The Addison Gallery, located on the campus of Phillips Academy in Andover, MA, is free and open to the public. Plan your visit >
Our Mission
Home to a world-class collection of American art, the Addison Gallery, located on the campus of Phillips Academy in Andover, MA, presents an adventurous exhibition program, hosts a vital artist-in-residence program, and works collaboratively with students and faculty at the Academy and in neighboring communities. Through our ongoing query What is America?, the Addison seeks to engage with the history of American art and American experience—past, present, and future.
About Our Collection
Comprised of more than 28,000 works in all media—painting, sculpture, photography, drawings, prints, and decorative arts—from the 18th century to the present, the Addison Gallery’s collection of American art is one of the most important in the world.
The museum’s founding collection included major works by such prominent American artists as John Singleton Copley, Thomas Eakins, Winslow Homer, Maurice Prendergast, John Singer Sargent, John Twachtman, and James McNeill Whistler.
In the nine decades since, aggressive purchasing and generous gifts have added works by such artists as Mark Bradford, Alexander Calder, Stuart Davis, Arthur Dove, Walker Evans, Robert Frank, Marsden Hartley, Hans Hofmann, Edward Hopper, Kerry James Marshall, Eadweard Muybridge, Georgia O’Keeffe, Jackson Pollock, Charles Sheeler, Lorna Simpson, John Sloan, Jaune Quick-to-See Smith, Frank Stella, Kara Walker, and Stanley Whitney.
Virtual program announcement! Join us on Zoom on Tuesday, January 14th at 3:00 Eastern for “Caring for Native American Collections.”
In conjunction with the Addison Gallery of American Art’s presentation of Kay WalkingStick / Hudson River School, join Marla Taylor, Curator of Collections, and Ryan Wheeler, Director, from Phillips Academy’s Robert S. Peabody Institute of Archaeology (@peabodyandover ) on Zoom for a free virtual conversation on a museum’s role and responsibilities in stewarding Native American cultural material. The Peabody Institute has lent several works from their vast collection to the Addison’s installation. This free program is organized with Andover’s Memorial Hall Library. Registration is required. Click the link in our bio for more information and to register!
Photograph of Marla Taylor and Ryan Wheeler by Henry Marte (@martemedia)
#addisongalleryofamericanart
Virtual program announcement! Join us on Zoom on Tuesday, January 14th at 3:00 Eastern for “Caring for Native American Collections.”
In conjunction with the Addison Gallery of American Art’s presentation of Kay WalkingStick / Hudson River School, join Marla Taylor, Curator of Collections, and Ryan Wheeler, Director, from Phillips Academy’s Robert S. Peabody Institute of Archaeology (@peabodyandover ) on Zoom for a free virtual conversation on a museum’s role and responsibilities in stewarding Native American cultural material. The Peabody Institute has lent several works from their vast collection to the Addison’s installation. This free program is organized with Andover’s Memorial Hall Library. Registration is required. Click the link in our bio for more information and to register!
Photograph of Marla Taylor and Ryan Wheeler by Henry Marte (@martemedia)
#addisongalleryofamericanart
Join us for an artmaking workshop for teens by teens. Inspired by contemporary Cherokee artist Kay WalkingStick’s abstracted landscapes, experiment with your own perspective on place through paint.
Open to high school students of all levels, no art experience necessary. This workshop is free, but space is limited and registration is required: https://bit.ly/addison11225 (link in bio).
Join us for an artmaking workshop for teens by teens. Inspired by contemporary Cherokee artist Kay WalkingStick’s abstracted landscapes, experiment with your own perspective on place through paint.
Open to high school students of all levels, no art experience necessary. This workshop is free, but space is limited and registration is required: https://bit.ly/addison11225 (link in bio).
ONE WEEK LEFT!
Americans in Paris: Artists Working in Postwar France, 1946-1962 must close on January 5th. You don’t want to miss seeing this spectacular exhibition in person!
Contrary to entrenched presumptions that Manhattan became the primary locus of art after World War II, Americans in Paris: Artists Working in Postwar France, 1946–1962 delves into the various circles of artists who made France their home during an era of intense geopolitical realignment. Bolstered by the GI Bill, many artists, such as Norman Bluhm, Ed Clark, Sam Francis, Al Held, Ellsworth Kelly, Kenneth Noland, and Jack Youngerman, along with lesser-known figures such as Robert Breer, Harold Cousins, and Shinkichi Tajiri, opted for a foreign rather than a domestic learning experience. Seasoned artists, such as Beauford Delaney, Claire Falkenstein, Carmen Herrera, Joan Mitchell, Kimber Smith, and Mark Tobey, like the GIs, were drawn to the storied modernist traditions that still flowed from this fabled City of Light. Comprising some 135 artworks by approximately 70 artists, Americans in Paris investigates the academies where many of these artists studied, the spaces where their work was exhibited, the aesthetic discourses that animated their conversations, their interactions with European artists, and the overarching issue of what it meant to be an American abroad.
Americans in Paris was organized by the @nyugrey. Curated by Debra Bricker Balken (@dbbalken) with Lynn Gumpert.
Installation photographs by Julia Featheringill (@juliafeatherphoto)
#americansinparis
ONE WEEK LEFT!
Americans in Paris: Artists Working in Postwar France, 1946-1962 must close on January 5th. You don’t want to miss seeing this spectacular exhibition in person!
Contrary to entrenched presumptions that Manhattan became the primary locus of art after World War II, Americans in Paris: Artists Working in Postwar France, 1946–1962 delves into the various circles of artists who made France their home during an era of intense geopolitical realignment. Bolstered by the GI Bill, many artists, such as Norman Bluhm, Ed Clark, Sam Francis, Al Held, Ellsworth Kelly, Kenneth Noland, and Jack Youngerman, along with lesser-known figures such as Robert Breer, Harold Cousins, and Shinkichi Tajiri, opted for a foreign rather than a domestic learning experience. Seasoned artists, such as Beauford Delaney, Claire Falkenstein, Carmen Herrera, Joan Mitchell, Kimber Smith, and Mark Tobey, like the GIs, were drawn to the storied modernist traditions that still flowed from this fabled City of Light. Comprising some 135 artworks by approximately 70 artists, Americans in Paris investigates the academies where many of these artists studied, the spaces where their work was exhibited, the aesthetic discourses that animated their conversations, their interactions with European artists, and the overarching issue of what it meant to be an American abroad.
Americans in Paris was organized by the @nyugrey. Curated by Debra Bricker Balken (@dbbalken) with Lynn Gumpert.
Installation photographs by Julia Featheringill (@juliafeatherphoto)
#americansinparis
Merry Christmas to all those who celebrate!
Lucien Aigner (1901-1999). Santa Enters the City, Float, Macy Parade, c. 1940. Gelatin silver print. Purchased as the gift of Katherine D. and Stephen C. Sherrill (PA 1971, and P 2005, 2007, 2010), 2015.11.82
#lucienaigner #addisongalleryofamericanart
Merry Christmas to all those who celebrate!
Lucien Aigner (1901-1999). Santa Enters the City, Float, Macy Parade, c. 1940. Gelatin silver print. Purchased as the gift of Katherine D. and Stephen C. Sherrill (PA 1971, and P 2005, 2007, 2010), 2015.11.82
#lucienaigner #addisongalleryofamericanart
This is for all you The Very Hungry Caterpillar fanatics out there! First graders studying the late great Eric Carle enjoyed exploring colors and textures and creating their own abstract art in Americans in Paris: Artists Working in Postwar France, 1946-1962! You don’t have much time to catch this blockbuster exhibition—it must close on January 5th!
Come visit the Addison this holiday season! We’re closed on December 24th and 25th in addition to January 1st, otherwise, we’re maintaining our regular opening hours! Remember, we’re ALWAYS free for EVERYONE.
Photographs courtesy of Christine Jee and Neil Evans.
#americansinparis #addisongalleryofamericanart #teachingmuseum #whatisamerica
This is for all you The Very Hungry Caterpillar fanatics out there! First graders studying the late great Eric Carle enjoyed exploring colors and textures and creating their own abstract art in Americans in Paris: Artists Working in Postwar France, 1946-1962! You don’t have much time to catch this blockbuster exhibition—it must close on January 5th!
Come visit the Addison this holiday season! We’re closed on December 24th and 25th in addition to January 1st, otherwise, we’re maintaining our regular opening hours! Remember, we’re ALWAYS free for EVERYONE.
Photographs courtesy of Christine Jee and Neil Evans.
#americansinparis #addisongalleryofamericanart #teachingmuseum #whatisamerica
There are plenty of great organizations to support this Giving Tuesday, and we hope you make the Addison Gallery of American Art one of them!
A contribution of any size goes far at the Addison. Plus, your generosity will directly and immediately benefit our work with students. So, what’s your reason to give today?
“I support the Addison because its treasured collection enriches the lives of hundreds of students and faculty every year. It serves as a beacon—reflecting Andover’s unique and powerful light—to both the local community and the world.”
—Andrew Z. Scharf ’02
P.S. A $100 donation will have a meaningful impact at the Addison. And in return, you’ll receive FREE admission and discounts to more than 1,000 museums through the North American Reciprocal Museum (NARM) Association.
Click the link in our bio and THANK YOU from all of us at the Addison!
#addisongalleryofamericanart
There are plenty of great organizations to support this Giving Tuesday, and we hope you make the Addison Gallery of American Art one of them!
A contribution of any size goes far at the Addison. Plus, your generosity will directly and immediately benefit our work with students. So, what’s your reason to give today?
“I support the Addison because its treasured collection enriches the lives of hundreds of students and faculty every year. It serves as a beacon—reflecting Andover’s unique and powerful light—to both the local community and the world.”
—Andrew Z. Scharf ’02
P.S. A $100 donation will have a meaningful impact at the Addison. And in return, you’ll receive FREE admission and discounts to more than 1,000 museums through the North American Reciprocal Museum (NARM) Association.
Click the link in our bio and THANK YOU from all of us at the Addison!
#addisongalleryofamericanart
Please join the Addison and Andover’s Memorial Hall Library tomorrow (Tuesday, December 3rd) at 3:00 for a FREE virtual talk with curator Debra Bricker Balken (@dbbalken) about our current major exhibition Americans in Paris: Artists in Postwar France, 1946-1962!
Registration is required—just click the link in our bio. We’ll see you—virtually—tomorrow afternoon!
Installation photograph by @juliafeatherphoto.
#americansinparis
Please join the Addison and Andover’s Memorial Hall Library tomorrow (Tuesday, December 3rd) at 3:00 for a FREE virtual talk with curator Debra Bricker Balken (@dbbalken) about our current major exhibition Americans in Paris: Artists in Postwar France, 1946-1962!
Registration is required—just click the link in our bio. We’ll see you—virtually—tomorrow afternoon!
Installation photograph by @juliafeatherphoto.
#americansinparis
Happy Thanksgiving! The Addison will be closed on Thursday, November 28th in observance of the holiday. Normal hours resume on Friday! Stop by and bring the whole family—remember, we’re 𝙖𝙡𝙬𝙖𝙮𝙨 free! Gobble gobble/the equivalent noise that a tofurkey makes!
Unidentified photographer. Woman tending to a roasted turkey, 20th century. Gelatin silver print. Gift of Peter J. Cohen, 2021.72.541
Unidentified photographer. Man carving a turkey, 20th century. Gelatin silver print. Gift of Peter J. Cohen, 2021.72.542
#thanksgiving #vernacularphotography #addisongalleryofamericanart
Happy Thanksgiving! The Addison will be closed on Thursday, November 28th in observance of the holiday. Normal hours resume on Friday! Stop by and bring the whole family—remember, we’re 𝙖𝙡𝙬𝙖𝙮𝙨 free! Gobble gobble/the equivalent noise that a tofurkey makes!
Unidentified photographer. Woman tending to a roasted turkey, 20th century. Gelatin silver print. Gift of Peter J. Cohen, 2021.72.541
Unidentified photographer. Man carving a turkey, 20th century. Gelatin silver print. Gift of Peter J. Cohen, 2021.72.542
#thanksgiving #vernacularphotography #addisongalleryofamericanart
Are you taking the lyrics of “Defying Gravity” and really holding space with that and feeling power in that?
Today, the Addison is proud to announce that we have NOT been asked by Universal Studios to promote their major motion picture, Wicked. They appear to have engaged every single corporation/nonprofit organization/fast casual dining chain/arms manufacturer/lemonade stand/fast fashion cartel/vegan co-op out there…just NOT the Addison—I guess we’re green with envy…
Eadweard Muybridge (1830-1904). Plate 464. Two Models with Broom from Animal Locomotion, 1885. Collotype on paper. Gift of the Edwin J. Beinecke Trust, 1984.6.518
#wicked #notsponsored #eadweardmuybridge #animallocomotion #addisongalleryofamericanart
Are you taking the lyrics of “Defying Gravity” and really holding space with that and feeling power in that?
Today, the Addison is proud to announce that we have NOT been asked by Universal Studios to promote their major motion picture, Wicked. They appear to have engaged every single corporation/nonprofit organization/fast casual dining chain/arms manufacturer/lemonade stand/fast fashion cartel/vegan co-op out there…just NOT the Addison—I guess we’re green with envy…
Eadweard Muybridge (1830-1904). Plate 464. Two Models with Broom from Animal Locomotion, 1885. Collotype on paper. Gift of the Edwin J. Beinecke Trust, 1984.6.518
#wicked #notsponsored #eadweardmuybridge #animallocomotion #addisongalleryofamericanart
Have you visited Americans in Paris: Artists in Postwar France, 1946-1962 yet?
Contrary to entrenched presumptions that Manhattan became the primary locus of art after World War II, Americans in Paris: Artists Working in Postwar France, 1946–1962 delves into the various circles of artists who made France their home during an era of intense geopolitical realignment. Comprising some 135 artworks by approximately 70 artists, Americans in Paris investigates the academies where many of these artists studied, the spaces where their work was exhibited, the aesthetic discourses that animated their conversations, their interactions with European artists, and the overarching issue of what it meant to be an American abroad.
Americans on Paris, organized by the @nyugrey and curated by @dbbalken and Lynn Gumpert, will be on view at the Addison through January 5th!
Installation photography by @juliafeatherphoto.
#americansinparis
Have you visited Americans in Paris: Artists in Postwar France, 1946-1962 yet?
Contrary to entrenched presumptions that Manhattan became the primary locus of art after World War II, Americans in Paris: Artists Working in Postwar France, 1946–1962 delves into the various circles of artists who made France their home during an era of intense geopolitical realignment. Comprising some 135 artworks by approximately 70 artists, Americans in Paris investigates the academies where many of these artists studied, the spaces where their work was exhibited, the aesthetic discourses that animated their conversations, their interactions with European artists, and the overarching issue of what it meant to be an American abroad.
Americans on Paris, organized by the @nyugrey and curated by @dbbalken and Lynn Gumpert, will be on view at the Addison through January 5th!
Installation photography by @juliafeatherphoto.
#americansinparis
Need a break? Not sure what else is going on today but in case you’re in need of a distraction…check out @nytimes’ 10-Minute Challenge featuring Edward Hopper’s Manhattan Bridge Loop (link in bio). The Times spoke with Gordon Wilkins, the Addison’s Robert M. Walker Curator of American Art, about this beloved work from our permanent collection, which, we would argue, also happens to be a perfect Election Day painting. Want to try this IRL? Manhattan Bridge Loop is currently on view at the Addison in Figure/Ground!
#edwardhopper #manhattanbridgeloop #addisongalleryofamericanart
Need a break? Not sure what else is going on today but in case you’re in need of a distraction…check out @nytimes’ 10-Minute Challenge featuring Edward Hopper’s Manhattan Bridge Loop (link in bio). The Times spoke with Gordon Wilkins, the Addison’s Robert M. Walker Curator of American Art, about this beloved work from our permanent collection, which, we would argue, also happens to be a perfect Election Day painting. Want to try this IRL? Manhattan Bridge Loop is currently on view at the Addison in Figure/Ground!
#edwardhopper #manhattanbridgeloop #addisongalleryofamericanart
THINK and VOTE!
Inspired by the connections between European Surrealism and American Pop art, William N. Copley (PA 1938), also known as CPLY (pronounced “see ply”), is best known as a painter but was also a writer, publisher, collector, and gallerist. The adopted son of a newspaper magnate, Copley attended Phillips Academy and Yale University before being drafted into the U.S. Army. After completing his military service in 1945, Copley worked as a reporter for his father’s newspaper in Los Angeles. In the late 1940s, he turned his attention to art and began dealing in Surrealist and Dada work. In 1947 he cofounded a gallery in Beverly Hills, which exhibited works by Joseph Cornell (PA 1921), Max Ernst, and René Magritte, among others. During this period, he befriended expatriate artists Marcel Duchamp and Man Ray. The gallery lasted only a few months, and after it closed, Copley, with the encouragement of his artist friends, embarked on a career as a painter. In 1949, when Man Ray returned to Paris, Copley moved there, too, and continued to paint in Surrealist circles. He stayed in the French capital for nearly thirteen years before returning to the United States, settling in New York in 1961. By the early 1970s, he had established his signature style of narrative painting infused with eroticism, symbolism, social satire, and political humor.
Copley began to produce bitingly satirical flag works in the early 1960s in response to the increasingly nationalistic Cold War-era geopolitical climate. First executed as paintings, his flag designs were fabricated as functional flags in 1962–1967 and were later reproduced on a larger scale for documenta 5 in 1972. Copley’s flags were first exhibited at Galerie Iris Clert in Paris in 1962 as part of the artist’s solo exhibition, “The Flags (Les États-Unis du Monde).”
An installation of Copley’s now iconic Imaginary Flags can be found in the stairwell leading up to the Addison’s second level.
William N. Copley (1919-1996). Imaginary Flag for USA, 1972. Cotton, nylon, and polyester textile. Courtesy of the William N. Copley Estate/@williamncopley
THINK and VOTE!
Inspired by the connections between European Surrealism and American Pop art, William N. Copley (PA 1938), also known as CPLY (pronounced “see ply”), is best known as a painter but was also a writer, publisher, collector, and gallerist. The adopted son of a newspaper magnate, Copley attended Phillips Academy and Yale University before being drafted into the U.S. Army. After completing his military service in 1945, Copley worked as a reporter for his father’s newspaper in Los Angeles. In the late 1940s, he turned his attention to art and began dealing in Surrealist and Dada work. In 1947 he cofounded a gallery in Beverly Hills, which exhibited works by Joseph Cornell (PA 1921), Max Ernst, and René Magritte, among others. During this period, he befriended expatriate artists Marcel Duchamp and Man Ray. The gallery lasted only a few months, and after it closed, Copley, with the encouragement of his artist friends, embarked on a career as a painter. In 1949, when Man Ray returned to Paris, Copley moved there, too, and continued to paint in Surrealist circles. He stayed in the French capital for nearly thirteen years before returning to the United States, settling in New York in 1961. By the early 1970s, he had established his signature style of narrative painting infused with eroticism, symbolism, social satire, and political humor.
Copley began to produce bitingly satirical flag works in the early 1960s in response to the increasingly nationalistic Cold War-era geopolitical climate. First executed as paintings, his flag designs were fabricated as functional flags in 1962–1967 and were later reproduced on a larger scale for documenta 5 in 1972. Copley’s flags were first exhibited at Galerie Iris Clert in Paris in 1962 as part of the artist’s solo exhibition, “The Flags (Les États-Unis du Monde).”
An installation of Copley’s now iconic Imaginary Flags can be found in the stairwell leading up to the Addison’s second level.
William N. Copley (1919-1996). Imaginary Flag for USA, 1972. Cotton, nylon, and polyester textile. Courtesy of the William N. Copley Estate/@williamncopley
