Chronology 



145 



the Washington Stage Guild, the program was sponsored by 

 Eastman Kodak Company. 



November 1 1 



■ Exhibition "Missing You: Letters from WW II" opens at 

 the National Postal Museum. 



November 1 2-1 3 



■ Smithsonian Council meeting The Smithsonian Council 

 meeting, coordinated by the Office of the Under Secretaty 

 for Science, was held November 12 and 13. Nineteen 

 members were present and focused on the topic of Smith- 

 sonian research activities in the major areas in which the 

 Institution is engaged. Four panel discussions, with Smith- 

 sonian scholars representing various research fields, along 

 with a concluding roundtable discussion, with senior man- 

 agement and museum and research institute ditectors, 

 covered topics such as the research environment and re- 

 search models, the linkage of research and public programs, 

 research challenges in museum settings, and future direc- 

 tions in Smithsonian research. The Council's Report to the 

 Secretary was widely distribured ro sraff and units through- 

 out the Institution. 



November 1 3 



■ Workshop In celebration of the release of NMAI's book 

 When the Rain Sings: Poems by Young Native Americans, the 

 museum offered a workshop and reading for young Native 

 American writers in the New York metro area. A reception 

 and book signing followed rhe program. 



November 14 



■ Anniversary The Visitor Informarion and Associates' 

 Reception Center's Smithsonian Information Center cele- 

 brated its 10th anniversary, having served some 20 million 

 visirors over the decade. 



November 14-January 9 



■ Traveling exhibition "Philippe Halsman: A Retrospective," 

 organized by rhe National Portrait Gallery, was on view at 

 the Toledo Art Museum in Ohio. 



November 15-19 



■ Professional education course "Plant Anatomy and Morphol- 

 ogy," a new course designed and hosted by the Smithsonian 

 Center for Materials Research and Educarion, was given for 

 the first time as part of the series offered by the laboratory's 

 optical microscopy program. This course was repeated later 

 in the year (July 31- Augusr 4) 



November 15 



■ Public program The Narional Portrait Gallery presented a 

 Cultures in Motion presenrarion of Papa. James Earl Jones 



performed a staged reading of John deGroot's Tony Award- 

 winning play about the life of Ernest Hemingway. The 

 program was produced by the Washington Stage Guild and 

 sponsored by Thomasville Furniture Industries, Inc. 



November 15 



■ Research A team of scientists from the Freer Gallery of 

 Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, as well as the Johns 

 Hopkins University in Baltimore, began work on a $17,200 

 award from the National Center for Preservation Technology 

 and Training of the National Park Service. The yearlong 

 technology transfer grant will test whether the "eddy- 

 current" technique — a means of examining metals — also can 

 be applied to the field of conservation. 



November 1 7 



■ Exhibition Thirty works on paper and parchment, tex- 

 tiles, coins, gemstones, metalwork, and wood dating from 

 the ninth century to the presenr were on view in "Imaging 

 the Word: Selections of Calligraphy from the Islamic 

 World," an exhibirion at the Arthur M. Sackler Gallery. The 

 works, all of which are inscribed in a variery of Persian and 

 Arabic, represented recent gifts, purchases, and long-terms 

 loans of Islamic calligraphy. The show examined the variety 

 of calligraphic styles that evolved in the Islamic world, and 

 the ways these scripts were used as a means of communica- 

 tion and embellishment. 



November 18 



■ Exhibition "On Time," a permanent exhibition at the 

 National Museum of American History, looks at the chang- 

 ing ways Americans have measured, used, and thought about 

 time during the past 300 years. The larger than 4,000- 

 square-foot exhibition intermixes almost 200 clocks and 

 watches with a wide variety of everyday objects to show how 

 today's society has come to equate time with the clock. An- 

 other 300 objects will be virtually showcased through 

 interactive computer stations in the exhibition. It aims to 

 stimulate visitors to think about time, both in American 

 hisrory and in their own lives, in new ways. 



November 18 



■ Exhibition series This year's "Directions" series under- 

 scoring the diversiry of imagery and media pursued by 

 emerging artists was launched at the Hirshhorn Museum 

 and Sculpture Garden with a show of miniature, semi- 

 autobiographical works on paper in watercolor and natural 

 vegetable pigments by Pakistani-born, Houston-based artist 

 Shahzia Sikander. Next in the series, opening March 16, 

 were large wall-mounted sculptures made of discarded and 

 recycled hardware, roys, wrappers, timber, and other detritus 

 of the city by New York-based artist Leonardo Drew — a re- 

 flection in part on his southern Black heritage. Finally, 

 opening July 14, Brirish artist Cathy de Monchaux's enig- 

 matic sculptures of sofr fabric and hard metal (often 



