Art surrounds you at the Hirshhorn. The museum's eye-catching, cylindrical architecture encompasses a spectacular center fountain and is home to the nation's premier collection of international modern and contemporary works of art. Open since 1974, the museum is named for Joseph H. Hirshhorn (1889-1981), a renowned collector who donated more than 6,000 paintings and sculptures—one of the largest bequests of artworks ever made to the Smithsonian Institution.

Plaza Level

The museum store, located near the entrance, is filled with an intriguing assortment of art books, gifts, posters and artist-designed jewelry. A kids' corner is packed with toys, puzzles and activity books.

Lower Level

Black Box In recognition of the growing significance of video and film as an artistic medium, the museum's theater screens works by some of the most prestigious filmmakers and artists in the world.

Level Two

Special temporary exhibitions rotate approximately every four months. These large exhibitions explore a different grouping of works gathered around a theme or individual artist, and provide new ways of looking at the museum's diverse holdings, as well as artworks from other collections. These shows often include rarely seen works, as well as favorite masterpieces.

Level Three

Selected Works From the Collections These galleries highlight the museum's world-renowned collections. Several galleries offer an in-depth look at works by important artists of the 20th century: the groundbreaking mobiles of Alexander Calder; a chronicle of Willem de Kooning's Expressionist style as it evolved during his 50-year career; the abstract, richly textured creations by Clyfford Still; and the shaped canvases of Ellsworth Kelly.

Sculpture The museum's sculpture collection includes signature masterpieces by Henri Matisse, David Smith, Louise Nevelson and Constantin Brancusi.

On View

Black Box: Laurent Grasso (April 4, 2011-July 24, 2011) lower level. Probing the seam between the real and the surreal, French-Italian artist Laurent Grasso (b. 1972) often depicts strange interfaces between the natural realm and the world created by humankind.

Black Box: Nira Pereg (August 1, 2011-Nov. 27, 2011) lower level. Israeli artist Nira Pereg (b. 1969) creates documentary-based video works that transform reality into dramatic scenarios. This Black Box presentation features the 2006 work 67 Bows, in which Pereg studied a flock of flamingos at Germany's Karlsruhe Zoo. Over the muffled noise of the birds' squawks and clucks, the artist adds a provocative, sporadically timed soundtrack, implying disturbing human intrusion into their peaceful realm, and evoking a sense of suspense and heightened apprehension in the viewer.

Fragments in Time and Space (June 23, 2011-Aug. 28, 2011) level two. The Hirshhorn presents a selection of works from its permanent collection focusing on the interpretation of time and space since the beginning of Modernism. See works by such artists as Thomas Eakins, Hamish Fulton, Douglas Gordon, Ed Ruscha and Hiroshi Sugimoto.

Directions: Grazia Toderi (April 21, 2011-Sept. 5, 2011) level three. Italian artist Grazia Toderi (b. 1963) likens her video projections to frescoes of light. Although inspired in part by Giotto and other early- 14th-century painters, she draws more heavily on contemporary experience, from distant views of cities glowing at night to the zero-gravity ballets of the U.S. space program. Manipulating her imagery with computer animation, Toderi combines satellite and military footage with her own films and photographs in an effort to visualize the infinite.

Andy Warhol: Shadows (Opening Sept. 25, 2011-Jan. 8, 2012) level two. Andy Warhol (1928-1987) is best known for his appropriation of images from popular culture—advertisements, mass media photographs and celebrity portraits—but in 1978 the artist turned to the abstract. In the series Shadows, he used two photographs that were silkscreened over hand-painted backgrounds to create 102 canvases. At the Hirshhorn, the paintings are installed as Warhol instructed, hung edge-to-edge in an uninterrupted 450-foot arc around the museum's distinctive circular gallery wall.

Download exclusive interviews with the artists. Free podcasts are available at hirshhorn.si.edu.

Become a member of the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden's Annual Circle.