Did you know that the federal government owns almost 30,000 pieces of art in federal buildings, courthouses, and museums across the country? Many are works by our most accomplished artists: Ben Shahn, Alan Houser, Philip Guston, Louise Nevelson, Martin Puryear, Beverly Pepper, Maya Lin, Alexander Calder, and Sam Gilliam, to name only a few.

Today, the fate of those works is being discussed as never before. Can they be sold, destroyed, painted over, put up for auction? What protections do they enjoy?

Jennifer Gibson knows the answers to these and other questions: Who controls art at the Kennedy Center? In the National Gallery? The Smithsonian? In our embassies around the world? Is art in federal buildings protected and preserved from destruction or sale? Before her recent retirement, Dr. Gibson oversaw the General Services Administration Center for Fine Arts. She is perhaps our leading authority on art in federal buildings. By attending our salon on September 23, you can meet Jennifer and have all of your questions answered.

Jennifer Gibson recently retired as the director of the U.S. General Services Administration’s Center for Fine Arts where she was responsible for the policy, oversight, and management of the Fine Arts Collection and Art in Architecture program. The collection includes over 27,000 artworks dating from the 1850s to the present. These artworks are permanently installed in federal buildings, U.S. courthouses, and land ports of entry throughout the country or are on loan to public institutions. The center commissions new artworks through the Art in Architecture program. Gibson joined GSA as a project manager for Art in Architecture and then assumed responsibility for the Fine Arts Program. Subsequently she established and became director of the Center for Fine Arts which combined the two programs and resulted in a more seamless process for the commissioning of new artworks and long-term care of GSA’s Fine Arts Collection. She currently serves as a member of the Federal Reserve Board Collections Panel.

Prior to GSA, Gibson directed the visual arts program for the Maryland-National Capital Park and Planning Commission, a regional government agency, where she curated exhibitions, lectured on art, established art outreach programs, and developed a public art program. She has taught art history, served on the board of Pyramid Atlantic was chair of the art advisory board at the University of Maryland, University College, and sat on numerous advisory boards, juries, and artist selection panels. She earned a Ph.D. in art history at the University of Virginia, and was a pre-doctoral fellow at the Smithsonian Institution.

Proceeds from this event will help your older neighbors remain in the community, with support from our dedicated staff and volunteers. $80 of your purchase is tax deductible.

Accessibility: The entrance to this home has many steps with a railing on one side.