American Faces: A Cultural History of Portraiture and Identity

Since the arrival of the first itinerant portrait painters in the colonies, Americans have created portraits to commemorate loved ones, glorify the famous, establish national myths, and honor shared heroes. Whether on canvas, in stone, in bronze, on film, or in binary code, we spend considerable time creating, contemplating, and collecting our likenesses. This exhibit, which brings together 90 portraits from more than 20 collections, explores and explains Americans’ 300-year fascination with images of themselves. Free