnology
- printer
- Government Printing Office
- author
- Mallery, Garrick
- block maker
- Grottenthaler, V.
- ID Number
- 1980.0219.1368
- catalog number
- 1980.0219.1368
- accession number
- 1980.0219
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Engraved woodblock of an "Indian Village"
- Description
- This engraved woodblock of an “Indian Village” was prepared by the Government Printing Office in Washington, D.C.; the image was published in 1875 as Figure 43 (p.119) in Report of the Exploration of the Colorado River of the West and Its Tributaries. Explored in 1869, 1870, 1871, and 1872, under the direction of the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution by John Wesley Powell (1834-1902). The illustration was drawn by Thomas Moran, and engraved by John Minton (fl. 1875).
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1875
- publisher
- Bureau of American Ethnology
- printer
- Government Printing Office
- author
- Powell, John Wesley
- original artist
- Moran, Thomas
- graphic artist
- Minton, John
- block maker
- V. W. & Co.
- ID Number
- 1980.0219.1424
- catalog number
- 1980.0219.1424
- accession number
- 1980.0219
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Engraved woodblock of the "Workshop of a Navajo Silversmith"
- Description
- This engraved woodblock of the “Workshop of a Navajo Silversmith” was prepared by the Government Printing Office in Washington, D.C.; the image was published as Plate XVII (p.175) in an article by Dr. Washington Matthews (1843-1905) entitled “Navajo Silversmiths” in the Second Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian, 1880-81.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1883
- publisher
- Bureau of American Ethnology
- author
- Matthews, Washington
- printer
- Government Printing Office
- ID Number
- 1980.0219.1428
- catalog number
- 1980.0219.1428
- accession number
- 1980.0219
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Engraved woodblock of a "Haida totem post"
- Description
- This engraved woodblock of a “Haida totem post” was prepared by the Government Printing Office in Washington, D.C.; the image was published as Figure 24 (p.68) in an article by Garrick Mallery (1831-1894) entitled “Pictographs of the North American Indians: a preliminary paper” in the Fourth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian, 1882-83.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1886
- publisher
- Bureau of American Ethnology
- printer
- Government Printing Office
- author
- Mallery, Garrick
- block maker
- J. J. & Co.
- ID Number
- 1980.0219.1509
- accession number
- 1980.0219
- catalog number
- 1980.0219.1509
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Engraved woodblock of a "Canoe burial"
- Description
- This engraved woodblock of a “Canoe Burial” was prepared by Henry Hobart Nichols (1838-1887) and the Government Printing Office in Washington, D.C.; the image was published as Figure 23 on page 171 in an article by H.C. Yarrow (1871-1876) entitled “Mortuary Customs of North American Indians” in the First Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian, 1879-80.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1881
- publisher
- Bureau of American Ethnology
- printer
- Government Printing Office
- graphic artist
- Nichols, H. H.
- author
- Yarrow, Harry Crecy
- block maker
- Grottenthaler, V.
- ID Number
- 1980.0219.1510
- catalog number
- 1980.0219.1510
- accession number
- 1980.0219
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Engraved woodblock of cliff dwellings and pueblos
- Description
- This engraved woodblock of cliff dwellings and pueblos was prepared by John Minton and the Government Printing Office in Washington, D.C.; the print was published in John Wesley Powell's Report of the Exploration of the Colorado River of the West and Its Tributaries. Explored in 1869, 1870, 1871, and 1872, under the direction of the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution in 1875. Thomas Moran (1837-1926) was the original artist.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- ca 1880
- publisher
- Bureau of American Ethnology
- printer
- Government Printing Office
- original artist
- Moran, Thomas
- graphic artist
- Minton, John
- block maker
- V. W. & Co.
- ID Number
- 1980.0219.1512
- catalog number
- 1980.0219.1512
- accession number
- 1980.0219
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Engraved woodblock of the "Signal for 'buffalo discovered'"
- Description
- This engraved woodblock of “Signal for ‘buffalo discovered’” was prepared by Henry Hobart Nichols (1838-1887) and the Government Printing Office in Washington, D.C.; the image was published as Figure 337 on page 532 in an article by Garrick Mallery (1831-1894) entitled “Sign Language Among the North American Indians” in the First Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian, 1879-80.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1881
- publisher
- Bureau of American Ethnology
- printer
- Government Printing Office
- maker
- Nichols, H. H.
- author
- Mallery, Garrick
- ID Number
- 1980.0219.1523
- accession number
- 1980.0219
- catalog number
- 1980.0219.1523
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Engraved woodblock of a "Bird’s-eye view of cliffs of erosion"
- Description
- This engraved woodblock of the “Bird’s-eye view of cliffs of erosion” was prepared and printed by the Government Printing Office in Washington, D.C.; the image was published in 1875 as Figure 74 (p.162) in The Exploration of the Colorado River of the West by John Wesley Powell (1834-1902). Henry Hobart Nichols (1838-1887) engraved the illustration which “depicts the Shin-ar’-ump Cliffs, Vermillion Cliffs, and Gray Cliffs, in order from right to left.”
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1875
- printer
- Government Printing Office
- publisher
- Bureau of American Ethnology
- author
- Powell, John Wesley
- graphic artist
- Nichols, H. H.
- block maker
- V. W. & Co.
- ID Number
- 1980.0219.1562
- accession number
- 1980.0219
- catalog number
- 1980.0219.1562
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Engraved woodblock of a "Dipper - province of Tusayan"
- Description
- This engraved woodblock of a “Dipper - province of Tusayan” was prepared by the Government Printing Office in Washington, D.C.; the image was published as Figure 299 (p.327) in an article by William Henry Holmes (1846-1933) entitled “Pottery of the Ancient Pueblos” in the Fourth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian, 1882-83.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1886
- publisher
- Bureau of American Ethnology
- printer
- Government Printing Office
- author
- Holmes, William Henry
- ID Number
- 1980.0219.1725
- catalog number
- 1980.0219.1725
- accession number
- 1980.0219
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Engraved woodblock of a "Handled cup, province of Tusayan"
- Description
- This engraved woodblock of a “Handled Cup – Province of Tusayan” was prepared by the Government Printing Office in Washington, D.C.; the image was published as Figure 297 (p.327) in an article by William Henry Holmes (1846-1933) entitled “Pottery of the Ancient Pueblos” in the Fourth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian, 1882-83.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1886
- publisher
- Bureau of American Ethnology
- printer
- Government Printing Office
- author
- Holmes, William Henry
- ID Number
- 1980.0219.1796
- catalog number
- 1980.0219.1796
- accession number
- 1980.0219
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
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