} SMITHSONTAN. INSTITUTION 
‘PLEASE RETURN RELEASE CaRD IF PUBLISHED 
Information for publication Saturday afternoon, March 18, 1916, 
GRAPHIC ARTS EXHIBITION. 
Washington, D. C.=-The Division of Graphic Aris; which foras e part 
of the U. S. National Museum collections, is now installed on the 
first floor of the Smithsonian building, where it is open week days 
from 9 A. M. bO- 4750 Po. 
Graphic Arts is the expression of artistic ideas or the repre- 
sentation of objects on plane surfaces, This includes the evolution 
of drawing, painting, and engraving, and their reproduction in num- 
bers by mechanical means or the light processes, for pictorial pur- 
poses and the graphic representation of ideas, The operations 
necessary in printing texts and in the making of the book are also 
ineluded. 
In museums of art, ag these are usually understood, the results 
alone of artistic activities of men are shown to the exclusion of 
the applications, tools, and materials used by the artists. In the 
U, 8. National Museum sraphic arts exhibit, on the contrary, special 
stress is laid upon the material or technical side of art, and the 
Peiaction: therefore embrace, not only manuscripts, drawings, paint- 
ings, and prints, but papers, canvases, pencils, brushes, colors, 
inks, plates, types, tools,and machinery, @s well. 
Artists, engravers, publishers, and other friends, have =¢o- 
operated with the Museum in assembling the different @xni bits Of Ties 
‘division, until it now comprises probably the most complete collec- 
tion of its kind in the world. including many rare and unique speci- 
mens, It is arranged with the idea of presenting to the layman the 
