National

On the National Mall, The Largest Participatory Art Project in a Quarter Century Makes Tangible the Human Toll of COVID-19


Artist Suzanne Brennan Firstenberg has planted 695,000 white flags on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.—one for each person in the U.S. who has died of COVID-19.

The massive installation, titled In America: Remember, is a reminder of the human cost of the still-ongoing pandemic, even as thousands of Americans refuse to get the vaccination that could keep them from becoming part of the death toll.

Underneath the shadow of the Washington Monument, it took a team of 150 landscapers, their time donated by Ruppert Landscape, three complete days to install the sea of white flags, spaced 10 inches across in 60-foot grids. It helps make tangible the sheer scale of loss that is otherwise unfathomable.

It’s the second year Firstenberg, a longtime hospice volunteer, has staged an artwork of this nature in the nation’s capitol. Last year, she put up 219,000 flags at the D.C. Armory for In America: How Could This Happen…. The five-week project concluded with a total of 267,000 flags when she ran out of space to continue adding to the display. A selection of flags from that original piece are now in the collection of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History.

Suzanne Brennan Firstenberg, <em>In America: How Could This Happen...</em> flags on display at the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History in Washington, D.C. Photo National Museum of American History.

Suzanne Brennan Firstenberg, In America: How Could This Happen… flags on display at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History in Washington, D.C. Photo National Museum of American History.

The sequel opened on September 17, with 670,032 flags. It remains on view through the end of this weekend, and still continues to grow. In fact, In America is the largest public participatory art installation on the National Mall since the NAMES Project AIDS Memorial Quilt was last shown in full there in 1996.

Visitors are invited to inscribe a flag with handwritten dedications to the deceased from their loved ones. You can walk through the installation on nearly four miles of grassy paths, stopping to sit and reflect on benches placed throughout.

We spoke with Firstenberg about what inspired her to respond to the pandemic through art.

Suzanne Brennan Firstenberg, In America: Remember (2021), installation view on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Photo by Bruce Guthrie, courtesy of the artist.

Suzanne Brennan Firstenberg, In America: Remember (2021), installation view on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Photo by Bruce Guthrie, courtesy of the artist.

Why did you want to bring the project back for a second year and how have your feelings about the pandemic changed since you last staged the work?

I did not expect when I closed the art installation in November 2020 that this would happen again. But people from the Trust for the National Mall and from the National Park Service saw that art and worked with me to bring it back.

The National Mall is the greatest stage, and to have the opportunity to call attention to such a tragedy was something I felt I had to do. Words aren’t working any longer. Words are falling on unlistening ears. It really is incumbent on visual artists to help translate and reflect back to society what is happening in the hope that things will improve, because art can effect positive change.

Suzanne Brennan Firstenberg, <em>In America: Remember</em> (2021), installation view on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Photo by Bruce Guthrie, courtesy of the artist.

Suzanne Brennan Firstenberg, In America: Remember (2021), installation view on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Photo by Bruce Guthrie, courtesy of the artist.

What kind of reaction have you gotten to the piece from visitors this year?

I did not expect how much solace and comfort this art would provide people families whose loved ones died from COVID-19. I knew that they would bring their grief, their outrage, their anger. What I didn’t know was what the flags would give back.

Some people said they didn’t have a funeral, and this is the only public memorial they had. “We’ve gathered family around our dad’s flag,” they said.

Another woman said “I have been so isolated in my grief in my dad’s death. But coming here and seeing all these flags, I realize I have had a lot of company—I have not been mourning alone.’

It’s been so gratifying to let my art do this for people.

Suzanne Brennan Firstenberg, In America: Remember (2021), installation view on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Photo by Bruce Guthrie, courtesy of the artist.

Suzanne Brennan Firstenberg, In America: Remember (2021), installation view on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Photo by Bruce Guthrie, courtesy of the artist.

Have you had any negative reactions?

We haven’t had any damage to the flags or any efforts to disrupt the piece. We did have one woman who said, “My mother didn’t die of COVID. She had COVID and she died of a heart attack. I need to take her flag out of here.”

I said to her, “this is not about taking the flag out. This is about your grief for your mother.” We talked for awhile, and she thanked me and she left. What she was really saying was, “I’m in pain.”

Suzanne Brennan Firstenberg, In America: Remember (2021), installation view with a dedication on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Photo by courtesy of the artist.

Suzanne Brennan Firstenberg, In America: Remember (2021), installation view with a dedication on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Photo by courtesy of the artist.

Do you think art can help people comprehend the scale of loss that we are dealing with here?

The beauty of this art installation is that even seeing so many flags, it’s still so hard to comprehend. But 11,000 flags have been personalized. If a person walks through any pathway, they’ll see a flag that’s been personalized for a loved one who died. That helps them understand the magnitude of the tragedy. It goes from understanding the number to understanding the amount of grief this art represents.

The number represents that America is in pain. This art represents the pain that we all are suffering.

Do you hope these flags help remind people who are complaining about ongoing health restrictions or mask and vaccine mandates what is really happening here, and how without precautions this number will continue to grow?

I don’t think they will be compelled by fear to change their behavior. They are demonstrating such antisocial selfish behavior by not protecting other people by getting immunized and wearing masks.

We need more art to help them find their own dignity in all of this. I hope this art touches them to get vaccinated and to wear masks and stop fighting mandates. But we need more art to help people flip their cameras, stop with the selfie mentality, and start focusing on others.

Suzanne Brennan Firstenberg, In America: Remember (2021), installation view on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Photo by Bruce Guthrie, courtesy of the artist.

Suzanne Brennan Firstenberg, In America: Remember (2021), installation view on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Photo by Bruce Guthrie, courtesy of the artist.

It seems as if COVID-19 is becoming an endemic disease. Does that change the way that you think about this project and do you plan to continue it or restage it in the future?

It can’t be extended because the permit for use of this space is limited. We just hosted a congressional delegation, many of whom asked that we bring the project to their community. I’m going to encourage people to replicate this art in their own community.

Do you ever feel overwhelmed by the project and what it represents, and its potential to be ongoing for the foreseeable future?

As an artist, this project has been overwhelming not only in its physical scope, but in its emotional scope.

I’m not trying to document what is happening with COVID. My goal was to reclaim the dignity of each person who had become a number but to also give our nation a moment of pause. I wanted to create a moment of reflection so we could say “Oh my god. We cannot let this happen again. What do we need to do to find our better selves?

“In America: Remember” is on view on the National Mall, north of the Washington Monument, between 15th and 17th Streets, Washington, D.C., September 17–October 3, 2021. 

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Hong Kong’s Local Art Market Is Flourishing. But Under Its National Security Law, Many Fear an Artist Exodus


Hong Kong’s fall art season started with a bang. Eager collectors crowded into the second edition of the boutique art fair Unscheduled, which took over the vacant former Topshop flagship store on Queen’s Road earlier this month. After a wave of gallery openings, the city’s elite is now preparing for an action-packed slate of auctions as well as the Fine Art Asia fair in October.

The excitement surrounding these commercial events seems to exist in a parallel universe from the anxiety gripping many in the cultural sector and beyond since the implementation of Beijing’s national security law last year. Never before has the vitality of the market felt so disconnected from the everyday lives of Hong Kong people. 

Some see the national security law, which bans activities that government deems related to secession, subversion of the state, terrorism, and collusion with foreign agents to endanger national security, as a stabilizing force after the social unrest that gripped the city in 2019. Others consider the law—and the subsequent mass arrests of pro-democracy politicians and journalists, the abrupt closure of a pro-democracy newspaper, the expansion of the film censorship ordinance, and the disbanding of civil organizations—to be a grave clampdown on freedom in the city. 

Visitors at Unscheduled Hong Kong. Courtesy of Felix Wong and HKAGA, 2021.

Visitors at Unscheduled Hong Kong. Courtesy of Felix Wong and HKAGA, 2021.

This fear has sparked the biggest exodus the city has seen in decades. Although the government does not keep statistics on how many people have left town permanently, figures show that Hong Kong’s population has dropped by 1.2 percent—nearly 90,000 people—since the law took effect last June. 

“Running a gallery in Hong Kong right now is more challenging than doing so anywhere else in the world,” one gallerist told Midnight Publishing Group News on the condition of anonymity. “There are too many considerations, not just about money and space. Artists are leaving. Some have left quietly, or they are planning to. The environment makes it harder to create.”

Perhaps counterintuitively, these challenges have coincided with a flourishing of business in Hong Kong as a new generation of young Asian buyers pours millions of dollars into art. “The business has been going so well over the recent year or two,” the gallerist continued. “Artists may leave, but galleries are staying.” 

 

“Everyone Wants to Support the Hong Kong Art Community”

Even in the shadow of the national security law, the success of Unscheduled, organized by the Hong Kong Art Gallery Association, illustrates how much local dealers are benefitting from a renewed interest in Hong Kong art, which has historically been overlooked by regional collectors. (A similar dynamic was evident at Art Basel Hong Kong in May.)

Homegrown galleries Woaw and Edouard Malingue sold out their solo presentations of work by Charlie Roberts and Eric Baudart respectively. Ben Brown Fine Arts reported strong sales of Miya Ando’s works, priced between $15,000 and $25,000. 

“Everyone wants to support the Hong Kong art community these days,” said Angela Li, whose gallery sold all eight oil paintings at her stand by the young artist Cheung Tsz Hin for prices between a few thousand Hong Kong dollars and HK$70,000 ($8,994). 

The recent commercial success of Hong Kong artists such as Chris Huen, Firenze Lai, and the late Matthew Wong, who was born to a Hong Kong family in Canada and grew up in the city, has helped boost the profile of other local artists. 

Visitors at Unscheduled Hong Kong. Courtesy of Felix Wong and HKAGA, 2021.

Visitors at Unscheduled Hong Kong. Courtesy of Felix Wong and HKAGA, 2021.

“I have a lot more collectors who previously did not collect Hong Kong art but are now interested,” said Kenneth Young, the director of Karin Weber Gallery, which cleverly converted Topshop’s former fitting rooms into mini galleries for its presentation of artists affiliated with the Hong Kong Baptist University’s Academy of Visual Arts.

The inquiries, Young continued, are coming from everywhere: locals and expats living in Hong Kong, foreign collectors who previously collected only Western and Japanese art, and financial institutions looking to boost their holdings. The fact that many of these collectors are considering art in a range of media—as opposed to just paintings—leads him to believe that return on investment is not their only motivation. 

“Maybe they know more about Hong Kong, what has happened in Hong Kong and the art market,” Young said. “A veteran Hong Kong collector tells me, ‘If I call myself a Hong Kong collector, how can I not support Hong Kong artists and Hong Kong galleries?’”      

 

To Stay or Go?

But while collectors may be newly committed to local artists, it remains to be seen whether local artists will remain committed to Hong Kong. 

Reports of a Hong Kong exodus have been making international headlines for months, often accompanied by heartbreaking images of families and friends saying tearful goodbyes at the airport. Emigration has become easier as countries including the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, and the United States relax their visa policies for Hongkongers. Most people keep a low profile about their departure, announcing their relocation on social media only after they have arrived safely—if they go public at all. 

Twice a day, Hong Kong's virtually deserted airport fills with the sound of tearful goodbyes as residents fearful for their future start a new life overseas, mostly in Britain. (Photo by ISAAC LAWRENCE/AFP via Getty Images)

Twice a day, Hong Kong’s virtually deserted airport fills with the sound of tearful goodbyes as residents fearful for their future start a new life overseas, mostly in Britain. (Photo by ISAAC LAWRENCE/AFP via Getty Images)

It is understood that some members of Hong Kong’s arts community have already relocated abroad, mostly to Britain and Taiwan. One gallerist told Midnight Publishing Group News that at least half of the artists they work with have left or are planning to leave. “They come from all age groups,” the gallerist said. “Some of them have children.” 

There are no statistics on exactly how many people leaving the city are arts and culture professionals. But a number of prominent media personalities, political commentators, and journalists have fled, as have two of the six directors of the dystopian anthology film Ten Years, which angered Beijing. Jevons Au moved to Canada a few months ago, while Ng Ka-leung recently announced that he has landed in Britain.

Meanwhile, artist and illustrator Lau Kwong-shing, who has published drawings related to the 2019 protests, relocated to Taiwan after his father warned him not to return to Hong Kong. Critics who remain in the city have gone silent and turned down interview requests.  

The mass arrests of pro-democracy politicians—many of whom have been denied bail and remain behind bars before facing trial—this past spring is what prompted artist Kacey Wong to leave the city. He arrived in Taiwan in late August. “Hong Kong has become a red zone,” Wong told Midnight Publishing Group News from his new studio in Taichung. “I’m now in a green zone. [Taiwan] has 100% freedom, like what we used to have in Hong Kong.” 

Wong sees the crackdown as the collapse of the legal system that once made Hong Kong proud. Known for his political art, specifically performances that became fixtures at the city’s protests, Wong has also been named and shamed by the local state-owned media for “glorifying rioters.”

“I’d be really worried about speaking to the media if I were still in Hong Kong,” Wong said. “I could not function normally.” 

Indeed, speaking up can come with a price in Hong Kong. Recently, Canto-pop singer and activist Denise Ho had a performance cancelled by the Hong Kong Arts Centre, which alleged that “public order or public safety would be endangered” if it were to go ahead.

Protests against the National Security Law in Hong Kong on July 1, 2020. (Photo by Katherine Cheng/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)

Protests against the National Security Law in Hong Kong on July 1, 2020. (Photo by Katherine Cheng/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)

Outspoken members of the Arts Development Council have stepped down, with artist Chris Chan citing fear for his personal safety. Political cartoonist Justin Wong temporarily shut down his Facebook page, while the M+ Museum removed an image of Ai Weiwei’s Study of Perspective: Tian’anmen from its website as it awaits authorities’ approval. Five speech therapists were arrested over children’s books that were deemed seditious. The city’s security chief also accused the Hong Kong Journalists Association of infiltrating schools (a charge the association has denied) and demanded a list of its members. 

“My departure is a reflection of a generation of Hongkongers,” Wong said. “This is only the beginning. More people like me will appear in the U.K., Taiwan, Canada, and many other places. Exile literature, exile Hong Kong art, is likely to be big in the future.”

What about the art produced in Hong Kong? “The art market, art fairs will go on. Sales will continue,” Wong predicted. While some artists will opt for coded visual language to address sensitive issues, those who choose to stay are more likely to steer away from political topics entirely, he said. More colorful, decorative works are likely to emerge as a result. 

 

The Future of the Hong Kong Market

Those who choose to remain in Hong Kong—for now, at least—have hope. Willem Molesworth, the former director of de Sarthe and the vice president of the Hong Kong Art Gallery Association, is planning to open a new contemporary art space in the city in December. 

“There are more gallery openings now than in the pre-pandemic days,” Molesworth said. “The younger generation are becoming serious collectors. More people in Hong Kong are buying art, period.” 

Hong Kong’s cultural infrastructure has also grown considerably in recent years with the opening of public institutions like Tai Kwun, the revamped Hong Kong Museum of Art, and the forthcoming M+. “People recognize the power of art, to pick up where words fail… given what the city has been through,” Molesworth said. 

Auctioneer Danielle So at Phillips’ 20th Century & Contemporary Art & Design spring auction in Hong Kong. Courtesy of Phillips.

A number of Molesworth’s clients who buy work by established artists from major international galleries are now collecting emerging local artists as well, he said. Plus, the diverse price range of Hong Kong art points to a healthy, growing market.

The broader question, however, is whether Hong Kong’s art scene can remain vibrant under these conditions long-term. “When you take the critical edge away,” Kacey Wong asked, “is it still art?”

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The National Gallery of Art Reopened Today with a New Brand Identity—and New Leadership on the Horizon


“Of the nation. For the people.” 

So reads the new tagline for the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., which reopened to the public today—for the first time since November 2020—with an overhauled visual brand calibrated toward messages of optimism and equality. 

The federally funded institution’s old palette of grays and off-whites has been replaced with nine bright colors, which will adorn institutional signage, employees’ uniforms, and new banners on the building’s facade, as will a new logo and universal typeface. 

The makeup of the museum has changed too. E. Carmen Ramos, who currently serves as curator of Latinx art and acting chief curator at the Smithsonian American Art Museum, has been named the National Gallery’s new chief curator, according to the New York Times. Upon starting in August, Ramos will become both the first woman and first person of color to hold the position.

With the hire, more than half of the museum’s seven top leadership positions will be occupied by BIPOC. That’s a stark change from just two years ago, when the group was 100 percent white.  

The logo for the National Gallery of Art in the brand color palette. Courtesy of the National Gallery of Art and Pentagram.

The logo for the National Gallery of Art in the brand color palette. Courtesy of the National Gallery of Art and Pentagram.

“With our doors finally open, we re-present to our public how the National Gallery will meet our mission of welcoming all people to explore and experience art, creativity, and our shared humanity—with generosity, inclusivity, and joy,” the museum’s director, Kaywin Feldman, said in a statement. 

“A brand is more than a new logo or color palette,” she went on. “A brand is the embodiment of what we offer and what our audiences experience. Most importantly, it helps us demonstrate what our vision, mission, and values promise to the nation.”

Behind the rebrand effort was Pentagram, a New York-based design firm, and AEA, a Beacon, New York consultancy. The companies were paid $500,000 and $320,000, respectively, per the Washington Post. Meanwhile, an additional $900,000 from the museum’s operating budget was put toward updating the museum. 

Feldman explained to the Post that, upon being hired as the museum’s first female director in 2018, she was tasked with one major mandate from the institution’s board. “They described it as putting the national back in the National Gallery of Art,” she told the paper. “That’s been the focus of the work.”

Kaywin Feldman, after her first year as director of the NGA, in Washington, DC. Photo by Bill O'Leary/The Washington Post via Getty Images.

Kaywin Feldman, after her first year as director of the NGA, in Washington, DC. Photo by Bill O’Leary/The Washington Post via Getty Images.

In recent years, the museum has faced increasing pressure from both internal staff and the broader public to address issues of diversity and inclusion. In July 2020, two anonymous former employees and one current staff member issued a petition alleging sexual and racial harassment at the museum. 

The National Gallery also came under fire for its postponement of a long-awaited Philip Guston retrospective due to concerns over how the artist’s more politically charged pieces would be received.  

To that end, Feldman stressed that the rebrand wasn’t just aesthetic. “We have done the rest of the work, too,” she told the Post, citing a diverse slate of new acquisitions, including the museum’s first painting by a Native American artist, and upcoming shows, such as those dedicated to contemporary female photographers and “Afro-Atlantic Histories.”

“It’s not like we’ve been sitting around only doing a brand identity,” Feldman added. “We have a lot to show for the last two years. The challenge is: We couldn’t do the work without updating the brand.” 

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A Populist French Mayor Has Reopened Four Local Museums in Defiance of National Lockdown Rules


A defiant mayor in the southern French city of Perpignan has reopened four museums in his city, despite a national government ban. The move is the latest sign of growing discontent with the French administration over its continued lockdown on museums since the end of October.

“Culture is essential to the life of Perpignanese as well as all French people, it is high time to reopen the cultural spaces,” mayor Louis Aliot, deputy leader of the far-right party National Rally, told reporters yesterday. “We are not going to stay locked down until the end of our days!”

Perpignan’s Hyacinthe-Rigaud art museum, the Casal Pairal Museum of Catalan Art, and the National History Museum all opened their doors to a steady trickle of visitors today, and a fourth museum, the Joseph Puig coin museum, is slated to open tomorrow. Aliot has said that entrance to the museums, where crowd control and mask wearing will be enforced, will be free until March 9. Around 50 people visited the Hycinthe-Rigaud art museum within 15 minutes of its opening, according to AFP. The museum did not respond to a request for comment by press time.

The news comes as museum directors have been lobbying the French government to relax its restrictions, arguing that culture is essential to the nation’s mental health as well as stressing the robust health and safety measures already in place.

Some 50 museum directors met with the French culture minister yesterday to plead their case for the reopening of museums in time for the half-term holidays for French schools this weekend. The meeting followed weeks of mounting pressure from the industry, including two petitions signed by a cohort of museum directors and of French art publications.

Culture minister Roselyne Bachelot has assured museums that they will be the first to reopen once infection rates drop low enough. 

The local police prefecture went to court on Monday evening in an effort to keep museums closed. The Perpignan mayor’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

It is as yet unclear what the consequences of the decision to defy lockdown will be, but some French politicians have voiced their support for the move. “I think that Louis Alion is right to begin the debate,” tweeted French politician Marion Maréchal, niece of the controversial leader of France’s far-right National Front party, Marine Le Pen. “It makes no sense today that a municipal museum can’t open when we can go out and buy clothes and things deemed ‘non essential.’ It is disproportionate and incoherent.”

Others, such as Christophe Castaner, a member of France’s centrist ruling party La République en Marche, have condemned the decision. “Louis Aliot wants us to believe that the [National Rally party] is defending culture by opening museums in contempt of health regulations,” Castaner tweeted. “But behind this communications exercise, no one is fooled by its populism. Culture knows how to protect itself from the extremist virus.”

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Republican Leaders Accuse the National Museum of African American History of ‘Bias’ in Its Display on Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas


A freshman Republican lawmaker from Florida has accused the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture of bias and dishonesty in the way it presents the story of Justice Clarence Thomas in a display about the Supreme Court.

In 2017, the museum added the display, which presents information on Thomas and Justice Thurgood Marshall, the first Black Supreme Court Justice. It includes a photo of Thomas as a college student, a photo of him assuming his position at the court in 1991, and a copy of Jet magazine featuring him on the cover. A display text gives a biography of Thomas and compares the two men’s judicial philosophies, explaining that Thomas identifies himself as an advocate for “judicial restraint,” and for the “original intent” of the writers of the Constitution.

Representative Byron Donalds, who is Black, authored a letter complaining that the museum’s treatment of Thomas, the second African American to serve on the nation’s highest court, “falls short.”

President Donald J. Trump is presented with an award by Florida State Rep. Byron Donalds, left, and Matthew Charles, one of the first inmates to benefit from the First Step Act of 2018, at the 2019 Second Step Presidential Justice Forum Friday, Oct. 25, 2019, at Benedict College in Columbia, S.C. Official White House photo by Shealah Craighead.

President Donald J. Trump is presented with an award by Florida State Rep. Byron Donalds, left, and Matthew Charles, one of the first inmates to benefit from the First Step Act of 2018, at Benedict College in Columbia, South Carolina. Official White House photo by Shealah Craighead.

“Black history cannot and should not be political,” reads the letter, which was also signed by South Carolina Senator Tim Scott, Utah Representative Burgess Owens, and other prominent conservative leaders.

Addressing the museum’s director, Kevin Young, who assumed the position this year, and advisory council chair Kenneth Irvine Chenault, the lawmakers acknowledge that the museum largely fulfills its mission but note that, “It is unfortunate to see pitfalls likely driven by irresponsible bias.” The museum must present Thomas’s whole life and history, they conclude, “and not the disingenuous effort displayed today.”

Young declined an interview, but the museum sent a statement: “While all our exhibitions are based on rigorous research, they are still open to interpretation,” it reads. “Through scholarship, publications, and education, the museum will continue to explore the rich contributions and complexity of African Americans.”

Representative Donalds’s office did not respond to a request for comment.

Also co-signing the letter were five prominent figures in Black conservative circles: Heritage Foundation president Kay C. James, who served in the office of personnel management under George W. Bush; Bruce LeVell, who headed up Donald Trump’s Diversity Coalition; Alveda King, a niece of Martin Luther King Jr. and former Republican Representative from Georgia; Los Angeles attorney Marc T. Little; and political commentator Paris Dennard.

Supporters of Thomas were outraged when the museum opened, in 2016, including a mention of the Justice only in connection with Anita Hill’s sexual harassment accusation during his confirmation hearing in 1991, which he notoriously described as “a high-tech lynching.”

Installation at the National Museum of African American History and Culture.

In 2019, in the context of “rumors” about his retirement, Thomas incorrectly criticized the museum’s display, saying that it misrepresented the inspiration for his beliefs about affirmative action, which he opposes. While noting that he’d never been to the museum, he said that a group of students had told him that the display attributes those beliefs to his childhood educational experiences.

In fact, the display correctly states that his beliefs came about in connection to his law school education. However, he again condemned the museum’s portrayal of him, which he had not seen but had only heard about and which was still factually correct.

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