Behind The Scenes

View of the museum from outside showing the Neoclassical building from one corner. The building is a tan-colored stone with an arched doorway, long vertical windows, and detailed molding around the roof.
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NMWA @ Home: Creative Coping with Melani N. Douglass and Orin Zahra
Posted: April 13, 2020
Category: Behind The Scenes
As NMWA remains temporarily closed due to COVID-19, we check in with staff for a personal look at the creative ways they’re staying connected, inspired, and grounded.
A color photograph of a large, ornate room in a palace. The expansive floor is bare and empty. At the other end of the room, a large ornate mirror hangs between two dark wooden doors. The moldings and details above the doors and mirror are extravagantly designed and a dramatic mural is featured at the very top of the wall. In the mirror, a small figure is seen, seemingly the photographer.

NMWA @ Home: Creative Coping with Lynora Williams and Adrienne Poon
Posted: April 2, 2020
Category: Behind The Scenes
As NMWA remains temporarily closed due to COVID-19, we check in with staff for a personal look at the creative ways they’re staying connected, inspired, and grounded.
Large vertical painting in minimalist style features thinned pigments poured in translucent layers onto the unsized canvas. The abstract composition is dominated by a central ambiguous form in vibrant yellow-orange and peach, flanked by amorphous swaths of pale pink and a dark gray.

Heavy Lifting: Behind the Scenes of The Contour of Feeling
Posted: May 20, 2019
Category: Behind The Scenes
A frequent question from visitors to the museum’s Ursula von Rydingsvard exhibition is: how did you get these sculptures into the building? A conversation with NMWA Registrar Catherine Bade revealed...

Appreciating Architecture: #EmptyNMWA Instameet
Posted: July 18, 2016
Category: Behind The Scenes
More than 25 D.C.-area Instagrammers visited NMWA on June 17, 2016, for a before-hours Instameet. With access to the empty galleries, local photographers explored the museum’s building and collection, as...
Exterior color photo of the museum building with a blue sky and clouds.

Camera-Sly: #EmptyNMWA Instameet
Posted: March 22, 2016
Category: Behind The Scenes
On March 8, 2016, the museum hosted an #EmptyNMWA instameet (a gathering of Instagram photographers) in honor of International Women’s Day. NWMA welcomed 30 local instagrammers to visit the museum...
Exterior color photo of the museum building with a blue sky and clouds.

#Instameets @WomenInTheArts
Posted: March 2, 2016
Category: Behind The Scenes
In honor of International Women’s Day, NMWA will host an #EmptyNMWA instameet on Tuesday, March 8. An “instameet” is an opportunity for photographers to gather, meet, and snap pictures for...
Exterior color photo of the museum building with a blue sky and clouds.

Go Global with Mary
Posted: January 20, 2015
Category: Behind The Scenes
Did you know that NMWA launched its first-ever online exhibition, A Global Icon: Mary in Context, in conjunction with Picturing Mary: Woman, Mother, Idea?
View of a gallery space with blue walls. On the left is a painting of a woman in a dark blue dress in a golden frame. Next to it is a red cloth framed in glass.

Looking Forward: Women to Watch 2015—Organic Matters
Posted: November 21, 2014
Category: Behind The Scenes
NMWA is thrilled to host the fourth Women to Watch exhibition, Organic Matters, from June 5 to September 13, 2015. Developed in collaboration with the museum’s national and international outreach...
View of a gallery space. In big letters green , the text on the wall reads "Women to Watch: Organic Matters, 2015."

The Art of Change: New Trends in Activist Art
Posted: November 19, 2014
Category: Behind The Scenes
Earlier this fall, National Museum of Women in the Arts Director Susan Fisher Sterling traveled to Tianjin, People’s Republic of China, to present at the World Economic Forum’s eighth Annual...
View of the museum from outside showing the Neoclassical building from one corner. The building is a tan-colored stone with an arched doorway, long vertical windows, and detailed molding around the roof.

Behind the Scenes in the Registrar’s Office: Crates, Notes, and Dust Motes
Posted: September 4, 2014
Category: Behind The Scenes
Visitors to the National Museum of Women in the Arts have no doubt seen Anne Vallayer-Coster’s majestic portrait of Madame de Saint-Huberty in the Role of Dido, which currently hangs...
Exterior color photo of the museum building with a blue sky and clouds.