Review: ‘Star Power’ Photographs Exhibit at National Portrait Gallery

A couple of weeks ago, I visited the Swamp. Whenever I’m in Washington, D.C., I row my figurative canoe, proofed to repel slime and preening nincompoops, past rows of think tanks, government buildings, and influence-peddling parlors, to the Old Patent Office, now the home of the National Portrait Gallery and the Smithsonian Museum of American Art, both favorites. The building soars like Parnassus, on a promontory about 80 feet above sea level.

This explains — alas, only in part — why Pennsylvania Avenue, K Street, and the land around the Capitol, tens of feet lower, nurture so many rats, skunk apes, and humanoid lizards. At least that’s this art historian’s take on the marine biology of Washington. It’s a lovely city. Too bad so many high paid creeps-in-suits slither in the halls of power.

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Brian T. Allen

Brian T. Allen is National Review’s art critic.

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A couple of weeks ago, I visited the Swamp. Whenever I’m in Washington, D.C., I row my figurative canoe, proofed to repel slime and preening nincompoops, past rows of think tanks, government buildings, and influence-peddling parlors, to the Old Patent Office, now the home of the National Portrait Gallery and the Smithsonian Museum of American Art, both favorites. The building soars like Parnassus, on a promontory about 80 feet above sea level.

This explains — alas, only in part — why Pennsylvania Avenue, K Street, and the land around the Capitol, tens of feet lower, nurture so many rats, skunk apes, and humanoid lizards. At least that’s this art historian’s take on the marine biology of Washington. It’s a lovely city. Too bad so many high paid creeps-in-suits slither in the halls of power.