Founded in 1869 by philanthropist William Wilson Corcoran, the gallery was one of the earliest public art museums in the United States.

Prior to the Corcoran Gallery of Art's closing, it was one of the oldest privately supported cultural institutions in the United States.

The 135,000 square feet (12,500 m2) building was built to house an expanded Corcoran collection in addition to the nascent school, which had been formally founded in 1890.

[5] In 1928, the art collection of former Senator William A. Clark joined the Corcoran in a new wing designed by Charles Adam Platt, which was inaugurated by President Calvin Coolidge.

These plans abruptly ended in 2005 after a Frank O. Gehry-designed wing was scrapped due to lack of funding, and the remainder of the available property was sold to a private developer.

At its peak, the museum owned a significant collection including work from Rembrandt Peale, Eugène Delacroix, Edgar Degas, Thomas Gainsborough, John Singer Sargent, Claude Monet, Mariano Fortuny, Pablo Picasso, Edward Hopper, Willem de Kooning, Joan Mitchell, Gene Davis, and many others.

[citation needed] In 1989, the Corcoran Gallery of Art agreed to host a traveling solo exhibit of Robert Mapplethorpe's works.

[13] As a result of the controversy, more than a dozen artists canceled exhibitions, funding and membership declined, and staff resigned in protest.

[15] In its final years, the museum and its affiliated Corcoran College of Art and Design together had a staff of about 140 and an operating budget of about $24 million.

Revenue came from grants and contributions, admissions fees, tuition, membership dues, gift shop and restaurant sales, and an endowment worth around $30 million.

[citation needed] In 2014, following years of negligence and financial mismanagement, a lawsuit was brought by the law firm Gibson Dunn on behalf of the group Save the Corcoran against the trustees.

The vast space, separated into three connected sections, consists of forty limestone columns and twin skylights (to light the intended display of sculptures).

Low rise stairs, 16 feet (4.9 m) wide, are watched over by six statues on pedestals atop marble platforms, and lead to a landing halfway to the second floor.

An observer would access a marble-floored, square, dark staircase hall with wood panels to reach the Clark Wing galleries.

[18] At the northern end of the building, the Hemicycle's unusual shape fills the angle created by New York Avenue and 17th Street.

[18] In 2015, preservationists added the interior portions of the Corcoran Gallery to the National Register of Historic Places (the exterior had been listed in 1971).