Modern Art and the White House

While the White House serves as both an office for the president and a home for the first family, it is also a museum full of art, objects, and furniture, including a large fine arts collection that hosts some of the best American paintings and sculptures. The fine arts collection at the White House developed over 200 years with great credit due to First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy’s restoration and preservation efforts in the early 1960s. Known officially as the White House Collection, art and sculpture exhibited in the White House tells American stories from the perspectives of diverse and innovative artists. In recent years, modern art holdings within the White House Collection have significantly increased. Learn about the lives and works of Georgia O’Keefe, Alma Thomas, Jacob Lawrence, and Isamu Noguchi—four prominent modern artists whose art is featured in the White House Collection.