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Annette Polan Founder/Chair
Faces of the Fallen

Annette Polan graduated with a B.A. in Art History from Hollins University in Roanoke, Virginia, and she completed additional graduate work at the Ecole du Louvre and the Tyler School of Art. Ms. Polan is currently a professor specializing in portraiture at the Corcoran College of Art and Design.

In addition to teaching, Ms. Polan is known internationally as a portrait artist.  She has photographed and painted the official portraits of leaders of industry and government including Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, (former) West Virginia Governor Gaston Caperton, Peter Tarnoff for the Council on Foreign Relations, Judge Rya Zobel for the Federal Judicial Center, Edward Villella for the Miami City Ballet, and Lord Baltimore for Kiplin Hall in Great Britain.

Ms. Polan has taught and lectured on her work and contemporary American portraiture in Europe, Asia, and Australia, and has had numerous solo and group exhibitions in the United States and abroad.  She is a participant in the U.S. Department of State’s Art in Embassy Program, with pieces showing in Denmark and Fiji as well as in the District of Columbia’s “Party Animals”, the largest public art installation in the city’s history.  Her interest in the narrative extends into video and site specific installations.

Annette Polan is the Chair of Faces of the Fallen, an exhibition of 1323 portraits by 230 American artists to honor the servicemen and women who died in Afghanistan and Iraq between October 10, 2001 and November 11, 2004. The exhibition opened on March 23, 2005 at women in Military Service of America Memorial in Arlington Cemetery. For recognition of her support of the men and women of the Armed forces and their families, Ms. Polan was awarded the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Outstanding Public Service Award, one of the highest honorary awards available to the Chairman for recognition of exceptional public service.  

Ms. Polan is the former Chairman of the Painting Department at the Corcoran, and has served on the on the board of the Washington Project for the Arts/Corcoran. She is on the Advisory Board of Smith Farm, a center for the Healing Arts.  She is a member of Art Table, the International Women’s Forum and the Women’s Forum of Washington and the Cosmos Club.  She is listed in Who’s Who in America, Who’s Who in the East, Who’s Who of American Women, Who’s Who of American Artists, The Dictionary of International Biography, and The World’s Who’s Who of Women.

Remarks given by Annette Polan at the Closing Ceremonies, Faces of the Fallen, June 7, 2007:

“Thank you, General Vaught, General Pace, and distinguished guests. And special thanks to General Pace and Greg Commons for their inspiring words.

Faces of the Fallen began just over 3 years ago when I was grieving over my mother’s death. My reaction to the pages of photographs of the Fallen in the Washington Post was immediate because there had been too few public acknowledgements of our losses in the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

I hoped then that the power of the 200 artists who created these 1,319 moving portraits would help pull Americans together to remember and pay homage to the men and women who had died so far away. I also hoped that the friends and families of these men and women would find solace from acts of remembrance by strangers. I grieve that the count has reached now 3500. We haven’t added additional faces to our memorial but hope that their families understand that Faces of the Fallen is a tribute to them as well. 

Since the opening, over 650,000 thousand visitors have come here. I have met a Navaho medicine man, an orphaned 6-year-old daughter of a single mother, marines on leave and wounded veterans from Walter Reed. Mothers and fathers, husbands and wives, boyfriends, children - all have come full of grief, anger, pride and love, to pay tribute. They have left letters and photographs, medals and teddy bears. Coins have piled up among flags and pinecones. Visitors have felt a need to leave signs that they were here. With their visits, the memorial came to life.

Before Faces of the Fallen opened in March 2005, someone told me: “Relax. Your life is about to change in ways you can’t even imagine.” I didn’t relax but my life did change. I come from a large closely-knit family. It has expanded exponentially to include all of you without whom this project never would have happened.

The efficient, compassionate staff here at the Women’s Memorial has provided the guidance and support that has held Faces of the Fallen together day by day. The volunteer board of dedicated professionals expanded the project to give it scope and impact. The artists gave it majesty. Ruth Riddick, our executive director, provided overall organization.

We owe a profound debt of thanks to our honorary Chairs, and to the individuals, corporations and foundations whose generosity helped develop, install and sustain the exhibit for more than two years. Their names are commemorated on our donor plaques, mounted on the walls next to the exhibit.

We are also deeply grateful to those who are helping us to bring Faces of the Fallen to an appropriate and meaningful close. Some, like Goldman Sachs, and Pentagon Federal Credit Union Foundation have been with us since the beginning. Of our new friends. I would particularly thank Lockheed Martin Foundation and Prudential for their generous financial support and the National Park Service for expert assistance with archiving the mementos. We are grateful to Secretary Jim Nicholson for the professional team from the Media Services division of the Department of Veterans Affairs who will dismantle the exhibition.

We also thank UPS for donating their delivery services so that the portraits will go home safely to the fallen’s next of kin. Partnering with UPS Corporation is The UPS Store-The Village at Shirlington in Arlington. Julie Sterling and her employees are volunteering their time to come to the Memorial to pack the portraits for shipping – a giant task.  

I close with a reading from an ancient prayer

Birth is a beginning
And death a destination.
And life is a journey…
From innocence to awareness
And ignorance to knowing;
From foolishness to discretion
      And then perhaps, to wisdom;
From weakness to strength
Or strength to weakness-
      And often back again….
From loneliness to love,
From joy to gratitude,
From pain to compassion,
And grief to understanding
      From fear to faith;
From defeat to defeat to defeat-
Until, looking backward or ahead,
We see that victory lies
Not at some high place along the way,
But in having made the journey, stage by stage,
A sacred pilgrimage.
Birth is a beginning

Together, in this beautiful place, we have created a community of support and belonging – understanding that although grief changes over time, it does last forever.

Thank you for coming on this journey with me.”