Smithsonian Update: Modest Abe Stops Sunbathing

By a remarkable coincidence, the 1864 Mathew Brady albumen silver print of Abraham Lincoln and the 1865 wood engraving of Lincoln’s second inaugural ball, which I had caught basking in the sun at the recent reopening of the renovated Smithsonian American Art Museum and National Portrait Gallery, were removed yesterday, just a day after I exposed their exposure.
Bethany Morookian Bentley, press officer of the NPG, at first told me that they had been replaced by facsimiles. She later called back with a revised story: The originals were off view, but the copies would not be up until next week. She also assured me that this shuffle had been previously planned and had nothing to do with my item in CultureGrrl.
Bentley added:
We are always cognizant of light levels when we place works on paper on view. In order to determine how long the object will remain on display, we take into account how much light exposure it receives.
Maybe they should have taken into account the fact that these light-sensitive works should never have been exposed to direct sun in the first place.
One day, I’ll tell you the story of how I saved for posterity a Cézanne hanging in the Philadelphia Museum of Art. (Or maybe I’ll tell you later today!)