PORTRAITS

It wasn’t long after Cokie Roberts came on Portraits that we learned the sad news of her passing, on Sept. 17. We quickly realized we has a ton of great material from our interview with her on First Ladies that never made it into the final edition. So this episode we reprise some of those special moments from the cutting room floor— where her smarts, her compassion, and her moxie are on full displ...

Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution Lonnie Bunch says a portrait can restore humanity, as in the case of Henrietta Lacks. She's the woman whose 'immortal' cells were taken without her knowledge and then used to pioneer important medical advances. Bunch, a scholar of American history, also describes images of one of his favorite presidents, Lyndon B. Johnson. As a lawmaker, Johnson had a 20-ye...

Classical vocalist Marian Anderson became a civil rights icon in 1939 when she sang before 75,000 spectators at the Lincoln Memorial — a concert organized after she was barred from singing at Constitution Hall because of her race. But curator Leslie Ureña wants people to know there’s much more to her story than a single performance.. including a pretty good pancake recipe. Check out the portraits...

Journalist Cokie Roberts laments the fact that Martha Washington’s portrait depicts her as an old lady. Perhaps if it had been painted sooner, when Washington was young and vivacious, we’d have an easier time remembering her as the trailblazing, politically engaged woman she was. Roberts describes four portraits of First Ladies, outlining their bold contributions and the challenges that come with...

If the 1995 animated Disney film is your guide, Pocahontas was a free-spirited Native American heroine who sang to the wind. So why is she dressed like European royalty in her painting at the National Portrait Gallery? Curator and author Paul Chaat Smith separates out what we know and what we think we know about this iconic figure. Check out the portraits we discuss on our website: https://npg.si....

Julie Packard is a leading ocean conservationist, so when the National Portrait Gallery approached her to sit for a portrait, she had one request: She wanted to work with an artist who could paint water. That artist, it turns out, is Hope Gangloff. Kim talks to both women on the day of the portrait's unveiling for a behind-the-scenes account of what it's like when the Gallery is your matchmaker. C...

You might see her leaning against a building on the street, or sitting across from you on your morning commute, pad in hand. Or, you might not have noticed her at all. Wendy talks about her 'drawn journalism' -- sketches and snippets of conversation that convey little slices of life, and connect us to bigger stories in the news. Check out the illustrations we discussed on our website: https://npg....

When author Sheryll Cashin looks at a photograph of Mildred Loving, she doesn't just see a woman who went to the Supreme Court to strike down a ban on interracial marriage. She sees a complicated person, struggling herself with questions of race and identity. Cashin puts Loving's life in historical and geographical context, and also discusses another of her favorite portraits in the Gallery. See t...

If you were a man with property in the 19th century, there's a good chance you sat for a portrait at some point. If you were an enslaved person, a Native American, or an immigrant, there's a good chance you did not. Jill Lepore addresses this lopsidedness, or asymmetry, of history as she shares her own efforts to excavate the stories of people overlooked in the official account. Sometimes this mea...

Art, biography, history and identity collide in this podcast from the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery, launching on June 18, 2019. Join Director Kim Sajet as she chats with artists, historians, and thought leaders about the big and small ways that portraits shape our world. Subscribe now! Find the portraits we discuss at our website: https://npg.si.edu/podcasts