Smithsonian Associates Online Programs

Build on your botanical painting skills in this next-level class as you create vibrant watercolors inspired by nature. Learn to focus on the texture and detail of botanical subjects, including flowers, fruits, and vegetables.

In this class open to all levels, students discover the versatility and fluidity of working in watercolors while exploring the functional and aesthetic elements of design found in plants.

Acquire the basic skills to work with the versatile and portable rigid heddle loom—a great entryway into weaving scarves, placemats, dishtowels, and more.

This course is an introduction to J.M.W. Turner’s vast achievements in watercolor, with particular attention to his manner of expressing light and atmosphere. In-class exercises revolve around making studies of his masterworks with an emphasis on creating cohesive sketches, not replicas. (World Art History Certificate elective, 1/2 credit)

Painting on the cusp of the medieval and Renaissance worlds, Hieronymus Bosch continues to fascinate with his fantastic imagery and densely symbolic compositions. Even after decades of research and close examination, many of his masterpieces remain as perplexing as they probably appeared to their original viewers. Art historian Aneta Georgievskia-Shine discusses ways of approaching the unique vision of reality and human nature contained within Bosch’s painted worlds. (World Art History Certificate elective, 1/2 credit)

In the late 1950s, having already won lasting fame as a novelist, John Steinbeck was seized by a powerful urge to return to a longtime dream: contemporizing Sir Thomas Malory's Morte d' Arthur. Public humanities scholar Clay Jenkinson offers a fascinating look at the book that became the critically dismissed The Acts of King Arthur and His Noble Knights and Steinbeck’s quest to give new life to Malory and use the tales of King Arthur as a medium for his own expression.

The COVID-19 pandemic won't be our last, says biological anthropologist Sabrina Sholts of the National Museum of Natural History, because what makes us vulnerable to pandemics also makes us human. Drawing on her new book, The Human Disease: How We Create Pandemics, from Our Bodies to Our Beliefs, Sholts travels through history and around the globe to examine how and why such pandemics and many other infectious disease events are an inescapable threat of our own making.

Delve into Gen. George McClellan’s 1862 Peninsula Campaign with an emphasis on the Seven Days Battles. Evaluating McClellan’s actions and state of mind, Civil War tour guide Marc Thompson explains why this bold campaign plan yielded disastrous results.

Composing is solitary work, but artistry cannot flourish in isolation. Whether reclusive or gregarious, socially inept or beloved and charming, all successful composers were supported by a wide network of friends, family, fellow professionals and patrons. From Mozart and Haydn to Richard Wagner and Ludwig II of Bavaria to Aaron Copland and Leonard Bernstein, speaker and concert pianist Rachel Franklin examines some of these fascinating associations and the inspiring music that we owe to them.

Art historian Sophia D’Addio of Columbia University offers an introduction to the visual culture of Renaissance Italy from the 14th through 16th centuries in a five-part series of richly illustrated programs on varying types of images, objects, and structures. She examines some of the most influential and fascinating works of the period, exploring their formal innovations and the relationships between powerful patrons and skilled artists that resulted in their creation. (World Art History Certificate core course, 1 credit)