"Facing Portraits" Featured in Smithsonian Publication

A learning activity built into the Albany Institute's traveling panel exhibit, "Facing Portraits" was included in the September issue of Smithsonian in Your Classroom, a resource distributed to thousands of schoolteachers nationwide by the Smithsonian Office of Education.

"Facing Portraits" focuses on a wide variety of portraits of the Albany Institute's collection and explores the cultural value of portraits. The Albany Institute owns a copy of a famous mezzotint by Edward Savage which copies an original portrait of Benjamin Franklin by Benjamin West. In the portrait, Franklin is shown as a pensive scholar with books, papers, and a bust of Isaac Newton in the background. This print, along with two altered versions (one shows Franklin eating pizza which is illustrated above and the other pictures  him working at his personal computer), are used to emphasize the importance of objects in portraits.

Ted Lind, AIHA director of education, met the creators of Smithsonian in the Classroom at the annual meeting of the National Art Education Association, held in Washington, D.C. last spring. They were so impressed by this activity that they asked permission to reproduce the objects lesson in the September issue, which features an exhibit at the National Portrait Gallery entitled Franklin and His Friends. And, of course, the Albany Institute agreed wholeheartedly -- resulting in the lesson designed by our Education Department being replicated in countless classrooms across the country!