art through acquisitions, exhibitions, publications, research ac- 

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

 tion in its galleries and outdoor exhibition spaces. The 

 museum provides a public facility - fot the exhibition, study, 

 and preservation of 20th-century art while presenting a 

 spectrum of contemporary work. 



Research by Hirshhorn scholars reaped particularly reward- 

 ing benefits during the year. The scholarly persistence of 

 Judith Zilczer, Curator of Paintings, led to a discovery about 

 the subject of a figurative composition by Dutch-born 

 American artist Willem de Kooning (1904-1994) in the 

 Hirshhorn 's permanent collection. The painting's male figure 

 had always been known by its descriptive title Reclining Alan 

 and assigned the date 1964, but after a Washington colleague 

 pointed out that the face resembled that of President John F. 

 Kennedy, Zilczer began piecing together archival evidence 

 and recollections from de Kooning's intimates and associates — 

 including artist Susan Brockman, sculptor Ibram Lassaw, and 

 photographer Hans Namuth (who photographed the painting 

 shortly after it was created) — which proved the painting repre- 

 sents the artist's persona] response to the national tragedy of 

 Kennedy's assassination on November 22, 1963. Both the New 

 York Times and the Washington Post reported Zilczer's discovery 

 m July, and she presented her research in a scholarly article for 

 the summer 1998 issue of American Art, the journal of the 

 Smithsonian's National Museum of Amencan Art. As a result 

 of Zilczer's research, the work has been retitled Reclining Man 

 {John F, Kennedy) and assigned the earlier date of 1963. 



In the conservation department, conservator Susan Lake 

 also examined the work of de Kooning and other Abstract 

 Expressionists, undertaking new research into the paints and 

 pigments used by this group, for whom the descriptive nature 

 of paint was an essential factor in communicating a message. 

 Her analysis of de Kooning's work in the Hirshhorn 's collec- 

 tion revealed various mixtures of housepaint, ground glass, 

 plaster of paris, and chalk on several paintings and provided 

 numerous other insights into the artist's studio methods. 

 Lake's findings, which also touched on Jackson Pollock's 

 wotk, were later published in the National Gallery of Art's 

 conservation research journal. 



Tapping Smithsonian resources, this year's installments of 

 the "Collection in Context" exhibition series continued to 

 reflect an intetdisciplinary approach by using nonart materials 

 to elucidate the form, content, and context of select objects in 

 the Hirshhorn 's collection. An exhibition on Ftench Cubist 

 sculptor Raymond Duchamp- Villon's 1914 bronze Horse, orga- 

 nized by curator Zilczer, dramatized the artist's pursuit of a 

 machine-based style by displaying studies and contextual 

 artifacts — period views of machinery expositions, examples of 

 freeze-frame photography, and rare scientific treatises — as well 

 as correspondence and documents. Material was borrowed 

 from the Library of Congress, Smithsonian Institution Archives, 

 Smithsonian Institution Libraries, and Archives of American 

 Art. Next in che series was a summer exhibition, organized by 

 Valerie J. Fletcher, Curator of Sculpture, on Henry Moore's 



seminal 1937 carved wood sculpture Stringed Figure No. 1, in 

 which taut rows of string imbue an organic, natural composi- 

 tion with the logic of engineering — a fusion unprecedented in 

 the history of modern sculprure. Pinpointing Moore's source, 

 Fletcher borrowed two nineteenth-century mathematical 

 models from the Smithsonian's National Museum of 

 American History that matched those Moore saw 60 years ago 

 at the Science Museum in London, thus spurring him to cre- 

 ate this first in a series of sculptures. To demonstrate the 

 relationship of the British arrist's innovations to sculptures 

 that preceded and followed it, works from the Hirshhorn 's 

 permanent collection by Constantin Brancusi, Naum Gabo, 

 Barbara Hepworth, Alexander Calder, and others were also 

 exhibited. 



During the year, Fletcher continued her long-term research 

 on evolving issues, practices, and ethical quescions surround- 

 ing cast sculpture of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. 

 Her work took her to the archives of the Musee d'Orsay in 

 Paris, the Henry Moore Foundation in Hertfordshire, 

 England, and elsewhere to study a broad range of artists, tech- 

 niques, and materials. In June, Fletcher's capsule history of 

 the Hirshhorn 's 4.2-acre garden and plaza complex and a 

 work-by-work analysis of some 65 sculptures there appeared 

 in A Garden for Art: Outdoor Sculpture at the Hirshhorn Museum, 

 copublished by the museum and Thames and Hudson. The 

 96-page guide, made possible by a generous gift from Board 

 Chairman Robert Lehrman and supported by a grant from the 

 Smithsonian Women's Committee, provided a clear, in-depth 

 overview of the subjects, styles, materials, and conservation is- 

 sues embodied by the museum's comprehensive collection of 

 modern and contemporary sculpture, using clear language to 

 fostet understanding and appreciation of each work. 



The Hirshhom's exhibitions continued to provide compell- 

 ing, diverse aesthetic and learning experiences for visitors. 

 Stanley Spencer (British, 1891—1959), whose biblical scenes, 

 nudes, portraits, allegories, and landscapes have been little 

 exhibited or studied outside his native England, was the sub- 

 ject of "Stanley Spencer. An English Vision" (October 9, 1997- 

 January 11, 1998), cocurared by Hirshhorn Director James T. 

 Demetrion and Andrea Rose of the British Council, London. 

 British writer Fiona MacCarthy contributed an essay to a fully 

 illustrated 195-page catalog, and the show received major sup- 

 port from Howard and Roberta Ahmanson, Fieldstead and 

 Company. Among numerous public programs was a Sunday- 

 afternoon lecture series (October 12— November 16) exploring 

 Spencer's work from four distinct perspectives. "Stanley Spen- 

 cer A Modern Visionary" was the keynote presentation by 

 Duncan Robinson, author of a seminal 1979 monograph on 

 Spencer and Director of Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, 

 England, one of more than 30 lenders to the exhibition. 

 Judith Collins, a curator of twentieth-century British art for 

 the Tate Gallery in London, presented a lecture tided "Sacred 

 and Secular Stanley Spencer and His Contemporaries." Then 

 came "Painting God in Our Village: The Religious Dimen- 

 sion of Spencer's Painting" by Nicholas P. WoltersdorfT, 



58 



