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.
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
Happy Halloween! We live in a very spooky time—try to have some fun today!
Vincent Cianni (born 1952). Batman on Halloween, South 3rd Street, Williamsburg, Brooklyn, 1995. Gelatin silver print. Gift of W.M. Hunt / Dancing Bear, 2024.96.77/ @cianniv
#vincentcianni #halloween #addisongalleryofamericanart
Happy Halloween! We live in a very spooky time—try to have some fun today!
Vincent Cianni (born 1952). Batman on Halloween, South 3rd Street, Williamsburg, Brooklyn, 1995. Gelatin silver print. Gift of W.M. Hunt / Dancing Bear, 2024.96.77/ @cianniv
#vincentcianni #halloween #addisongalleryofamericanart
The Addison Gallery of American Art will be closed to the public on Tuesday, October 29th and Wednesday, October 30th. The museum will reopen at 10:00 on October 31st (spooky)! We apologize for inconvenience!
The Addison Gallery of American Art will be closed to the public on Tuesday, October 29th and Wednesday, October 30th. The museum will reopen at 10:00 on October 31st (spooky)! We apologize for inconvenience!
Join educator Angela Parker for an interactive tour and hands-on workshop based on the work of Ralph Coburn, featured in Americans in Paris. Coburn created artworks whose parts could be moved and rearranged into a new composition. Learn more about his process and try making your own changeable work of art. Space is limited and registration is required. Open to grades 3-6. Parents and guardians are welcome, but not required to stay. Check out our website for more information!
Join educator Angela Parker for an interactive tour and hands-on workshop based on the work of Ralph Coburn, featured in Americans in Paris. Coburn created artworks whose parts could be moved and rearranged into a new composition. Learn more about his process and try making your own changeable work of art. Space is limited and registration is required. Open to grades 3-6. Parents and guardians are welcome, but not required to stay. Check out our website for more information!
“My paintings take a broad view of what constitutes Native American Art. My wish has been to express our Native & non-native shared identity. We humans of all races are more alike than different, and it is this shared heritage, as well as my personal heritage I wish to express. I want all people to hold onto their cultures – they are precious – but I also want to encourage a mutual recognition of shared being. My goal has always been to paint about who I am as a 20th/21st century artist, and also as a Native American. My thoughts on our native history filled my work for many years. Today, I deal with feelings and thoughts common to all. I would hope that these paintings encourage the viewer to see our shared humanity in all of its gritty, frightening, awkward, sexy, funny and beautiful commonality.” —Kay WalkingStick
Kay WalkingStick / Hudson River School, organized by the @nyhistory, is on view at the Addison through February 2, 2025.
Kay WalkingStick (b. 1935). Our Land Variation II, 2008. Oil stick on paper. Miller Meigs Collections. Photo by JSP Art Photography/© Kay WalkingStick
#kaywalkingstick
“My paintings take a broad view of what constitutes Native American Art. My wish has been to express our Native & non-native shared identity. We humans of all races are more alike than different, and it is this shared heritage, as well as my personal heritage I wish to express. I want all people to hold onto their cultures – they are precious – but I also want to encourage a mutual recognition of shared being. My goal has always been to paint about who I am as a 20th/21st century artist, and also as a Native American. My thoughts on our native history filled my work for many years. Today, I deal with feelings and thoughts common to all. I would hope that these paintings encourage the viewer to see our shared humanity in all of its gritty, frightening, awkward, sexy, funny and beautiful commonality.” —Kay WalkingStick
Kay WalkingStick / Hudson River School, organized by the @nyhistory, is on view at the Addison through February 2, 2025.
Kay WalkingStick (b. 1935). Our Land Variation II, 2008. Oil stick on paper. Miller Meigs Collections. Photo by JSP Art Photography/© Kay WalkingStick
#kaywalkingstick
Join us on Thursday, October 17th at 6:00 right here at the Addison for In Conversation: Peter Saul and Debra Bricker Balken!
Join the renowned contemporary painter and printmaker Peter Saul, whose work is currently on view in Americans in Paris: Artists Working in Postwar France, 1946–1962, and lead exhibition curator Debra Bricker Balken for an engaging, informal conversation. Balken and Saul will discuss the artist’s fruitful time in Paris from 1958 to 1962, his interactions with other expats such as William N. Copley, his responses to French culture, and how these combined experiences have animated his celebrated and groundbreaking career over the past six decades. Space is limited and registration is required—just click the link in our bio! The program will be recorded.
Image: Peter Saul, The Mad Pilot, 1961. Oil, ripolin on canvas, 59 x 72 inches. Private collection, New York © Peter Saul. Courtesy Michael Werner Gallery
#petersaul #debrabrickerbalken #americansinparis @dbbalken @peter.saul.official @michaelwernergallery
Join us on Thursday, October 17th at 6:00 right here at the Addison for In Conversation: Peter Saul and Debra Bricker Balken!
Join the renowned contemporary painter and printmaker Peter Saul, whose work is currently on view in Americans in Paris: Artists Working in Postwar France, 1946–1962, and lead exhibition curator Debra Bricker Balken for an engaging, informal conversation. Balken and Saul will discuss the artist’s fruitful time in Paris from 1958 to 1962, his interactions with other expats such as William N. Copley, his responses to French culture, and how these combined experiences have animated his celebrated and groundbreaking career over the past six decades. Space is limited and registration is required—just click the link in our bio! The program will be recorded.
Image: Peter Saul, The Mad Pilot, 1961. Oil, ripolin on canvas, 59 x 72 inches. Private collection, New York © Peter Saul. Courtesy Michael Werner Gallery
#petersaul #debrabrickerbalken #americansinparis @dbbalken @peter.saul.official @michaelwernergallery
