Collection Creator:

McCausland, Elizabeth, 1899-1965  Search this

Extent:

2.9 Linear feet (Boxes 2-5)

Type:

Archival materials

Date:

1923-1960

Scope and Contents note:

Series consists primarily of McCausland's professional and, to a lesser extent, personal correspondence, which includes general, artist, and some family correspondence. Correspondence typically consists of letters to and copies of letters from McCausland, along with enclosures (such as clippings and other printed material; contracts, agreements, and other business and financial papers; and proposals and manuscripts) and related material (such as notes, illustrations, and writings). Correspondents include artists, art organizations, museums, curators, editors, publishers, scholars, research institutions, her agent (Mary Squire Abbot), friends, and her mother, Belle Noble McCausland. Correspondence largely documents McCausland's various professional activities as an art critic, art historian, and freelance writer, and her relationships with various figures of the art and publishing worlds before, during, and immediately after the Second World War. General correspondence relates to articles and reviews that McCausland wrote for the Springfield Republican; to freelance articles she wrote over the years for various publications, including ones for Parnassus, The New Republic, and Magazine of Art, as well as yearly articles for various encyclopedias (such as Encyclopedia Britannica, Encyclopedia Americana, and Collier Encyclopedia); and to various book projects, including Changing New York (1939), Careers in the Arts (1950), and ones on the artists E. L. Henry, George Inness, and Alfred H. Maurer. General correspondence also relates to her teaching job at Sarah Lawrence College and other courses taught; to various editing projects, including photo-editing Carl Sandburg's Poems of the Midwest and the planned book Art and Advertising; her work as a research consultant on the American Processional exhibition and book, and on other exhibitions; and her involvement in various art and social organization, as well as her participation in various conferences. General correspondence largely documents McCausland's tireless efforts to drum up work, and to fund (through various grants and fellowships) and carry out her many research and writing projects. Correspondence from particular artists, including Arthur Dove, Louis Eilshemius, Marsden Hartley, Georgia O'Keeffe, and Alfred Stieglitz, was maintained by McCausland in files separate from general correspondence. Artist correspondence documents her relationships with these artists - particularly well-documented are her relationships with Dove and Stieglitz - and the artists' reactions to her reviews of their shows. Files of artist correspondence also include some of McCausland's own notes on her feelings about or relationship with particular artists. Family correspondence consists almost entirely of letters and copies of letters from McCausland to her mother, Belle Noble McCausland. These seem to have originated from the scrapbook kept by McCausland's mother which can be found amongst personal papers. See Appendix for a list of notable correspondents from Series 2

Arrangement note:

General correspondence is arranged in rough chronological order. Within individual yearly files, McCausland often grouped together letters to and from a particular correspondent; this existing organization has for the most part been maintained. Selected artist correspondence and family correspondence are arranged in files at the end of the series. Correspondence can also be found amongst research and writing files.

Appendix: Notable Correspondents from Series 2:

List represents only a selection of correspondents from general correspondence. A. A. Wynn Inc.: 1951 ACA Gallery: 1941, 1943, 1945, 1946, 1947 Abbot, Mary Squire (McIntosh and Otis Company): 1941, 1945, 1947, 1948, 1949, 1950, 1952, 1953, 1954, 1955, 1958 Abbott, Berenice: 1934 Adams, Charles: 1938, 1939, 1940, 1943, 1944, 1946, 1947, 1948, 1949, 1950, 1951, 1952 Adams, Harriet Dyer: 1946 Adelphi College: 1953 Adlow, Dorothy ( -- Christian Science Monitor -- ): 1950, 1951, 1952, 1953, 1954 Albany Institute of History and Art: 1946, 1947 Aldrich, Adolf: 1945 American Academy of Arts and Sciences: 1946, 1947 American Artist Magazine -- : 1952 American Artists Congress: 1938, 1939, 1942 American Artists Group: 1939, 1945, 1946, 1947, 1950 American Association of University Women: 1951 American Federation of Arts: 1946, 1947, 1948, 1949, 1951, 1952, 1954, 1956 American Museum of Natural History: 1944 American Newspaper Guild: 1942 American Philosophical Society: 1947 Anderson, Mrs. Sherwood (Eleanor): 1949 Antiques -- : 1955 Arden, Elizabeth: 1937 Arnason, H. Harvard (Walker Art Center): 1951, 1952, 1953, 1954 Art Digest -- : 1951 Art in America -- (see also Jean Lipman): 1957 Art Institute of Chicago: 1945, 1947 Art of this Century: 1944 Artists for Victory: 1944 Artists Equity Association: 1956 Artists League of America: 1942, 1943, 1944, 1945 Artists Society for National Defense: 1941 Associated American Artists: 1940 Baltimore Museum of Art: 1953 Bard College: 1953 Barnes, Djuna: 1951 Barr, Alfred H.: 1939, 1944, 1947, 1951 Barr, Norman: 1941, 1942, 1943, 1945 Baumann, Gustave: 1946 Baur, John I. H.: 1939, 1942, 1946 Beam, Lura: 1945, 1958 Beard, Mary: 1938, 1939, 1944 Benn, Ben: 1951 Bennington School of the Arts: 1940 Berkshire Museum: 1939, 1940 Biddle, George: 1947 The Bobbs-Merrill Company: 1944 Bourke-White, Margaret (letter to Berenice Abbott): 1940 Brewster, William F.: 1954, 1955 The Brooklyn Museum: 1943, 1945, 1948, 1954 Brown, Milton: 1945 Buchholz Gallery: 1941, 1943 Butler, Joseph (Butler Institute of Art): 1954, 1955 Cahill, Holger: 1937, 1942, 1944, 1946, 1950 Carter, Clarence H.: 1945, 1946 Cinema -- : 1947 Clarke, Bert: 1950 Constantine, Mildred: 1939, 1941, 1942 Cook, Waldo Leland: 1949 Cooper Union: 1949, 1952 Cooper Union Art School: 1947, 1948 Corcoran Gallery of Art: 1948, 1949, 1950, 1951 Cowdrey, Mary Bartlett (Smith College Museum of Art): 1943, 1949, 1951, 1952, 1953, 1954 Crawley, Lawrence: 1950 Crehan, Hubert ( -- Art Digest -- ): 1953 Crichlow, Ernest: 1941 Curran, Charles: 1942 D'Harnoncourt, Rene: 1947 Daura, Pierre: 1949, 1951, 1954 Detroit Institute of Arts: 1945 Devree, Howard: 1949 Diamond (Rotkin), Adele: 1941 Donato, Louis: 1939 Dows, Olin: 1942 Eames, Charles: 1950, 1951 Estler, William C.: 1944 Federation of Modern Painters and Sculptors: 1946 Fitch, George: 1955 Fitch, James: 1940 Fortune Magazine -- : 1946 Francis, Robert: 1940, 1942, 1943 Frick Art Reference Library: 1944, 1948, 1950, 1951, 1953, 1958 Friedman, William: 1939 Fuerstenberg, Eugenia Maurer: 1950, 1951 Fulton, W. Joseph (University of Chicago): 1951, 1952, 1954, 1955, 1956, 1958, 1959 G. P. Putnam's Sons: 1937 Genauer, Emily: 1947 George Walter Vincent Art Museum (Cordelia Sargent Pond): 1945, 1946, 1947, 1948 Gibran, Khalil: 1928 Gilbert, Dorothy: 1950 Godsoe, Robert Ulrich: 1951 Golden, Samuel (see also American Artists Group): 1946 Goodrich, Lloyd: 1942, 1947, 1950, 1951, 1952 Goodwin, Phillip L.: 1943 Gottlieb, Harry: 1944 Griffin, Maude: 1953 Graham, Martha: 1934, 1942 Grossman, Sid: 1938 Gwathmey, Robert: 1945 Harcourt, Brace and Company: 1947, 1949 Harper and Brothers: 1951 Hayes, Bartlett (Addison Gallery of Art): 1942, 1945, 1947 Hess, Thomas ( -- Art News -- ): 1950 Hope, Henry (University of Indiana): 1949, 1950 International Fine Arts Council: 1950 Irvine, Rosalind: 1952 J. B. Lippincott Company: 1951, 1952 Jacques Seligmann and Company: 1938 James, Rebecca Salsbury: 1951 Javitz, Romana: 1946, 1950, 1951, 1952, 1954, 1955 Jewell, Edward Alden: 1946, 1947 John Day Company: 1950, 1951, 1955 John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation: 1941, 1942, 1943, 1944, 1945, 1946, 1947, 1952, 1953 Jones, Howard Mumford (Harvard University): 1947 Kauffer, E. McKnight: 1946 Kent, Rockwell: 1945, 1946 Kirstein, Lincoln: 1941, 1943, 1944, 1946, 1947 Kish, Maurice: 1945 Kistler, Aline: 1941 Knight Publishers Inc.: 1938 Kuniyoshi, Yasuo: 1945 Landon, Edward: 1939 Lange, Dorothea: 1945 Larkin, Oliver: 1943, 1944, 1949 Leeper, John and Blanche (see also Corcoran Gallery of Art): 1950, 1951, 1954 Leighton, George: 1945 Lerner, Abe (see also World Publishing Company): 1950, 1951 Lipman, Jean: 1945, 1946, 1947, 1952 Lipton, Norman C. ( -- Good Photography -- ): 1941, 1942, 1943 Longman, Lester: 1940 MacMahon, Audrey (see also -- Parnassus -- ): 1936, 1938, 1939, 1940, 1942 The MacMillan Company: 1943, 1947, 1949, 1950 Magazine of Art -- : 1944, 1945, 1946, 1947 Magriel, Paul: 1954 Maurer, Alfred L.: 1951 Metropolitan Museum of Art: 1943, 1947, 1955 Miller, Dorothy: 1950, 1951 Milwaukee Art Institute: 1948 Minicam Photography -- : 1941, 1943, 1944 Modernage Furniture Corp.: 1945 More, Herman (Whitney Museum of American Art): 1954 Morton, Phillip: 1951, 1952 Mount Holyoke College: 1943 Munson-Williams-Proctor Institute: 1956 Museum of Modern Art: 1934, 1942, 1943, 1944, 1945 Museum of the City of New York: 1958 N.W. Ayer and Son: 1945, 1946, 1950 The Nation -- : 1940, 1955 National Gallery of Art: 1944, 1945 National Maritime Union: 1945 Navas, Elizabeth: 1952, 1953, 1954 Neuberger, Roy: 1952 The New American Library -- : 1955, 1956 The New Republic -- : 1944, 1947 The New School for Social Research: 1945 The New York Herald Tribune -- : 1945, 1947 New York Historical Society: 1943 New York Public Library: 1943, 1955, 1956 New York State Museum: 1949 The New York Times -- : 1940 Newark Museum: 1944 Newhall, Beaumont: 1944 Newhall, Nancy: 1945 Norman, Dorothy: 1934, 1937, 1938, 1940 Old Print Shop: 1945 Olmsted, Anna Wetherill (Syracuse Museum of Art): 1950 Opportunity -- : 1943, 1944, 1945 Ossorio, Alfonso: 1953 P. F. Collier and Son Corp.: 1947, 1948, 1949, 1951, 1952, 1953, 1954, 1955, 1957, 1958 Pach, Walter: 1955 Parnassus -- : 1939 Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art: 1951 Pepsi-Cola Company: 1944, 1945 Philadelphia Art Alliance: 1946 Pierre Matisse Gallery: 1938, 1939 Popular Photography -- : 1943 Portland Art Museum: 1940 Porter, Eliot: 1954 Printer's Ink (Carl Weiss): 1951 Railway Express Agency: 1949 Rivera, Diego: 1949 Rogers, John C.: 1941 Roosevelt, Eleanor: 1944 Rosenblum, Walter: 1944 Rothschild, Lincoln: 1937, 1942, 1945, 1946, 1949 Royce, William: 1933, 1934, 1935, 1942, 1958 Rukeyser, Muriel: 1941, 1950 San Francisco Chronicle -- : 1951, 1953 Sarah Lawrence College: 1942, 1943, 1944 Saturday Evening Post -- : 1946 Schlesinger, Arthur: 1943 School Art League of New York City: 1953, 1954 Schwimmer, Rosika: 1933, 1935, 1943 Sculpture's Guild: 1938, 1940, 1941 Segy, Ladislaw: 1943 Shelter -- : 1939 Sloan, John: 1951 Smith College Museum of Art: 1939, 1954 Soby, James Thrall: 1935, 1946, 1951 Social Science Research Council: 1948 Springfield Museum of Fine Art: 1938, 1940, 1941 Standard Oil: 1946 Stein, Gertrude: 1934 Sterling, Charles (Department of Painting, The Louvre): 1951 Strand, Paul: 1942 Survey Associates -- : 1938, 1939 Sweeney, James John: 1954, 1955, 1956 Thornton, Russell (see also Corcoran Gallery of Art): 1951, 1952, 1953 Time Magazine -- : 1945 Toklas, Alice B.: 1949 Traphagen School of Fashion: 1957 U.S. Camera -- : 1940 University of Chicago Library: 1951 University of Minnesota: 1951 University of Nebraska: 1953, 1954, 1956, 1957 Vanderbilt, Paul (Library of Congress): 1950 Vogue Magazine -- : 1953 Vose, Robert C.: 1945 Wade, Henry: 1954 Walker Art Center: 1946, 1947, 1949, 1950, 1951 Walker, Hudson: 1948, 1949, 1950, 1951, 1952 Ward, Lynd: 1942, 1945, 1947 Western Photography -- : 1946 Weston, Edward: 1943 Weyhe Gallery: 1940, 1951 Wheaton College: 1955 Wheeler, Monroe: 1941, 1942, 1943, 1944, 1945 Whitney Museum of American Art: 1946, 1947, 1951 Wichita Art Association: 1947 Williams, Hermann Warner (see also Corcoran Gallery of Art): 1950, 1951, 1952, 1954 Wilson, Sol: 1945 Worcester Art Museum: 1943, 1945 World Publishing Company: 1946, 1949, 1950, 1955 Yale University Art Gallery: 1949 Yale University Library: 1951, 1952, 1953, 1954 Young, Art: 1941 Young Artists Guild: 1948

Collection Restrictions:

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Collection Rights:

The Archives of American Art makes its archival collections available for non-commercial, educational and personal use unless restricted by copyright and/or donor restrictions, including but not limited to access and publication restrictions. AAA makes no representations concerning such rights and restrictions and it is the user's responsibility to determine whether rights or restrictions exist and to obtain any necessary permission to access, use, reproduce and publish the collections. Please refer to the Smithsonian's Terms of Use for additional information.

Collection Citation:

Elizabeth McCausland papers, 1838-1995, bulk 1920-1960. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.

Sponsor:

Funding for the processing and digitization of this collection was provided by the Terra Foundation for American Art

Identifier:

AAA.mccaeliz, Series 2

See more items in:

Elizabeth McCausland papers

Archival Repository:

Archives of American Art

GUID:

https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw9c5d24e2b-e768-46c3-ad9f-cdb7e238e691

EDAN-URL:

ead_component:sova-aaa-mccaeliz-ref60