WASHINGTON, DC.- In 1976, the year of the U.S. bicentennial, the National Portrait Gallery expanded its collecting mandate to include photography. Without photographs, it was difficult—if not impossible—to feature likenesses of many of the individuals who shaped the nation’s history but never posed for a painted or sculpted portrait. Timed with the U.S. semiquincentennial, the Portrait Gallery celebrates the 50th anniversary of its photographs collection, which now accounts for nearly half of the museum’s total holdings. To mark this milestone, the museum presents “Photographic Memory: Fifty Years of Collecting,” an exhibition that features more than 120 photographic portraits and explores the evolution of the artistic medium and its use in reflecting U.S. history and culture throughout the decades. On view are photographic portraits from the Daguerreian era to today’s digital age, including never-before-exhibited works and historic treasures from the museum’s wide-ranging collection. “Photographic Memory: Fifty Years of Collecting” is curated by Ann Shumard, senior curator of photographs, and is on view on the museum’s second floor from Nov. 14, 2026, to Nov. 7, 2027.
Organized chronologically, “Photographic Memory” documents the evolution of photography and highlight some of the most influential photographers from 1843 to present day. An introductory timeline introduces different photographic processes and innovations.
Notable works include an 1846 quarter-plate daguerreotype of Dolley Madison by John Plumbe Jr., on view for the first time since it was acquired by the Portrait Gallery in July 2024. The portrait has been paired with an 1843 half-plate daguerreotype of President John Quincy Adams, marking the first time the earliest known photographs of a U.S. President and First Lady have been displayed together. Other historical works include Alexander Gardner’s original “cracked-plate” portrait of Abraham Lincoln, British camera artist Julia Margaret Cameron’s image of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and rare cabinet-card photographs of Ida B. Wells-Barnett by Sallie E. Garrity and Ko K’un-hua by George K. Warren.
Audiences will also encounter some of America’s biggest names in sports, music, dance, literature, business and innovation. On view are images of athletes Muhammad Ali and Althea Gibson; singers James Brown, Billie Holiday and Celia Cruz; and artists Georgia O’Keeffe, Isamu Noguchi and Carrie Mae Weems. The museum’s photographs of poet and author Amanda Gorman by Shawn Theodore, and actor and activist Christopher Reeve by Herb Ritts, will be exhibited for the first time. The exhibition also includes works by influential photographers, including Mathew Brady, Alfred Stieglitz, Edward Steichen, Dorothea Lange, Ansel Adams, Philippe Halsman, Gordon Parks, Yousuf Karsh, Irving Penn, Richard Avedon, Diane Arbus, Annie Leibovitz, Robert Mapplethorpe, Anthony Barboza, Catherine Opie, Mickalene Thomas and Alec Soth.
A richly illustrated catalog, Photographic Memory: Fifty Years of Photography at the National Portrait Gallery, co-published by the National Portrait Gallery and Scala Art Publishers, will accompany the exhibition and will be released in spring 2027. The book, written by Shumard, will include an introductory essay on the history of the museum’s photography collection and insightful entries on the featured portraits.
