United States. Internal Revenue Service Search this
Allied Forces. Supreme Headquarters. Monuments, Fine Arts and Archives Section Search this
Place:
Germany (Territory under Allied occupation, 1945-1955)
Place of publication, production, or execution:
United States
Physical Description:
25.7 Linear feet
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged as 10 series. Series 1: Biographical Materials, 1905-1983 (1.2 linear feet; Box 1-2, OV 28) Series 2: Correspondence, 1906-1981 (6.2 linear feet; Box 2-8, OV 28-29) Series 3: Lectures, 1909-1963 (4.6 linear feet; Box 8-12) Series 4: Writings and Notes, 1910-1974 (2 linear feet; Box 13-14) Series 5: American Defense Harvard Group, 1942-1946 (0.6 linear feet; Box 15) Series 6: Office of Military Government for Germany, 1947-1952 (0.3 linear feet; Box 15) Series 7: Exhibition Files, 1930-1969 (1 linear foot; Box 15-16, OV 29) Series 8: Research Files, 1922-1976 (7.5 linear feet; Box 16-24, OV 28-29) Series 9: Printed Material, 1921-1977 (0.5 linear feet; Box 24) Series 10: Photographic Materials, circa 1940-1960 (1.4 linear feet; Box 24-27, OV 28-29)
Access Note / Rights:
Use of original papers requires an appointment. Glass plate negatives are housed separately and not served to researchers.
Summary:
The papers of art historian and museum curator W.G. (William George) Constable measure 25.7 linear feet and date from 1905 to 1981, with the bulk of the material from 1920 to 1976. The papers include biographical material; professional and personal correspondence; extensive lectures, writings, and notes; exhibition and book research files; printed materials; and photographs, glass plate negatives, and slides. There is substantive correspondence related to Constable's participation in the American Defense Harvard Group and about the formation of the Roberts Commission, including correspondence with Ralph Perry, Hugh Hencken, Paul Sachs and George L. Stout. There are numerous official reports prepared by Constable after World War II for the U. S. Office of Military Government for Germany.
Citation:
W.G. Constable papers, 1905-1983, bulk 1920-1976. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Additional Forms:
The bulk of the collection was digitized in 2016 and is available on the Archives of American Art's website. Materials which have not been scanned include blank pages, blank versos of photographs, and duplicates. Negatives and slides of artwork in Series 2, 4, 5, and 8 have not been scanned. In some cases, exhibition catalogs and other publications have had their covers, title pages, and relevant pages scanned.
Funding:
Funding for the processing of this collection was provided by the Terra Foundation for American Art. Digitization of this collection was funded by the Samuel H. Kress Foundation. Glass plate negatives in this collection were digitized in 2019 with funding provided by the Smithsonian Women's Committee.
Use Note:
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.
Related Materials:
The Archives also holds additional materials related to W.G. Constable, including an oral history interview with Constable conducted by Robert Brown in 1972-1973, and a photograph and clipping of Constable donated by Eleanor Barton in 1982.
Additional W.G. Constable papers are located at archival materials are also located at St. Johns College in Cambridge,England; the Warburg Institute in London, England; the National Gallery in London, England; and the Society for the Protection of Science and Learning in London, England. Photographs of works art collected by Constable are found at the British Studies Center at Yale University. Records relating to his tenure at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston are housed there.
Biography Note:
W. G. (William George) Constable (1887-1976) was a museum curator and art historian who worked in England and Boston.
Born in Derby, England, Constable studied for the bar at Cambridge University, but was encouraged to pursue art over law by the Lord Chancellor who told him that law would be too strenuous after a two year convalescence from gassing during World War I. For three years, he studied at the Slade School and the Bartlett School of Architecture. In 1923, he joined the National Gallery of London where he became the Assistant Director in 1929. In 1930, he accepted the first Director's position at the newly formed Courtauld Institute, where he worked to develop one of the first programs on art history. In 1938, Constable became Curator of Paintings at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts and worked there until his retirement in 1957.
Throughout his career as an arts administrator, Constable remained an accomplished lecturer and held appointments as the Slade Professor of Art at Cambridge (1933-1936), Ryerson Lecturer at Yale University (1940), and the Lowell Lecturer at the Lowell Insitute (1958). As a researcher and art historian, he published a steady stream of essays on European and American art connoisseurship, and authored over ten scholarly books, including The Painter's Workshop (1953), Richard Wilson (1953), and Canaletto (1962), the definitive work on the Venetian master.
Constable was a trusted arts advisor and, in this capacity, worked for the Wadsworth Atheneum from 1943-1945. He also worked closely with Lord Beaverbrook to establish the National Gallery of Canada and later consulted for Sotheby's and the U. S. Internal Revenue Service.
In the years leading to World War II, Constable served as an advisor to the American Defense Harvard Group and was later appointed to the Commission for the Protection of Artistic and Historic Monuments in Europe (the Roberts Commission) by President Roosevelt. The Roberts Commission was responsible for the establishment of the U. S. Army's Monuments, Fine Arts, and Archives section. After the war, Constable served the U.S. government as a member of a commission responsible for the recovery of looted art work and the evaluation of the state of the arts in Germany and Italy.
After his retirement from the Boston Museum, Constable continued to research and write, and also served as president of the International Institute of Conservation (1958-1960) and the Renaissance Society of America (1959-1961). From 1957 to 1966, he worked on behalf of Christie's auction house, where he met with prospective clients and provided preliminary valuations of private art works and collections.
On February 4, 1976, Constable died in Cambridge, Massachusetts from natural causes.
Language Note:
The collection is in English.
Provenance:
The papers of W.G. Constable were donated in multiple gifts from 1978 to 1979 and in 1987 to 1988 by his son Giles Constable. Additional material regarding Constable's research on Canaletto was donated by researcher J.G. Links in 1985.
Digitization Note:
This site provides access to the papers of W. G. (William George) Constable in the Archives of American Art that were digitized in 2016, and total 59,054 images.
Location Note:
Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, 750 9th St. NW, Washington, D.C. 20001
