Museums and More Museums!

After hitting our neighbourhood coffee shop, we were on our way. The first stop of the day was a trip back to the Hirschorn, so Evan could chat with their interactive museum robot and so Brad could check out a few pieces he didn’t see yesterday (and we all needed to see the sculpture garden). The sculpture garden had works by Rodin, Yayoi Kusama (the artist we saw an entire show of in Toronto), and Lichtenstein. We then walked over to the National Gallery of Art where we did a quick tour of the Impressionists. We saw several Monets, Van Goghs, and Cezannes, but we had seen some of these artists’ greatest hits in Paris, so we only stayed for about 45 minutes.

We took the underground tunnel to the American Art Museum where we spent more time looking at some of my favourite art movement (Abstract Expressionism) pieces. There was “Mural” by Jackson Pollock, which was the piece that got him noticed by Peggy Guggenheim, and an early Rothko, as well as Warhol and Magritte. In the center if the museum was a large Calder sculpture which was pretty incredible!

Then we walked as close as we could get to the Capitol Building (lots of prep for the concerts happening tomorrow!) before catching our Hop On bus at The Newseum. We rode the bus towards Ford’s Theatre (where Lincoln was assassinated) and then hopped off to walk to our lunch destination. For lunch we visited a Top Chef finalist’s sandwich shop called Smoked and Stacked. Evan had the pulled pork, Brad had pastrami and I had the special BLT. Messy, delicious, and satisfying. After sandwiches, we made a quick stop at Buttercream for a Mexican cookie sandwiched with dulce de leche.

We walked back towards the National Portrait Gallery. To begin, we looked at some of the new acquisitions including Christy Turlington, and then moved on to the presidential portraits. The highlight was obviously seeing Obama’s portrait that was done by Kehinde Wiley. It was luminescent! It seemed to glow from within - it was that enigmatic! We also went upstairs to see Michelle Obama’s portrait, which is really beautiful.

Unbeknownst to us, it had stormed something fast and fierce while we were in the gallery. So we ended up taking a cab to the Holocaust Museum.Read more