Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden

The origins of the Hirshhorn date to the late 1930s, when the United States Congress mandated an art museum for the National Mall. At that time, the National Gallery of Art was the only venue for visual art in the area, and it focused on Dutch, French, and Italian art. World War II pushed the project into the background. Meanwhile, Joseph H. Hirshhorn, a Latvian immigrant who had made a fortune in uranium mining, had assembled a vast collection ranging from classic French Impressionism to American modernism and sculpture. In 1955 he sold his uranium interests for more than $50 million and continued expanding his holdings. A 1962 sculpture exhibition at New York's Guggenheim Museum revealed the breadth of his collection to the international art community, and institutions in Italy, Israel, Canada, California, and New York City competed to acquire it. President Lyndon B. Johnson and Smithsonian Secretary S. Dillon Ripley successfully campaigned to bring the collection to Washington. An Act of Congress established the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institution, in 1966. Federal funding covered most construction costs, though Hirshhorn later contributed $1 million. Groundbreaking occurred in 1969, and Abram Lerner was named founding director, overseeing the transfer of more than 6,000 items from the Hirshhorns' Connecticut estate and other properties. The museum opened in 1974, and one million visitors attended the inaugural exhibition of 850 works in its first six months. At the inauguration, Hirshhorn stated that giving his collection to the American people was a small repayment for what the nation had done for immigrants like himself. Upon his death in 1981, the museum received additional works and $5 million. Leadership has changed several times: James T. Demetrion directed from 1984 for more than 17 years; Ned Rifkin, former chief curator, became director in 2002; Olga Viso directed from 2005 to 2007; Richard Koshalek served from 2009 until his resignation in 2013 following the Bloomberg Bubble controversy; and Melissa Chiu, a scholar of contemporary Chinese art, was appointed in 2014 and oversaw the museum's 40th anniversary.

The collection includes significant works by major modern and contemporary artists. In painting, holdings include Joan Miró's Peinture (Le Cheval de cirque) (1927) and Edward Hopper's Hotel by a Railroad (1952). The sculpture collection features works by Auguste Rodin, Alexander Calder, Henry Moore, Barbara Hepworth, Alberto Giacometti, Joan Miró, Hans Arp, Willem de Kooning, and others. The museum also holds an substantial group of works by Frank Stella, including Arundel Castle (1959), Pagosa Springs (1960), Louisiana Lottery Co. (1962), Line Up (1962), Wolfeboro IV (1966), Concentric Squares (1966), Darabjerd III (1967), Black Series I (1967), Star Of Persia I and Star Of Persia II (1967), (Aluminum Series) Kingsbury Run (1970), Jablonow (Sketch) (1972), and Quaqua! Attaccati La! (1985). Pop art is represented by Andy Warhol's Marilyn Monroe's Lips (1962) and Claes Oldenburg's Dixie Cup and Candies (1962), Soft Engine for Airflow, Scale 5 (1966), and Geometric Mouse: Variation I, Scale A (1971). Contemporary works include Ron Mueck's Big Man (2000). The sculpture garden contains works by Rodin and Calder among others.

The Hirshhorn building was designed by Gordon Bunshaft, a Pritzker Prize-winning architect and long-time partner at Skidmore, Owings and Merrill. Bunshaft reportedly stated that if the building did not stand in stark contrast to everything else in the city, it would not be suitable for housing a modern art collection. The structure takes the form of an open hollow cylinder elevated on four massive, sculptural piers 4.30 meters high. The building diameter is 70.4 meters, with a central courtyard of 35.1 meters containing an 18-meter fountain. It stands 25 meters tall. The New York Times described it as a fortress serving as a museum. The galleries on the first and second floors have 4.6-meter-high walls with exposed coffered ceilings 0.9 meters deep. The building provides 6,000 square meters of exhibition space on three floors, with an auditorium seating 274 in the lower level. Beneath and around the building is 11,000 square meters of space. The sculpture garden behind Jefferson Drive covers 5,300 square meters at 1.8 to 4.3 meters below street level, with ramps providing accessibility. Total exhibition area indoors and outdoors is 18,300 square meters. The building's exterior has no openings and displays a light tone; interior circulation follows a simple circuit around each floor, with light entering through the open top.

The Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden is located on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., between the National Air and Space Museum and the Arts and Industries Building. It is owned by the Smithsonian Institution and accessible via its website at hirshhorn.si.edu. The museum's position on the L'Enfant axis places it within a key element of Pierre L'Enfant's 1791 city plan and the 1901 MacMillan Plan, alongside the National Archives/National Gallery of Art Sculpture Garden across the Mall and the National Portrait Gallery/Smithsonian American Art building to the north. The institution continues its role as a major public museum of contemporary and modern art, with free admission as part of the Smithsonian system.