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Lillian Gish played a girl haunted by the wind of the western prairies in the 1928 silent film The Wind. On Sunday, see the film set to a live piano concert at the American Art Museum. Photo by Movie-Fan, courtesy of Flickr Creative Commons

Friday May 17: Modern art conservation: palimpsest

What does it take museums to conserve art projects that go beyond a painted picture? Ann Hamilton‘s palimpsest is an installation in the exhibition “Over, Under, Next: Experiments in Mixed Media, 1913-present” that takes up a small room, whose walls are covered in loosely hanging newsprint sheets with handwritten scrawls across them. In the middle is a glass case that contains two heads of cabbage being eaten by 20 snails. This afternoon, Conservator Gwynne Ryan discusses the conservation issues surrounding this challenging artwork. Free. 12:30 p.m. Hirshhorn Museum.

Saturday, May 18: The art of Japanese pouch-books

The Japanese “pouch-book” was a common format used for novels, romances and comedies during the Edo period (1603-1868)—but you can still make one today! Artists from Pyramid Atlantic Art Center are in the Sackler Gallery this afternoon to show you how, with plenty of supplies. You get to take your masterpiece home when you’re done. $15 materials fee. 1 p.m. Sackler Gallery.

Sunday, May 19: The Wind

Two good Sunday afternoon activities: watching movies, listening to music. One great Sunday afternoon activity: both at the same time! This afternoon, in a very special “cineconcert,” composer and pianist Andrew E. Simpson performs a new, original score for The Wind, a silent film classic form 1928. In the movie, Lillian Gish plays an innocent girl who moves to the western prairies and is haunted by the ever-present wind. Free tickets distributed 30 minutes before the film in the G Street Lobby. 3 p.m. American Art Museum.

Also, check out our Visitors Guide App. Get the most out of your trip to Washington, D.C. and the National Mall with this selection of custom-built tours, based on your available time and passions. From the editors of Smithsonian magazine, the app is packed with handy navigational tools, maps, museum floor plans and museum information including ‘Greatest Hits’ for each Smithsonian museum.

For a complete listing of Smithsonian events and exhibitions visit the goSmithsonian Visitors Guide. Additional reporting by Michelle Strange.

View of Xu Bing’s Phoneix models in transit. Photo by John Tsantes

When you go to the museum for a show, what you see is the final product: a painting, a photograph, an installation. But now at the Sackler, you can see the process behind the product in the new exhibit “Nine Deaths, Two Births: Xu Bing’s Phoenix Project.” The exhibit explores the two-year effort to complete Chinese contemporary artist Xu Bing’s “Phoenix Project” and offers a look into the ways both creation and destruction can be part of the artistic process.

Now on view at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art, the final product, two giant phoenix sculptures, were originally commissioned in 2008 and intended for a building in the heart of Beijing’s central business district. But after delays for the Olympics, a global financial crisis and funding issues, the installation found different sponsors and a new home. At 12 tons and nearly 100 feet in length, the sculptures need lots of space. Mass MoCA had the room and desire to display it and the Sackler decided to offer its companion exhibit having worked with Xu in 2001 for his show “Word Play,” when it also acquired the iconic  ”Monkeys Grasping For the Moon” sculpture.

A gold and pearl hair ornament shows the long tradition of the phoenix motif in Chinese culture. China, Qing dynasty, courtesy of the Sackler

The phoenixes reference the traditional Chinese motif but rendered from construction site materials, take on a new and modern meaning in the saga of China’s economic development. “My two phoenixes are quite different,” says Xu. While traditional lacquers, paintings and even hair ornaments from China (some of which are on view as part of the exhibition) draw on the mythical bird as a symbol of wealth, nobility and peace, Xu’s industrial installation is in tension with these qualities.

When Xu went to the site where his sculptures were originally going to be and saw the construction of the new building in Beijing, he says he came in contact with the conditions of the workers there. He saw before him the face of Chinese development–its soaring architectural business buildings–and the hands–the laborers who did not seem to reap the benefits of the country’s boom. “The contrast was the inspiration,” he says.

Because of the scale of his project, he had to rely on the same labor. He relied on their know-how and expertise when designing and modifying his work. He also spoke with engineers and architects to help design the massive birds.

Preparatory ink drawing of Xu Bing’s Phoenix Project. Xu Bing, courtesy of the Sackler

Preparatory drawing of Xu Bing’s Phoenix Project. Xu Bing, courtesy of the Sackler

But, in the lead up the Olympics, he, along with everyone else engaged in construction, was ordered to stop. The government wanted to ensure pristine air quality for the international games so as not to draw any criticism. It’s an irony not lost on Xu, who included official government notices in the exhibit at the Sackler. After the financial crisis, he then had to find alternative funding and ended up turning to Taiwanese-based businessman, Barry Lam, founder of Quanta Computer.

Citing the many ups and downs of the artistic process, curator Carol Huh says, “What we’ve tried to do here for the first time is really show the process.” Sketches, clay models, computer-generated renderings as well as a special documentary about the works comprise the exhibit. The title, nine deaths and two births, refers to the many challenges he faced and the two children born to his staff during the process, a symbol of the phoenix-like quality of artistic creation.

On view at Mass MoCA until November, the phoenixes will head next to New York City’s Cathedral of St. John the Divine.

“Nine Deaths, Two Births: Xu Bing’s Phoenix Project” is on view through September 1, 2013.

The Cyrus Cylinder is sometimes called the oldest declaration of human rights. See it on display and hear its story on Tuesday at the Sackler Gallery. Photo courtesy of the Sackler Gallery

Tuesday, April 23: From Babylon to Persepolis: Cyrus the Great and the Legacy of Ancient Iran

The Cyrus Cylinder is one of the most significant archaeological artifacts in history. Inscribed with cuneiform, one of the earliest known scripts, the football-shaped cylinder of baked clay describes Cyrus the Great’s conquest of Babylon in 539 B.C., and describes how the king freed his newly conquered people from religious persecution by restoring their temples and sending prisoners home to worship their own gods. Cyrus’ tolerant approach has inspired philosophers and politicians for centuries. The Cylinder is on display at the Sackler Gallery through April 28, and in preparation of its departure, curators of the exhibition today will discuss its archaeological and historical context and lasting legacy. Free. 12:15 p.m. Sackler Gallery.

Wednesday, April 24: Curator Tour: “Over, Under, Next: Experiments in Mixed Media, 1913-Present”

Since 1912, when painter Georges Braque began to mix swatches of printed paper and cloth into his pictures, collage has redefined the limits of artistic expression by blending everyday materials like car parts, butterfly wings and furniture. “Over, Under, Next: Experiments in New Media,” a new exhibit at the Hirshhorn Museum, displays approximately 100 assemblages from the past century. This evening, associate curator Evelyn Hankins discusses ways in which artists from almost every major art movement have incorporated assemblage into their work. Free. 7 p.m. Hirshhorn Museum.

Thursday, April 25: Smithsonian Craft Show

Furniture! Ceramics! Glass! Wearable art! More than 100 of America’s top artisans are displaying and selling their hand-crafted work this weekend in the institution’s 31st annual craft show. Great chance to pick up an early Mother’s Day gift, or something for yourself to impress your friends. Daily admission $15; two day admission $20 (12 and under free, no strollers permitted). To purchase tickets, call the Craft Show Office at 202-633-5006 or 888-832-9554, or go here.  10:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. today and Friday, 10:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. on Saturday, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Sunday. National Building Museum.

Also, check out our Visitors Guide App. Get the most out of your trip to Washington, D.C. and the National Mall with this selection of custom-built tours, based on your available time and passions. From the editors of Smithsonian magazine, the app is packed with handy navigational tools, maps, museum floor plans and museum information including ‘Greatest Hits’ for each Smithsonian museum.

For a complete listing of Smithsonian events and exhibitions visit the goSmithsonian Visitors Guide. Additional reporting by Michelle Strange.

Secretary G. Wayne Clough testified before Congress today about the effects of sequestration on the institution. Photo by Ken Rahalm, courtesy of the Smithsonian

On April 16, Smithsonian Institution Secretary G. Wayne Clough testified before the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform about the impending effects of sequestration. Though the Obama administration had sought a $59 million budget increase for the Institution in fiscal 2014, this year Clough has to contend with a $41 million budget reduction due to sequestration. Gallery closings, fewer exhibitions, reduced educational offerings, loss of funding for research and cuts to the planning process of the under-construction National Museum of African American History and Culture were listed among the impacts of the sequestration.

Clough began his testimony: “Each year millions of our fellow citizens come to Washington to visit—for free—our great museums and galleries and the National Zoo, all of which are open every day of the year but one. Our visitors come with high aspirations to learn and be inspired by our exhibitions and programs.”

“It is my hope,” Clough told the committee, “that our spring visitors will not notice the impact of the sequestration.” Perhaps most noticeable would be the gallery closures, which, while they would not close entire museums, would restrict access to certain floors or spaces in the museums, unable to pay for sufficient security. Those changes would begin May 1, according to Clough.

Clough warned, however, that while these short-term measures will save in the near future, they might also entail long-term consequences. Unforeseen costs may arise in the form of diminished maintenance capabilities, for example. “Any delays in revitalization or construction projects will certainly result in higher future operating and repair costs,” Clough said.

This also threatens the Institution’s role as steward of thousands of historic and valuable artifacts–”Morse’s telegraph; Edison’s light bulb; the Salk vaccine; the 1865 telescope designed by Maria Mitchell, America’s first woman astronomer who discovered a comet; the Wright Flyer; Amelia Earhart’s plane; Louis Armstrong’s trumpet; the jacket of labor leader Cesar Chavez,” to name a few.

Around the Mall will keep the issue updated and tweet significant closures.

Nam June Paik’s “Video Flag” (1985-96). Celebrate the avant-garde artist’s life and work on Sunday with a symposium and performance organized by some of his most prominent contemporaries. Photo by Jill, courtesy of Flickr Creative Commons

Note: If you’re going to be around the Mall this weekend, watch out for a handful of road closures between Saturday and Sunday due to the Japanese Street Festival, the National Cherry Blossom Festival Parade and Race to Stop the Silence. See these events’ websites for details. 

Friday, April 12: Experimental Film from Korea

Instead sitting down to another conventional Friday night popcorn flick, how about tackling some of the past few years’ most inventive short films? Fresh from the Experimental Film and Video Festival in Seoul, North Korea, a selection of unique and groundbreaking works will be introduced in person by Park Donghyun, the festival’s director, this evening at the Freer Gallery. The batch of films explores the experience of time, tensions between North and South Korea and the sibilant character [ ∫ ]. The showing is part of the 2013 Korean Film Festival. Free. 7 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. Freer Gallery.

Saturday, April 13: Super Science Saturday: How Things Fly

Think you’re an expert on flight? Seen everything the Air and Space Museum has to offer? Then take a trip out to the Air and Space Museum’s Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center near Dulles Airport, where thousands of aviation and space artifacts that take up too much room to be exhibited on the Mall are on display. On the second Saturday of each month (that’s today!), the museum holds demonstrations and hands-on activities that teach visitors about aviation and space exploration. Free. 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Air and Space Museum Udvar-Hazy Center.

Sunday, April 14: Nam June Paik: Art & Process

Nam June Paik (1932-2006) was an avant-garde musician, installation master and the world’s first video artist. The American Art Museum opened a retrospective of his career earlier this year (see some of his work at his website), and today five of the most prominent scholars and artists who studied and worked with him are coming together in a symposium to discuss his legacy. After a subsequent gallery talk and break, prominent composers who knew Paik will premiere a performance of his film and music. Free tickets distributed beginning at 12:30 p.m. for the symposium and concert, and again at 6:30 p.m. for the concert. Symposium: 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. Gallery Talk: 4:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. Concert: 7 p.m. American Art Museum.

And all weekend: Cherry Blossoms!

It’s the prettiest time of the year in DC, and there are many around the Mall this weekend to celebrate the city’s favorite flowers as they hit their peak. After you enjoy the National Cherry Blossom Festival Parade and Japanese Street Festival on Saturday, head over to the Sackler Gallery to check out National Cherry Blossom Festival Anime Marathon, a showing of all 26 episodes of Shinichiro Watanabe’s landmark animated television series Samurai Champloo. And if you want a sneak peak at the beautiful scenery down by the water, take a look at our new slideshow of the cherry blossoms in all their glory!

Also, check out our Visitors Guide App. Get the most out of your trip to Washington, D.C. and the National Mall with this selection of custom-built tours, based on your available time and passions. From the editors of Smithsonian magazine, the app is packed with handy navigational tools, maps, museum floor plans and museum information including ‘Greatest Hits’ for each Smithsonian museum.

For a complete listing of Smithsonian events and exhibitions visit the goSmithsonian Visitors Guide. Additional reporting by Michelle Strange.