Programs

A mecca for aficionados of railroad technology and history, Strasburg, Pennsylvania, offers the ideal destination for a tour led by rail historian James Reaves. Featured in the leisurely day are a round-trip steam train excursion through beautiful Lancaster County on the country’s oldest continuously operating railroad and an afternoon at the Railroad Museum of Pennsylvania, which houses more than 100 locomotives and cars.

The stark natural beauty of Long Island’s South Fork has inspired painters from William Merritt Chase and Childe Hassam to Willem de Kooning, Jackson Pollock, and Lee Krasner. Participants in a 5-day tour led by arts journalist Richard Selden encounter works by these artists and others at galleries in the Hamptons; visit the former home and studio of Krasner and Pollock; and take in the Brooklyn Museum and the Yale University Art Gallery during travel to and from Long Island. (World Art History Certificate elective, 1 credit)

From Martha Washington to Jill Biden, each woman who has served in the role of first lady of the United States has a story. During a walking tour of the area around the White House, A Tour of Her Own staff members share a few of these sagas.

Virginia Woolf famously said that George Eliot’s monumental Middlemarch from 1872 was “one of the few English novels written for grown-up people.” Joseph Luzzi, professor of literature at Bard College, examines how Eliot used innovative literary techniques and delves into her treatment of political issues, key transitions in English social and cultural life, and the characters’ emotional lives.

Smithsonian Chamber Music Society audiences are privy to the unparalleled experience of being able to hear two magnificent quartets of instruments—one made by Antonio Stradivari, the other by his teacher Nicoló Amati—in this popular four-concert series on Saturdays. The concert features music composed by Schubert, Mozart, and Brahms.

Smithsonian Chamber Music Society audiences are privy to the unparalleled experience of being able to hear two magnificent quartets of instruments—one made by Antonio Stradivari, the other by his teacher Nicoló Amati—in this popular four-concert series on Sundays. The concert features music composed by Schubert, Mozart, and Brahms.

Television news has undergone remarkable transformations in the last seven decades. From the “Camel News Caravan” with John Cameron Swayze in 1948 to the “CBS Evening News” with Walter Cronkite in 1963 to 24/7 coverage on CNN and then cable, coverage has changed in availability and character. Media historian Brian Rose looks at these sweeping changes and examines the impact of television journalism.

Experience forest bathing as Melanie Choukas-Bradley, a certified nature and forest-therapy guide, leads a 2-hour morning walk in the Enid A. Haupt Garden at the Smithsonian Castle. This unique and restorative celebration of the beauty of autumn in in one of Washington’s garden gems is the perfect way to learn why forest bathing is popular all over the world.

Discover how visual art can inspire creative writing and how writing can offer a powerful way to experience art. Join Mary Hall Surface, the founding instructor of the National Gallery of Art’s popular Writing Salon, for five online workshops that explore essential elements of writing and styles through close looking, word-sketching, and imaginative response to prompts. This writing session is inspired by 20th-century Hungarian-American artist Lily Furedi’s Subway.

This introductory course teaches the basic skills needed for drawing. Working with a variety of materials and techniques, including charcoal and pencils, students explore the rendering of geometric forms, volume, and perspective, with an emphasis on personal gesture marks.