community of musicians and dancers that has developed with 

 it. The concert was timed with rhe new release of a New Lost 

 City Ramblers recording on Folkways. 



We have continued to extend the reach of our work through 

 other media and other formats. Our big Folkways hit was the 

 reissue of Harry Smith's Anthology of American Folk Music. First 

 released in 1952 as a six-LP set, it was an inspiration for the 

 folk and blues revivals and a creative source for many of 

 today's well-known musicians. Not only did this seminal his- 

 torical collection sell out of music stores and go through three 

 pressings in its first week, but it has generated unprecedented 

 reviews, features, and critical essays in the media. The list of 

 more than 100 full- and multipage stories (in for example, the 

 New York Times. Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Rolling 

 Stone. Newsweek. Billboard. The Nation) is impressive and rarely- 

 generated even for the most popular musical releases. 



We are particularly interested in encouraging children to 

 learn of the cultural traditions closest to them. Some 1,000 

 schools in Iowa received Iowa Folklife: Our People. Communities, 

 and Traditions. This multimedia learning guide is based on 

 work with the Iowa Sesquicentennial Commission and the 

 1996 Festival. The kit includes lesson plans, a video essay and 

 documentary, Smithsonian Folkways CD, and a resource direc- 

 tory, and relied on the cooperation of the Iowa Arts Council, 

 Iowa Public Television, the Iowa Historical Society, and 

 generous funding from Pioneer Hi-Bred International, Inc. 



This summer the Center also sponsored a two-day meeting, 

 "Revisiting Talleres." for teachers, principals, and specialists in 

 early childhood education from the U.S. -Mexico border. All of 

 the teachers had attended one of the earlier workshops that in- 

 troduced the Center's education kit, Borders and Identity. At 

 the meetings, teachers gave their reactions to using the materials 

 in the classroom, and many of the participating teachers agreed 

 to serve as advisors to the education kit that will come out of the 

 1998/99 Rio Grande/Rio Bravo Basin program. 



In preparation for the Rio Grande/Rio Bravo Basin program, 

 31 Rio Grande basin students, scholars, educators, and com- 

 munity scholars participated in a Folklife Field Research Series 

 during May and July to complement the field research. The goals 

 were to engage people in the region in the fieldwork for the Fes- 

 tival and to offer a training program for the research and produc- 

 tion of public folklife programs in general. 



The Center has also been collaborating with the South 

 African Department of Arts, Culture, Science, and Technology 

 on Festival-related initiatives and exchanges. Five South 

 Africans observed the Festival and engaged in planning with 

 Center staff and with other Smithsonian organizations. In 

 April Smithsonian staff organized a panel at the South African 

 Museum Association conference in Pietermarizburg and met 

 with the director and staff of the Robben Island Museum 

 project in Capetown. 



We continue to use various media — television, radio, air- 

 line in-flight programs, video encyclopedia, museum exhibits, 

 enhanced CDs, a World Wide Web site, and books — to com- 

 municate broadly. 



Hirsbborn Museum and Sculpture Garden 



James T. Demetrion, Director 



The Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, the Smithson- 

 ian Institution's center for modern and contemporary art, is 

 committed to increasing the awareness and understanding of 

 art through acquisitions, exhibitions, publications, research 

 activities, public programs, and the presentation of the collec- 

 tion in its galleries and outdoor exhibition spaces. The 

 museum provides a public facility for the exhibition, study, 

 and preservation of 19th- and 20th-century art while present- 

 ing a spectrum of contemporary work. 



Two new publications appeared in November, each bring- 

 ing a fresh perspective to works encountered at the 

 Hirshhorn. A free Family Guide encourages interactive gal- 

 lery responses among parents and children. Supported by the 

 Smithsonian's Special Exhibition Fund, the full-color packet 

 containing 12 "art cards" won honorable mention in the 1997 

 American Association of Museums publications competition. 

 Also well received was Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden: 

 150 Works of Art, a chronological panorama of 20th-century art 

 in succinct, informative essays and color images. Copublished 

 with Harry N. Abrams, Inc., this 166-page volume provided a 

 capstone to the Smithsonian's 150th anniversary celebration 

 and marked the first substantive publication on the 

 Hirshhorn since the inaugural catalog of 1974. 



Through acquisitions funds as well as gifts from generous 

 donors, the Hirshhorn continued to acquire significant works 

 by modern and contemporary artists. Among highlights for 

 the year were Joseph Beuys's metaphonc wax-and-tallow 

 sculpture Memory of My Youth in the Mountains (1977), the first 

 work by this influential artist to enter the permanent collec- 

 tion; a painting by Alberto Giacometti, Annette Seated in the 

 Studio (1954); Wayne Thiebaud's oil on canvas Girl with Ice 

 Cream Cone (1963); two works combining sculpture and 

 photography — by Alfredo Jaar (1988), and Thomas Schutte 

 (1994); and an important gift of 14 modern and contemporary 

 paintings and sculptures from the Lannan Foundation. The 12 

 artists represented in the gift were John Ahearn, Carlos 

 Alfonzo, Robert Arneson, Rafael Coronel, Edward Dugmore, 

 Vernon Fisher, Robert Morris, Manuel Neri, Julian Schnabel, 

 John Storrs, Richard Stankiewicz, and Christopher 

 Wilmarth. 



Providing an overview of earlier acquisitions, "The 

 Hirshhorn Collects: Recent Acquisitions, 1992-1996" opened 

 June 4 and was accompanied by an illustrated catalog. Reflect- 

 ing the fruits of five years of active purchasing and the 

 generosity of 70 donors of art, the exhibition of 129 works by 

 78 artists was praised by a Washington Post critic, who wrote 

 that it marked the Hirshhorn 's "coming of age" as "Washing- 

 ton's most important contemporary art museum [and] national 

 museum of modern and contemporary art." An accompanying 

 ten-week program of talks and films (part of "Art Night on 



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