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- Day Safari Time of Day Day Safari
- 2 Hours Duration 2 Hours
Photograph one of the most excitingly beautiful venues in Washington: the East Building of the National Gallery of Art.
Quick Details
Washington Photo Safari is pleased to announce we are taking advance reservations for the exciting November 2021 reopening of Smithsonian’s classic Art and Industries Building on the National Mall, which will feature a special exhibit entitled “FUTURES!
The Smithsonian Arts and Industries Building opened in October 1881 as the National Museum and established itself a first-of-its-kind palace of wonders, wowing global audiences for nearly a century and a half. It’s where Thomas Edison first showcased his lightbulb, people first gazed upon the telephone and saw the first cast of a blue whale.
And now, after being closed for nearly two decades, the Smithsonian is reopening the building this fall with a forward-facing exhibit, and WPS Director E. David Luria we will be there to help you get the most unique photographs of the exhibits, giving you the techniques of handheld indoor museum photography without tripods.
Called “FUTURES,” the 32,000-square-foot exhibit will offer guests the chance to see themselves as an emoji, meditate with an AI robot, and watch water being harvested from thin air. Or, visitors can try on a spacesuit that fits like a second skin, play a video game with their eyes, or (how appropriate?) meet a COVID-friendly support robot that helps you handle loneliness. The exhibit even explores futures of the past — that is, early robot models, art from groundbreaking artists throughout history, and a prototype for an Alexander Graham Bell telephone.
Architect David Rockwell’s award-winning firm designed the four exhibit halls, while a team of scientists, historians, and art experts curated the 150 items on display. The point, it seems, is to make a case for focusing on emerging trends, human connection, and pushing the boundaries of imagination. (Think flying cars, new ways of structuring cities, and befriending intelligent technology.)
Here is a description of what awaits us in this newly reopened building:
“In a world that feels perpetually tumultuous, there is power in imagining the future we want, not the future we fear,” said AIB director Rachel Goslins, in a press release. “With FUTURES, we want to invite all visitors to discover, debate, and delight in the many possibilities for our shared future. There’s no place better to do this than in the Arts + Industries Building, the nation’s original home for big ideas.”
Here are samples of the photos you will get on this safari:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/[email protected]/albums/72157720177246428
Meet at entrance to Arts and Industries Building at 900 Jefferson Drive SW. Limited street parking is available, closest METRO is Smithsonian on the Blue/Orange/Silver Lines.
E. David Luria is founder and director of the Washington Photo Safari, which has trained 36,700 amateur photographers – an average of 5 people every day, 365 days a year, since it was founded in 1999. Trained in Paris by a protégé of Henri Cartier-Bresson, Mr. Luria is a member of the American Society of Media Photographers and the Society of Photographic Educators and has had his images of DC appear in over 100 publications, calendars, and postcards and on 30 magazine covers.