America's Presidents

America’s Presidents lies at the heart of the Portrait Gallery’s mission to tell the American story through the lives of those who have shaped its history and culture, and is dedicated to presenting the portraits of U.S. presidents. The Portrait Gallery has the only complete collection of presidential portraits outside of the White House and holds more than 1,730 likenesses of U.S. presidents in its collection.

Highlights of America’s Presidents include an 1843 daguerreotype of President John Quincy Adams by Philip Haas (the earliest known photographic likeness of a U.S. president.) The exhibition also includes 1917 casts of Lincoln’s “life masks” (1860 and 1865) that were originally created by Leonard Volk and Clark Mills, respectively. In Feb. 2023, the Portrait Gallery added a 3-D tactile display of the Lincoln hand and face masks, designed with audio components and verbal descriptions to provide an enhanced sensory experience of the casts for all visitors including those who are blind or experience low vision. The Portrait Gallery also installed a large-scale painting of President Abraham Lincoln painted from life by W.F.K. Travers in 1865, on long-term loan from the Hartley Dodge Foundation.

The National Portrait Gallery began commissioning portraits of the president in 1994, with the portrait of George H. W. Bush. In 2006, the museum began commissioning portraits of first ladies.