American paintings, from colonial portraits to Civil War-era landscapes, occupy the Gibbes Main Gallery. Portraits of leading political, social, and military figures include works by Jeremiah Theus, Henry Benbridge, Benjamin West, Gilbert Stuart, Thomas Sully and Samuel F.B. Morse.

The gallery also features landscape and genre scenes by Angelica Kaufmann, Louis Mignot, Eastman Johnson, Conrad Wise Chapman, and William Aiken Walker.

The paintings collection is complemented by examples of neoclassical sculpture on view in the Campbell Rotunda, and decorative art objects on loan from the Rivers Collection.