Too Great a Nation for Small Dreams

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“When Ronald Reagan ran for president in 1980,” says the National Portrait Gallery, “it was the conventional wisdom, after what was viewed as four failed presidencies, that the office had outgrown the individual and needed to be changed or perhaps held jointly. Within a short time after Reagan became president, however, whether one agreed with his policies or not, there was no doubt about his capacity and command of the office, and the discussion about the need to change the office of the president ended. This fact alone altered the course of the nation’s history; Reagan’s two terms, moreover, would include much else of great consequence.”

According to the blog of the Smithsonian Museums, “The gallery has over 70 portraits of Reagan in its collections, and at the centennial of his birth, says the National Portrait Gallery’s director, Martin Sullivan, Reagan seemed a natural subject. One Life: Ronald Reagan chronicles the Gipper’s path through, essentially, six careers—as sports announcer, actor, union leader, corporate spokesman, governor of California and 40th president of the United States. Sullivan hopes that the exhibition gives visitors some insight into the personality traits that brought him success and made him such a ‘mesmerizing and sometimes polarizing figure.’”

“One Life: Ronald Reagan” runs through May 28, 2012 at the National Portrait Gallery, Eighth and F Streets NW, Washington, D.C., 202- 633-8300, npg.si.edu.

Franklin Einspruch is an artist and writer. He blogs at Artblog.net.


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