ces with provocative and insightful views of the world of 

 African art. An array of tours, workshops, and focus programs 

 gave students of all ages their first encounters with real works 

 of African art. 



Highlights included a rwo-day symposium on the Nsukka 

 Group, contemporary artists of southern Nigeria and its 

 relationship to Nigerian art and culture, and a family day 

 held in conjunction with the exhibition "Olowe of Ise." 



The museum also participated in "Art Night on the Mall," 

 offering a variety of programs during extended summer hours 

 on Thursday nights. 



In addition, workshops and demonstrations by practicing 

 artists engaged attentive audiences eager to meet and talk 

 with African artists. For example, artists-in-residence, Nas- 

 souko and Amidou Coulibaly, Malinke textile artists ftom 

 Cote d'lvoire, demonstrated how to spin cotton and weave on 

 a strip loom. 



The museum also continues to make itself accessible to 

 people with special needs. Tours for hard-of-hearing visitors 

 were made possible through a portable FM Assistive Listen- 

 ing System. This system also allowed hard-of-hearing visitors 

 to participate in educational programs in the workshop and 

 lecture hall. Sign-language inrerpreters for deaf visitors were 

 available upon request for all museum programs. 



Publications 



Throughout the year, the museum published informational 

 materials to accompany exhibitions. This included brochures 

 relating to "The Poetics of Line," "Olowe of Ise," "A Spiral of 

 History," "African Forms in the Furniture of Pierre Legrain" 

 and "South Africa 1936— 1949: Photographs by Constance 

 Stuart Larrabee." 



Photographic Archives and Library 



The museum continues to be a leading research and reference 

 center for the visual arts of Africa. The Warren M. Robbins 

 Library, a branch of the Smithsonian Insrimtion Libraries, con- 

 tains more than 20,000 volumes on African art and material 

 culture. The Eliot Ehsofon Photographic Archives specializes 

 in the collection and preservation of visual materials on 

 African art, culture and the environment. 



National Museum of American Art 



Elizabeth Broun, Director 



The 1998 fiscal year saw many happy developments at the 

 National Museum of American Art. A dramatic increase in 

 private funding revitalized the Museum's 30-year-old fellow- 

 ship program. In addition to support from the Renwick Al- 

 liance and the Sara Roby Foundation, which supported rwo 



fellows, fellowships were underwritten by Patricia and Phillip 

 Frost and Sheila W. and Richard J. Schwartz. Our widely 

 recognized expertise in Latino studies led the Rockefeller 

 Foundation to fund four Larino fellowships. An aggressive 

 promotional campaign, which disseminated fellowship infor- 

 mation through new brochures and the museum's Web site, 

 produced many high-quality applications. Nineteen fellows, 

 the largest number in the program's history, will pursue inde- 

 pendent research based on the museum's collection in the 

 1998—99 academic year. 



Attendance was up significantly, exposing larger audiences 

 to special exhibitions. "Eyeing America: Robert Cottingham 

 Prints" celebrated the acquisition of a set of the artist's 

 photorealist prints spanning three decades that focus on signs, 

 storefronts, and marquees, the emblematic details of the 

 urban American landscape. The Museum premiered David 

 Hockney's 24-foot painting of the Grand Canyon, ritled "A 

 Bigger Grand Canyon." The work, composed of 60 small can- 

 vases mounted as one continuous image, presents a sweeping, 

 colorful view of one of America's most extraordinary 

 topographical wonders. The Museum celebrated the final 

 weekend of its most popular show ever, "Ansel Adams, A 

 Legacy: Masterworks from the Friends of Photography," with 

 extended evening hours until 11 p.m. on March 27 and 28. 

 Both nights featured live jazz, cafe dining, and screenings of 

 a video on Adams's career. More than 11,500 people took ad- 

 vantage of this opportunity, made possible by the generous 

 support of the Monsanto Corporation, to see the exhibition, 

 which attracted some 285,000 visitors in 18 1/2 weeks. 



The Renwick Gallery, a departmenr of the National 

 Museum of American An, introduced the work of a relatively 

 unknown artist working with pure gold, steel, fossil ivory, 

 and precious gems to create extraordinary objects featured in 

 "Daniel Brush: Gold without Boundaries." Beautifully in- 

 stalled at the Renwick Gallery, it drew unusually large atten- 

 dance (almost 50,000 in four months). 



In July First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton helped launch 

 the second phase of SOS! (Save Outdoor Sculpture), a $14 

 million public-sculpture conservation program funded by 

 generous grants from Target Store and the National Endow- 

 ment for the Arts. SOS! is a nationwide public program 

 cosponsored by the National Museum of American Art and 

 the Heritage Preservation. 



Several acquisitions by the National Museum of American 

 Art focused on the museum's heightened involvement with 

 contemporary art. The purchase of PAegalronl Mat rix (1995), a 

 multimedia installation by pioneer video artist Nam June 

 Paik, articulates the borderless reality of the contemporary 

 world and the central role of technology in modern society. 

 The museum's acquisition of Carlos Jose Alfonzo's painting 

 Where Tears Can't Stop (1986) explores the personal iconog- 

 raphy of his Caribbean heritage. 



Of many exciting education programs held, perhaps most 

 notable was the Museum's first high school poster competi- 

 tion and award ceremony in conjunction with the "Posters 



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