ICYMI: Highlights from the week that was March 24 – March 30, 2019
No one can keep up with everything, so let us do it for you. We’ll gather the top Smithsonian stories from across the country and around the world each week so you’ll never be at a loss for conversation around the water cooler.
We checked out some great art museums, celebrated suffrage, averted our eyes from the perennial panda pregnancy insemination and discovered what killed the dinosaurs. All in all, a busy week.
Art’s Most Popular: here are 2018’s most visited shows and museums
Fashion continues upward trend in the US, shooting to the top of The Art Newspaper’s chart, while the British Museum slips from the top spot in the UK
The Art Newspaper, March 24
Nearly two decades have passed since the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York last topped The Art Newspaper’s annual museum exhibition attendance survey with its 2001 show on Vermeer and the Delft School. The US institution made a spectacular re-entry into our leaderboard this year with not just the one, but the two most popular exhibitions of 2018. Heavenly Bodies: Fashion and the Catholic Imagination, a Costume Institute show that boldly mixed religious works of art—including 42 ecclesiastical pieces from the Sistine Chapel sacristy—with haute couture, was seen by nearly 1.7 million people (10,919 visitors a day), breaking the Met’s previous record set in 1978 with Treasures of King Tutankhamun(nearly 1.4 million). Read more from the Art Newspaper.
Once again, female giant panda shows signs that breeding time approaches
The Washington Post, March 25
The road to panda pregnancy is long and arduous, but at the National Zoo, Mei Xiang has apparently embarked once again on the journey.
On March 15, the zoo said last week, she “started exhibiting behavioral signs that breeding season is approaching! “
Analysis of hormones in her urine confirmed that changes in her behavior were due to rising levels of estrogen, the zoo said. Read more from The Washington Post.
The best museums in Washington, DC
CNN Travel, March 25
Washington, DC isn’t just the capital of the United States — it’s also arguably the finest place in the country for museum lovers.
The National Mall, the stretch of space in front of the White House, has been nicknamed “America’s front yard,” with historian Caroline Cunningham estimating that a whopping 50 percent of Americans will set foot there at least once.
The mall is home to several of the country’s most famous sites, including the Lincoln and Washington Memorials, but it’s also the home base for the Smithsonian, a series of affiliated museums that cover everything from space to pop culture.
These government-run museums are free to visit, and the sheer scope and volume of what they cover could take weeks to explore. But even if you manage to explore all of them, there’s plenty more to see and do in culture-rich DC to keep you from ever growing bored.
Here are the museums and sites you should put on your “yes” list, in alphabetical order. Read more from CNN.
Three major museums are turning down Sackler donations. Will others follow?
The Washington Post, March 23
When the National Portrait Gallery in London announced Tuesday that it was forgoing a grant from the Sackler family, observers could be forgiven for a certain degree of skepticism about the decision’s impact on the art world. The Sacklers, owners of the pharmaceutical behemoth Purdue Pharma, which makes OxyContin, had promised $1.3 million to support a public-engagement project. The money, no doubt, was welcome, but the amount involved was a relative pittance.
Now another British institution and a major U.S. museum, the Guggenheim, have said no to Sackler money, which has become synonymous with a deadly and addictive drug that boosted the family fortune by billions of dollars and caused immeasurable suffering. The Tate art galleries, which include the Tate Modern and the Tate Britain in London as well as outposts in Liverpool and Cornwall, announced Thursday that it will also not accept money from the family. Read more from The Washington Post.
Fragile inheritance: US museums bridge skills gap in conservation of Chinese paintings
Philanthropic funding assures new training for the next generation of masters to emerge
The Art Newspaper, March 25
Major grants promise to transform the field of Chinese painting conservation in US museums, which seemed threatened a decade ago. Back then, there were only four senior museum conservators nationwide with expertise. All were Chinese-born and had been trained in Beijing or Shanghai in the 1970s, when the arts were on the rise again after the intellectual and artistic setbacks of the Cultural Revolution. They were in their mid-to-late 50s, yet no younger specialists were emerging to take up their mantle.
“There was virtually no one in their 40s, no one in their 30s, and no one in their 20s training with them,” says Andrew Hare, the supervisory East Asian painting conservator at the Smithsonian Institution’s Freer Gallery and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery in Washington. “And we realised this was a problem. Unless we started training people soon, there would be a huge gap or a break in the tradition, and we’d potentially lose all of that knowledge, all of that experience.” Read more from The Art Newspaper.
You Can Now Rent Out a Smithsonian Museum for Your Special Event
More than a dozen Smithsonian museums and the National Zoo are opening up their private meeting spaces and even entire venues to the public for social events
WNBC4 Washington, March 26
The dream of hosting your next event at the Smithsonian just might become a reality.
More than a dozen Smithsonian museums and the National Zoo are now opening up their private meeting spaces and even entire venues — including the majestic Smithsonian Castle — to the public for social events.
Previously, they were available only for corporate and nonprofit galas, but the Smithsonian Institution officially changed its events policy March 1.
Karen Keller, director of special events and protocol for the Smithsonian, said there is definitely an appetite in the D.C. area for the use of unique event spaces like the ones offered by the Smithsonian. Read more from WNBC.
Peek into China’s Forbidden City at this new Smithsonian exhibit
The Washington Post, March 28
During China’s Qing dynasty, there was a draft of sorts for girls around 15 who were born to high-ranking families. Every three years, the emperor would summon these young women to Beijing, so that he could select the most beautiful, healthy and virtuous ones to be his wives. The chosen girls were married to the emperor in a midnight ceremony, and then they disappeared into a walled palace complex known as the Forbidden City. Cut off from their families and friends, these young women had one all-consuming goal: to get pregnant by the emperor and bear him a son. Read more from The Washington Post.
See the faces behind the 19th Amendment at the National Portrait Gallery
The Washington Post, March 28
American women gained the right to vote in 1920. So why does “Votes for Women: A Portrait of Persistence,” opening Friday at the National Portrait Gallery, start in 1832 and go all the way up to 1965?
“The 19th Amendment didn’t wrap things up in a pretty bow,” says Kate Clarke Lemay, who curated the exhibit, which is being mounted as part of the Smithsonian’s American Women’s History Initiative “Because of Her Story.” “It didn’t resolve the disenfranchisement of women for everybody. Black women, Native American women — any minority woman — still had all of these impediments to their voting rights until 1965,” when the Voting Rights Act was passed. Read more from the Washington Post.
‘A very deep kind of patriotism’: Memorial to honor Native American veterans is coming to the Mall
The Washington Post, March 28
A $15 million memorial will open next year in Washington to honor Native American military service members and veterans, more than two decades after planning began.
The steel and stone structure, called the “Warriors’ Circle of Honor,” will be built outside the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian on the Mall. The memorial will honor the more than 156,000 active military service members and veterans who are Native Americans and Alaska Natives. Read more from the The Washington Post.
Galapagos Islands where Charles Darwin formulated his theory of evolution under attack by alien invaders
The London Economic, March 28
The isolated island chain where Charles Darwin formulated his theory of evolution is under attack by a host of alien invaders.
A new study has revealed the Galapagos Islands have more than 50 non-native species probably brought in on boats.
This is nearly ten times previous estimates of non-indigenous species on the isolated islands 600 miles off the coast of Ecuador.
Scientists documented 53 invaders in the waters of the UNESCO World Heritage Site, one of the largest marine protected areas on Earth. Read more from the London Economic.
Hillary Clinton surprises guests in rock-star fashion at National Portrait Gallery exhibition opening
The Washington Post,March 28
“Our next guest needs no introduction,” Rep. Doris Matsui (D-Calif.) told the crowd gathered in the atrium of the National Portrait Gallery on Thursday night. “A former first lady …” Excited murmurs start growing in the audience gathered to celebrate the museum’s newest exhibition, “Votes for Women: A Portrait of Persistence,” ahead of next year’s 100th anniversary of the 19th amendment.
A younger girl turns to her friend. “Oh, my God. … Do you?” Read more from The Washington Post.
A festival that shows how to combine technology, creativity and innovation
The Washington Post, March 30
The acronym STEM, which stands for science, technology, engineering and math, probably rings a bell. But do you know what SEAD means?
After attending ACCelerate: ACC Smithsonian Creativity and Innovation Festival, a free event that runs Friday through Sunday, you just might.
The acronym stands for science, engineering, arts and design — a vibrant collision of disciplines with the potential to change technology and stimulate creativity and innovation.
The festival features the 15 universities that form the Atlantic Coast Conference. They’ll take over three floors of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History during the three-day event, which features 38 interactive installations themed around place and environment; health, body and mind; and culture and the arts. Read more from The Washington Post.
Snapshot of extinction: Fossils show day of killer asteroid
Associated Press, March 29
New research released Friday captures a fossilized snapshot of the day nearly 66 million years ago when an asteroid smacked Earth, fire rained from the sky and the ground shook far worse than any modern earthquake.
It was the day that nearly all life on Earth went extinct, including the dinosaurs.
The researchers say they found evidence in North Dakota of the asteroid hit in Mexico, including fish with hot glass in their gills from flaming debris that showered back down on Earth. They also reported the discovery of charred trees, evidence of an inland tsunami and melted amber. Read more from AP.
Posted: 2 April 2019