By Nancy Nesvet Washington D.C. - On Inauguration Day, January 20, 2017, two artworks were exhibited in celebration of the event. In the Capitol Building, George Caleb Bingham’s “The Verdict of the People,” on loan from the Saint Louis Art Museum, hung over the dais table at the inaugural lunch for Congress and the president and vice president. In depicting a party of white men who had apparently voted, with the lone black man pushing a cart, and the three women, all of whom could not vote, waving a banner proclaiming “Freedom for Virtue, Restriction for Vice”, the painting seemed an odd choice for the lunch after President Trump’s oath of office. The second artwork, displayed in the National Portrait Gallery, is the only official portrait, so far, of President Donald J. Trump. The photograph, shown here, courtesy of the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery, made by … [Read more...] about A Study in Contrasts: The 2017 Presidential Inauguration Festivities and Women’s March on Washington