National Gallery

Eric Hebborn, 61, a world-renowned, English-born art forger who boasted that many of his paintings were in major museums as old masters, died Thursday in Rome after being found in a street the day before with serious head injuries of undetermined origin. Mr. Hebborn, exposed as a forger in the late 1970s, published an autobiography, "Drawn to Trouble: Confessions of a Master Forger," in which he said that several of the world's top museums had paintings by him.He said he had sold more than 1,000 fake old master and modern drawings, including 80 works by Augustus John, and others that became accepted as the work of Walter Sickert, Pablo Picasso and Breughel after scrutiny by experts.

The National Portrait Gallery's new exhibition, “Poetic Likeness: Modern American Poets,” uses portraiture, biography and verse to explore the people who created a distinctive, American voice. Walt Whitman's free verse in "Leaves of Grass," (1855), was a shocking departure from literary tradition, the museum notes -- both for its form and for the inclusion of topics that described ordinary life. (That mirrors the equally shocking mid-century shift to realism by painters such as Courbet in France.)

The headless figure in the "cow face" yoga position, made of porcelain clay, still needs its arm fixed and a few touch-ups before Lauren Siminski hollows it out and sands it. For now, it sits calmly on a table, surrounded by other projects in Century High School's art room, awaiting its time to be baked and glazed. The figure will be the largest of the eight statues of women doing yoga poses that Siminski will create for her AP portfolio, and it'll be the one she presents at the end of her high school seminar at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. "It's going to be on display, and I didn't want it to be really small," said Siminski, 17. "Most of the people are doing paintings.

The headless figure in the "cow face" yoga position, made of porcelain clay, still needs its arm fixed and a few touch-ups before Lauren Siminski hollows it out and sands it. For now, it sits calmly on a table, surrounded by other projects in Century High School's art room, awaiting its time to be baked and glazed. The figure will be the largest of the eight statues of women doing yoga poses that Siminski will create for her AP portfolio, and it'll be the one she presents at the end of her high school seminar at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. "It's going to be on display, and I didn't want it to be really small," said Siminski, 17. "Most of the people are doing paintings.

WASHINGTON -- To ensure success for the latest exhibit at the National Gallery of Art, Director J. Carter Brown tried something different.He held a ceremonial pipe smoking to bless the exhibit with two Indians, Al Chandler and George P. Horse Capture, and two other officials involved in the exhibit, which is devoted to the rich heritage of North America's native peoples."

J. Carter Brown, the director of the National Gallery of Art in Washington for the past 22 years and one of the most visible figures on the national art scene, will retire by the end of the year, it was announced yesterday.Mr. Brown, 57, said he was retiring to devote more time to his family and his many other cultural and educational activities.The third and longest-serving director of the 51-year-old institution, Mr. Brown was appointed in 1969 when only 34 years old. He has piloted the gallery through major changes including the addition of the East Building by I. M. Pei; a tremendous increase in attendance, budget ($3.2 million to $52.3 million)

Washington -- When he was named the new director of Washington's National Gallery of Art in late April (a position he will assume about Labor Day), Earl A. "Rusty" Powell was quoted in newspapers as saying the day of the blockbuster exhibit is over. It was natural for people to think that meant the end of the kind of big exhibitions that Mr. Powell's predecessor, J. Carter Brown, made the National Gallery famous for -- from "Gauguin" to It was also natural to infer that Powell was stating a dislike of big exhibitions.

THE DRIVE to work had been more relaxing than usual. Instead of teaching four classes of high school English, I would be busing to Washington to see the Frederick E. Church exhibit at the National Gallery of Art. What's more, I would be accompanying a dear friend and colleague, Joe Abromaitis -- affectionately known on campus as Mr. A.Joe retired as a commercial artist some years back and now substituted often in the Art Department at Notre Dame Prep....

WASHINGTON -- National Gallery of Art Director J. Carter Brown is leaving his museum with a final-hour legacy -- the acquisition of pieces by three 20th century artists with unique visions.One of these, "The Japanese Footbridge" by Claude Monet, fills a gap in the National Gallery collection. Although the museum had 24 works by the impressionist master, this will be its first representation of his work from Giverny, France.The painting, completed in 1899, depicts a footbridge over Monet's famous lily pond at his Giverny home.

WASHINGTON -- It's a recent Monday morning at the National Gallery of Art -- early, before the museum has opened, acutely quiet -- and a single figure is taking his own private tour of the lords and ladies, the naked nymphs, the winged cupids and saints of the Van Dyck show ready to be dismantled.Tall, lanky, smartly dressed, the viewer climbs atop a lift in front of "Rinaldo and Armida," a large, lush mythological painting on loan from the Baltimore Museum of Art that was the centerpiece of the show.

War is hell, but it seems beautiful in the textiles hanging on the walls of Washington's National Gallery of Art in the exhibit "The Invention of Glory: Afonso V and the Pastrana Tapestries. " Celebrating that Portuguese Catholic king's victory over a Muslim army in North Africa in 1471, they're a gloriously woven testament to his military might. "The tapestries are a political statement about the power of the king, but they're also an expression of the Portuguese people," said Nino Brito, Portuguese ambassador to the United States, at the media unveiling of this temporary exhibit.

Hershey, Pa. The Spa at the Hotel Hershey Enjoy a spa day at the "sweetest place on Earth. " Throughout January, the Spa at the Hotel Hershey will be offering its guests the "Champagne Celebration. " The two-hour treatment includes citrus oils and a blend of champagne grapes to renew and soften the skin. The package also includes a Champagne Soak, Mimosa Champagne Scrub, Mimosa Champagne Body Wrap and complimentary glass of champagne. Guests can also enjoy a special menu of champagnes.

Rome wasn't built in a day, so Washington has given Italy five months. La Dolce D.C. is a celebration of all things Italian with arts, architecture, culture and food, running March through July. Honoring the 150th anniversary of the unification of Italy, La Dolce gives visitors and locals a taste of international culture through exhibitions, performances, fashion, music and of course delectable Italian meals. Whether you're stopping by for a day or planning a romantic getaway, there's an itinerary for everybody.

Robert Rauschenberg, the multifaceted artist who pioneered a new sense of openness and unlimited possibility in American painting, sculpture, photography and printmaking, died Monday at his home in Captiva Island, Fla. He was 82. Mr. Rauschenberg was an artistic polymath whose interests spanned the visual arts, music and dance. He was most famous for transforming ordinary objects such as bedsheets, newspaper scraps and stuffed animals into mischievously ingenious creations that defied conventional notions of what artworks should be. "He had an extraordinary understanding of the potential of everyday objects to redefine the art of today," said Darcie Alexander, senior curator of contemporary art at the Baltimore Museum of Art. "It's almost impossible to trace the legacy of someone like Rauschenberg, whose presence is still being felt in the work of artists today."

The National Gallery in Washington opens a new exhibit tomorrow titled In the Forest of Fontainebleau: Painters and Photographers From Corot to Monet. The show, which runs through June 8, is a declaration of love - the love of artists for place. "The forest of Fontainebleau was both sanctuary and subject," National Gallery curator Kimberly Jones says, describing a huge patch of woodlands just south of Paris that inspired several generations of landscape artists and spawned multiple artist colonies of kindred souls.

Philanthropist Robert E. Meyerhoff built seven galleries in a house with windows overlooking grazing horses on his northern Baltimore County farm to display a postmodern art collection that experts call one of the world's finest. Now he wants to give the public a chance to see the works by artists such as Roy Lichtenstein and Jasper Johns by opening a museum in the rural setting. "We don't want it in storage," Meyerhoff said of the collection, after a Baltimore County Council meeting yesterday during which lawmakers discussed a measure that would allow the museum to operate in an area designated for agriculture.

"The history of photography is often told as the triumph of one technology over another," says Sarah Greenough, one of the curators of a new photography show opening at the National Gallery today. "But this exhibition tells a different story." Running through May 4, Impressed by Light, is a collection of British photographs from paper negatives taken between 1840 and 1860. Called calotypes, the images created using this early technique were believed to have been rendered immediately obsolete upon the introduction of an "improved" collodion-on-glass negative process in 1851.

Roy Lichtenstein was one of the most important figures of the pop art movement of the 1960s. Lichtenstein's clever paintings, drawings and sculpture based on comic-book images taught an art world used to the high seriousness of abstract-expressionism that art could also be fun. So when the National Gallery of Art announced this month that the artist's family had donated more than a dozen of his drawings to the museum in memory of Jane Meyerhoff, the...

"The history of photography is often told as the triumph of one technology over another," says Sarah Greenough, one of the curators of a new photography show opening at the National Gallery today. "But this exhibition tells a different story." Running through May 4, Impressed by Light, is a collection of British photographs from paper negatives taken between 1840 and 1860. Called calotypes, the images created using this early technique were believed to have been rendered immediately obsolete upon the introduction of an "improved" collodion-on-glass negative process in 1851.

TELEVISION LAW & ORDER / / 9 p.m. Wednesday. WBAL-TV (Channel 11). ....................... The longest-running cop drama on television returns for its 18th season this week with lots of changes. Jack McCoy (Sam Waterston) is the new district attorney, and Detective Edward Green (Jesse L. Martin) has a new partner, Cyrus Lupo (Jeremy Sisto). There are a couple of new assistant DAs as well: Connie Rubirosa (Alana De La Garza) and Michael Cutter (Linus Roache). Happily, Lt. Anita Van Buren (S. Epatha Merkerson)