Black History Month Family Day Celebration
Saturday, February 4, 2012, 11:30 AM to 3:00 PM
National Portrait Gallery and Smithsonian American Art Museum
Robert and Arlene Kogod Courtyard
8^th and F Streets, NW
Washington, DC
Metro: Gallery Place/Chinatown

Bring the whole family to the Smithsonian’s kickoff celebration of Black History Month. This family day of activities is inspired by the exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery, The Black List: Photographs by Timothy Greenfield-Sanders. The entire family will enjoy performances by Virginia Piedmont guitarist Warner Williams, step team Taratibu, a puppet show by renowned puppeteer, Schroeder Cherry (Can You Spell Harlem?), hands-on arts and craft activities (including silhouette portraiture inspired by the NMAAHC exhibition entitled Slavery at Jefferson’s Monticello: Paradox of Liberty), a gallery tour of The Black List, and video interviews by the Hirshhorn’s Artlab+ teen videographers.

Admission is free.

Monticello, Slavery, and the Hemingses: A Conversation Between Annette Gordon-Reed and Michel Martin
Monday, February 6, 2012, 7:00 to 9:00 PM
National Museum of Natural History
Baird Auditorium
10^th and Constitution Avenue, NW
Washington, DC
Metro: Federal Triangle or Smithsonian

Michel Martin

Annette Gordon-Reed

NPR’s Tell Me More host Michel Martin, and Annette Gordon-Reed, Prof. of Law, Harvard University, and Pulitzer Prize-Winning author of The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family will discuss the lives of enslaved families living at Monticello alongside Jefferson and his family. They will also explore ideas about how Thomas Jefferson and the 11 other American Presidents who owned slaves could have used the power of their office to end slavery and improve the lives of free black communities across the U.S., but chose not to do so.

Copies of The Hemingses of Monticello and Andrew Johnson will be available for purchase and signing. Admission to the event is free and open to the public on a first come-first seated basis. Please call 202.633.0070 for more information.

The exhibition Slavery at Jefferson's Monticello: Paradox of Liberty is on view through October 14, 2012 in the NMAAHC's gallery space on level two at the National Museum of American History. For more information visit www.nmaahc.si.edu.