David C. Ward


David C. Ward is an American historian, poet and author, and civil servant. He served at the National [Portrait Gallery (United States)|National Portrait Gallery] as senior historian.

Early life

Ward studied under Christopher Lasch and Eugene Genovese at University of Rochester, graduating in 1974, and subsequently attended graduate school at Warwick University and Yale University, MA.

Hide/Seek curator

Ward curated numerous shows at the National Portrait Gallery, including Hide/Seek: Difference and Desire in American Portraiture, Face Value:Abstraction in Portraiture, and The Face of Battle. Hide/Seek, which opened in 2010, was the first exhibit hosted by a museum of national stature to address the topic and as such invited immediate political attack from conservatives who falsely argued that Hide/Seek was gay propaganda. It was also the largest and most expensive exhibit in the NPG's history, and more private donors contributed to it than to any prior NPG exhibit. In 2010, Ward interviewed Patti Smith for her book Just Kids. This was related to Hide/Seek. In addition to this, Ward did shows on Whitman, Grant & Lee, Lincoln, and Alexander Gardner.

Author

Ward has published two books of poetry, Call Waiting and Internal Difference, both published by Carcanet Press. Ward "has published more than 100 poems in Anglo-American literary magazines". Ward in 2004 wrote, for the Smithsonian, an analytical biography of Charles Wilson Peale, Charles Willson Peale: Art and Selfhood in the Early Republic.

Exhibitions

  • The Face of Battle
  • The Sweat of Their Face
  • Dark Fields of the Republic: Alexander Gardner's Photographs
  • One Life: Grant & Lee
  • Face Value: Portraiture in the Age of Abstraction
  • Poetic Likeness: Modern American Poets
  • Portraiture Now: Asian Americans Portraits of Encounter
  • Hide/Seek: Difference and Desire in American Portraiture
  • The Mask of Lincoln
  • Walt Whitman

Works