Events

Talks and Tours

Throughout the year, gallery talks and guided tours are offered in conjunction with our monthly exhibitions.

Guided Tour by Katherine Steichen Rosing

October 3, 2026

1:00 pm

First Saturday
Saturday, October 3, 2026, 1 to 1:45 p.m.
Guided Tour by Katherine Steichen Rosing

Join our featured solo artist, Katherine Steichen Rosing, who will guide visitors through her installation titled Harbingers. Designed as an immersive, multimedia installation, Rosing’s exhibition resembles a ghost forest in the aftermath of a wildfire.

Free to the public (a donation of $10 is suggested)

Curator Talk: Heather McMordie

October 10, 2026

1:00 pm

Second Saturday

Saturday, October 10, 2026, 1 to 1:45 p.m.
Curator Talk: Re-Inhabiting Conservation

Join Heather McMordie, Creature Conserve’s Director of Curatorial Programs, and Marissa Mireles Hinds, Creature Conserve’s 2026 Curatorial Fellow, as they discuss Re-Inhabiting Conservation: Our Shared Skies. McMordie will share about her curatorial process and the role of art in wildlife conservation, and Hinds will discuss the artworks that are inspiring and inform her November program, “The Conscious Museum: A Supper Club.”

Creature Conserve, a global nonprofit outreach organization based in Rhode Island, USA, that brings artists, scientists, writers and other creatives together for wildlife conservation. Learn more at www.creatureconserve.com.

Free to the public (a donation of $10 is suggested)

Guided Tour by Hillyer Director

October 15, 2026

6:15 pm

Guided Tour of the Exhibitions
Thursday, October 15, 6:15 pm

Hillyer Director, Tim Brown, will lead a guided tour of all three exhibitions that are currently on view throughout the months of October and November. Visitors can also take advantage of our extended evening hours, which occur on the third Thursday of every month.

Free to the public (a donation of $10 is suggested)

Conversation with Diana Mercado

November 19, 2026

6:15 pm

Third Thursday
Thursday, November 19, 6:15 p.m.

During our monthly third Thursday program, our featured solo artist, Diana Mercado, will be joined by Dr. Katie Larson, Vice President of Exhibitions at IA&A, to discuss topics related to her current exhibition La Casa en la Montaña.

Website

The Conscious Museum—A Drop In Supper Club

November 21, 2026

3:00 pm

– 5:00 pm

‘The Conscious Museum’ is a free, communal exploration of the ecology of food, the future of conservation, and the consciousness of our environment and the winged creatures who allow for its existence. This three-course, farm-to-table supper club will invite the artists from the exhibition and other guests from conservation, physics, community farms and sustainability to come into dialogue with our invited supper club guests to eat together and ideate together, creating our own museum of conscious thought.

At the end of this event, you will be able to take home the menu, which will include more information on the artists and contributing guests, as well as seeds for you to grow at home or at your own plot of land, and a QR code that will share information on community farm initiatives to get involved with.

Conversations will interrogate such things as: the consciousness of the sun, lived histories of our food, our mutualist relationships with winged creatures, food waste and regeneration, Colonial Botanical Empire, Extraction & Climate, and sonic ecologies. Participants will be encouraged to discuss, understand and create new ecological systems, examine resistance, listen differently, and finally create something new together.

Selected Past Events

Artist Talk with Mona Bozorgi

August 29, 2026

Saturday, August 29, 1 pm

Hillyer’s featured solo artist, Mona Bozorgi, will lead a gallery talk about her exhibition Threading the Gaze. Drawing on images, primarily selfies, taken by Iranian women during the Woman, Life, Freedom Movement, Bozorgi traces circuits of exchange between human and non-human gazes, investigating who looks at whom, how one chooses to be seen, and who can be seen or remain unseen.

Admission is free (a $10 donation is suggested)

Conversation with Elizabeth Casqueiro

August 22, 2026

Saturday, August 22, 1 pm

Our featured solo artist, Elizabeth Casquiero, will be joined by Reem Bassous, Director of the Washington Studio School, to discuss her exhibition Counterspace, inspired by DC landmarks and how they evoke power, identity, justice, connection, and knowledge.

Admission is free (a $10 donation is suggested)

A Conversation with Sunanda Khajuria

August 20, 2026

6:15 pm

Third Thursday

Thursday, August 20, 6:15 pm

Join us for a conversation with Sunanda Khajuria, who will joined by Tariq Allana from Art Heritage Gallery. The conversation will cover topics related to the exhibition Beyond Borders: Who I Am Between Homes. Living between India and China, Khajuria explores the psychological dimensions of cultural displacement and the ways in which belonging is negotiated across distinct national, linguistic, and aesthetic spheres.

Admission is free (a $10 donation is suggested)

Website

Artist Talk & Live Demonstration by Rashin Kheiriyeh

August 1, 2026

1:00 pm

Painting the Epic: Shahnameh
Artist Talk & Live Demonstration by Rashin Kheiriyeh

Our featured solo artist, Rashin Kheiriyeh will lead an artist talk that provides more insight into the subject of her exhibition “The Book of Shahnameh: Tales of Persia.”. As an accomplished author and illustration, Kheiriyeh will also lead a demonstration of her artistic practice and use of materials.

Website

Generative AI: Art and Technology

July 18, 2026

12:30 pm

– 2:00 pm

Hosted by Nihal J. Krishan

What does it mean to make art in a world where machines can dream?

At Hillyer Art Space, we’re bringing together artists, technologists, and cultural thinkers for a wide-ranging conversation about artificial intelligence, virtual reality, and the evolving landscape of creativity on Sunday, July 18th from 12:30-2pm.

Distinguished speakers include:

—Roger D. Eastman, Director of the Immersive Media Design University of Maryland-College Park

—Sandro Kereselidze, Co-Founder and Chief Creative Officer of ARTECHOUSE, an experiential, technology-driven art company producing groundbreaking 21st-century art experiences.

—Mollye Bendell, an interdisciplinary artist with a focus in immersive and electronic media. Her solo work has been exhibited in venues such as the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, Baltimore Museum of Art, the New York Electronic Arts Festival. She is also a founding member of media arts collective strikeWare.

Website

An Artist Talk and Demonstration with Rick Bach

June 27, 2026

1:00 pm

– 2:00 pm

Join us for our culminating event in June as we feature solo artist, Rick Bach, who will provide us with a deeper understanding of his exhibition titled CUT, which is on view through Sunday, June 28. Bach, whose primary medium is steel, will talk about his artistic process, including his use of tools, canvas, and preparatory drawings to create his artwork from conception to completion.

Free to the public (a $10 donation is suggested)

Modern Movements Symposium

April 14, 2026

9:00 am

– 12:30 pm

Join International Arts & Artists (IA&A) and Art Museum of the Americas (AMA) for Modern Movements Symposium—a convening of emerging scholars exploring the transnational exchanges, cultural diplomacy, and artistic innovations that shaped Latin American and Caribbean modern and contemporary art. This symposium accompanies the DC-based exhibition Modern Movements: Selections of Latin American and Caribbean Art from the Art Museum of the Americas (April 4 through May 31, 2026) on view at IA&A at Hillyer in Washington, DC. Visit our website to learn more.

SYMPOSIUM SCHEDULE

SESSION ONE: MODERNISM AND ITS DISCONTENTS

9:00

Welcome and Introduction

9:30 am

Alejandro Soto Chaves

Three Theses on Central American (Modernist) Abstraction, 1936-1967

9:45 am

Ronan Shaw, The Face of Modernity: Germán Cueto’s Geometric Abstraction

10:00 am

Ginevra Bria, Against Modernist Primitivism: Cildo Meireles’s Cruzeiro do Sul (1969-70) and “The Savage Slot”

10:15 am

Marco Polo Juarez Cruz , Latin American or Latinoamericano? Reframing Hemispheric Modernism

10:30 am

Q and A

11:00 am

Break

SESSION TWO: REFRAMING THE HEMISPHERE

11:10 am

Panel Introduction

11:15 am

Ayelen Pagnanelli, Sarah Grilo and the Success of Women’s Abstraction

11:30 am

Rachel Remick, Ideas of Brazil: Maria Martins Art and Reception in the United States

11:45 am

Carlos Antonio-Colón, The Latin American Voice: Tracing the Relational Voice in the Work of Fernando de Szyszlo and Jesús Rafael Soto

12:00 pm

Q&A

12:30 pm

Break

SESSION THREE: INSTITUTIONS, EXHIBITIONS, AND CULTURAL DIPLOMACY

1:00 pm

Panel Introduction

1:15 pm

Sol Izquierdo, Andean Handicrafts at the Pan American Union: Elena Eleska and Cold war Cultural exchange

1:30 pm

Anamaría Garzón Mantilla, Exhibiting Precolombinismo: Ecuadorian Abstraction at the Pan American

1:45 pm

Abigail Lapin Dardashti, (De)materialized Archive: Brazil’s Exhibition at FESTAC and the Underpinnings of Afro-Brazilian Art History

2:00 pm

Q&A

2:30 pm

End and closing remarks

Abol Bahadori-Artist Talk

March 21, 2026

1:00 pm

Hillyer will host a conversation between solo artist Abol Bahadori and photographer, Joshua Dunn, who will talk about the exhibition Hybrid Baroque. They will talk about the subject matter of Abol’s exhibition, his material methods and techniques, and his strongest pictorial influences.

Free to the public (a donation of $10 is suggested)

IA&A at Hillyer
9 Hillyer Court NW
Washington, DC 20008
202.338.0680

Inner Loop Ekphrastic Event

October 30, 2025

6:00 pm

– 8:00 pm

The Inner Loop Responds to three exhibitions curated by women and artists in the DMV area.

Join us for this special ekphrastic event, as nine writers from The Inner Loop community recite poetry and prose in response to three exhibitions curated by women and artists in the DMV area.

Écriture (Writing with the Body): Contemporary Korean Women’s Art, curated by Dr. Jung-Sil Lee and Dr. Koh Dong-Yeoh
Traces, curated by Laila Abdul-Hadi Jadallah
Landed, by Elizabeth Coffey

A bar and refreshments will be available during the event. The program is free to the public (a donation of $10 is suggested).

Website

Artist Talk with Elizabeth Coffey

October 19, 2025

1:00 pm

Our featured solo artist Elizabeth Coffey will lead an artist talk about her exhibition titled Landed. The exhibition features large scale portraits of women painted on repurposed lace curtains, which explore the tension between the seen and unseen layers of female identity.