A cool spring evening had settled over Washington. Most of the city's federal buildings were dark, but chandeliers shone brightly from the National Portrait Gallery. Inside the building in which Walt Whitman once read his poetry to wounded Union troops and Abe Lincoln held his second Inaugural Ball, a black-tie assemblage of guests stood chatting, their voices mingling with the strains of a string quartet.

Many of those gathered in the historic building had helped to make history during the past 30 years: Senator Eugene McCarthy, Lady Bird Johnson, General William Westmoreland, Judge John Sirica, Buckminster Fuller, Julia Child, Van Cliburn, Arthur Schlesinger Jr. They were talking with a dozen artists who had been associated with them and other leading figures in a special way--painting or sculpturing portraits for the cover of TIME.

The celebrities and artists were attending a formal dinner, held by TIME and the Smithsonian Institution, to mark a major bequest to the portrait gallery: nearly 900 pieces of original art used for TIME covers during the past 25 years. From this week until Aug. 30, in an exhibition entitled "The TIME of Our Lives," 107 of the covers will be on display. After that, a smaller number will be selected from the collection on a rotating basis and shown in a room permanently provided by the gallery. The covers not on view in Washington will be available for inspection by the public and for exhibition by other institutions, in the U.S. and abroad.

The show in Washington is by no means the first occasion that TIME's covers have gone on public display. The magazine has conducted a number of tours of its cover art, both in this country and overseas, and the U.S. International Communications Agency is now sponsoring a show that has appeared in Europe, the Middle East and Asia.

Time Inc. Corporate Editor Henry Grunwald, managing editor of TIME from 1968 to 1977, had long wanted to find a permanent home for the covers, which he felt combined elements of art, history and journalism.

His concern was shared by TIME Chief of Research Leah Gordon, who led the effort to find a suitable institution to house the collection. The National Portrait Gallery, established in 1962, seemed to be the ideal place. Reporter-Researcher Rosemary Frank finally succeeded, after months of work, in tracking down and retrieving hundreds of pieces of cover art, some of which had drifted to TIME offices round the world. Promotion Director Robert Sweeney arranged the complicated details of the bequest with the gallery. The gift was accepted by S. Dillon Ripley, secretary of the Smithsonian Institution. "These portraits are as stylish and as spirited as the people they depict," said Ripley, "and we are delighted to have them."

Marvin Sadik, director of the gallery, points out that the covers, although contemporary in painting styles, are closely aligned with the museum's older and more formal portraits of Presidents and policymakers, scoundrels and rogues.

Says Sadik: "Both the magazine covers and our own portraits show people who have had the strongest impact on American life. Both, in other words, tell history--and that's where they can meet." Sa dik also believes that TIME's covers are contributing to a revival of portraiture. "In the first decade of the 20th century, art went abstract, and representational portraiture became declasse," he explains.

"But with the reintroduction of the image in pop art of the 1960s, there's a new interest in portraiture, and I hope it continues. A painted portrait is the totality of an artists analysis of his subject."

The selection of TIME portraits, including some notable photographs that went on display last week recalled the era since World War II. From the '50s there were such memorable figures as Frank Sinatra (Aug. 29, 1955), gangling and youthful in his prime as the hottest entertainer in show business; an earnest Adlai Stevenson (July 16, 1956), struggling in vain a second time to reach the presidency; and Martin Luther King (Feb. 18, 1957), then, at 28, a minister just beginning to lead the fight for civil rights.

Faces from the '60s included a wood sculpture of Playboy's Hugh Hefner (March 3, 1967) in the days before the coming of women's liberation; Bobby Kennedy (May 24, 1968) just prior to the California primary; and a sculpture of Raquel Welch (Nov. 28, 1969), the sex-symbol star of Myra Breckinridge.

Many of the cover portraits of the '70s already seemed frozen in the hard-edged past: Henry Kissinger (Feb. 7, 1972) at the height of his power under Richard Nixon; Liza Minnelli (Feb.

28, 1972) as a bright new star of Cabaret; and a sculptured like ness of Nelson Rockefeller (Sept. 2, 1974) after he was chosen to be Gerald Ford's Vice President.

For gallery guests, cover subejects and artists alike, the portraits brought vivid memories. Painter Jamie Wyeth recalled being flown to TIME's presses in Chicago to sign his 1977 Man of the Year painting of Jimmy Carter because it bore no signature when he submitted it. Boris Chaliapin, who produced more than 300 TIME covers, remembered side trips with Subject Julia Child to buy pickle juice for a special Russian soup he served her between work sessions.

Paul Davis, another frequent TIME contributor, spoke of working on his Gore Vidal cover entirely from i photographs, then calling the author a year later in Rome to introduce himself. Said Davis: "He had me over for a drink immediately, and when I was there he showed me the profile he's reputed to be self-conscious about. It looked all right to me."

The cover subjects were less effusive--or perhaps just more modest. Senator McCarthy thought his portrait "captured the sort of impressionistic spirit of 1968." Judge Sirica admitted to having a framed copy of his own TIME portrait in his den ("My law clerks gave it to me"), but General Westmoreland had a different attitude. "My house is a home, not a museum," he declared. "Besides, any recognition I got was attributable to my troops, who did a magnificent job." And Lady Bird Johnson did not want to talk about her por trait at all. She graciously steered conversations to the exhibit as a whole: "It's a glittering thumbnail sketch of the last 25 years."

Acting for TIME, I was delighted to be able to present the collection to the Smithsonian and to open the portrait exhibition with Secretary Ripley and Mayor Walter D. Washington.

The TIME exhibit is a vibrant testament of where America is and where it's been going. As the country produces new faces and images, TIME will continue to capture them on its covers. And, by a special agreement with the National Portrait Gallery, the magazine will add new covers to its bequest every year.

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