An interview with Allan Sekula conducted 2011 August 20-2012 February 14, by Mary Panzer, for the Archives of American Art at Sekula's studio and home in Los Angeles, California and at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, New York.
Sekula speaks of his career and some of the mediums he works in; language and contemporary art; Roland Barthes; his relation to contemporary art; west coast conceptualism; genre switches; realism; documentary photography; Belgium and the industrial revolution; Meunier; minor figures; art history and marginalism; Roberto Matta; World War I; Homer Folks; Fish Story; historic cinema; economic factors of art shows and publication; galleries and the art world; growing up and his family; his father and moving; Ohio; his brothers and sisters; San Pedro; demographics of students at school; sports at school; Vietnam; protests; cross country and swimming; California; fishing; college; U.C. system; declaring a major; John Altoon; Ed Kienholz; exposure to art; visiting museums; Marcuse's classes; Baldessari's classes; course work and student life; student demonstrations; working in a library and exposure to books; father losing his job; science and working as a chemical technician; politics; his uncle committing suicide; moving away from his father; the draft; John Birch; Students for a Democratic Society; his mother; politics of his parents; Aerospace Folk Tales, autodidacts and scholarship; San Diego and Mexico; obtaining a camera and starting to use it; art school; CalArts; UCSD; Meditations on a Triptych; David Salle; Fred Lonidier; Phel Steinmetz; MFA and art training; poets; story of Allen Ginsberg and one of Sekula's sculptures; production and the audience; A Photograph is Worth a Thousand Questions, photography and the burden of tradition; pictorialism; moving to New York; Artforum; October; New York music scene; Captain Beefheart; Bo Diddley; Little Richard; Steichen and aerial photography; origins of October; New Criterion; Art Critic's Grant; teaching at Ohio State; television; technological historians; New York subway and getting a ticket for using French money; RISD lectures; Long Beach; photography; collages; Metro Pictures; New Topographics; School as a Factory; moral choice and the viewer; work method and the audience; Social Criticism and Art Practice; east and west coasts; Ed Ruscha; documentary; film, Los Angeles; cinema and social history; Ohio State Department of Photography and Cinema; Los Angeles Plays Itself; Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador; Ohio State campus, anti-Semitism; Ronald Reagan and protest; influences and colleagues; intellectual genealogy; Michael Graves and Ohio State architecture; Bad Ohio; tenure; University Exposed; AIDS issue of October; The Body and the Archive; making film; Korean War; collectors and images. Sekula also recalls Eleanor Antin, Jeff Wall, Terry Fox, Lewis Hine, Walker Evans, Paul Saltman, Marcuse, Baldessari, Sacvan Bercovitch, Stanley Miller, Jef Raskin, Paul Brach, David Antin, Howard Fried, Peter Van Riper, Alison Knowles, Dick Higgins, Manny Farber, Ihab Hassan, Diane Wakoski, Jackson Mac Low, Martha Rosler, Lenny Neufeld, Joshua Neufeld, David Wing, Brian Connell, Max Kozloff, Ian Burn, Mel Ramsden, Carole Conde, Karl Beveridge, Barry Rosens, Tom Crow, John Copeland, Harry Lunn, Hilton Kramer, Grace Mayer, Carol Duncan, Eva Cockroft, Richard Pommer, Rosalind Krauss, Sally Stein, Paddy Chayefsky, John Hanhardt, Mel Ramsden, Sarah Charlesworth, Jospeh Kosuth, Baruch Kirschenbaum, Robert Heinecken, Brian O'Doherty, Howard Becker, Jay Ruby, Jerry Liebling, Anna Wilkie, Ronald Feldman, John Gibson, David Ross, Britt Salvesen, Larry Sultan, Mike Mandel, Roy Ascott, Ilene Segalove, Paul Schimmel, DeeDee Halleck, Noel Burch, Joan Braderman, Woody Hayes, Thom Andersen, John Quigley, Ron Green, Kasper Koenig, Dan Graham, Jonathan Green, Christa Wolf, Catherine Lord, Ben Lifson, and Annette Michelson.
Biographical / Historical:
Allan Sekula (1951-2013) was a photographer, filmmaker, and writer, based at the California Institute of the Arts in Valencia, California. Mary Panzer (1955- ) is a historian from New York, New York.
Provenance:
This interview is part of the Archives of American Art Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and administrators.
The papers of librarian, curator, and photographer Paul Vanderbilt (1905-1992) measure 25.2 linear feet and date from 1854 to 1992 with the bulk of the material dating from 1945 to 1992. The papers are comprised of biographical materials, personal and business correspondence, interviews, writings and notes, fourteen diaries and two diary fragments, reference and project files, photographic materials, sound recordings, and professional files.
Scope and Contents:
The papers of librarian, curator, and photographer Paul Vanderbilt (1905-1992) measure 25.2 linear feet and date from 1854 to 1992 with the bulk of the material dating from 1945 to 1992. The papers are comprised of biographical materials, personal and business correspondence, interviews, writings and notes, fourteen diaries and two diary fragments, reference and project files, photographic materials, sound recordings, and professional files.
Biographical materials include seven appointment books, family letters and documents, and an honorary degree from the University of Wisconsin.
Vanderbilt's correspondence is with colleagues, and organizations including Dorothea Lange, Beaumont Newhall, Roy Stryker, and Julia Vanderbilt.
Sound recordings of interviews of Vanderbilt conducted by Mary North Allen, Barbara Crane, Carl Haywood, Jack Holzhueter, and Jane Plunkett. Other recordings are of Vanderbilt discussing his personal and professional life.
Writings by Paul Vanderbilt include drafts of Between the Landscape and its Other, poems, lectures, student papers, and notes on a variety of subjects. Writings by others are found for William Blake, Gregory Conniff, Woody Guthrie, Michael Lesy, Arnold R. Pilling, Jesse H. Shera, and Roy Stryker.
Fourteen of Vanderbilt's personal diaries and two diary fragments date from 1926 to 1990.
Reference files consist of printed materials on art, art historians, book reviews, library and information studies, photography and microphotography techniques, and other themes of interest to Vanderbilt. Project files include material from Vanderbilt's various projects, including a guide to the iconography of Iran, the reclassification of FSA photographs, and the Union Library Catalog of Philadelphia.
Included in professional files are administrative records, correspondence, exhibition files, project files, printed material, and research files created during Vanderbilt's career at the Library of Congress, Graphic History Society, State Historical Society of Wisconsin, Philadelphia Museum of Art, and the Farm Security Administration. Also found are materials for Vanderbilt's work as a consultant for several organizations, lecture documents, and art-related workshops.
Photographs are by and of Paul Vanderbilt, the staff of the Library of Congress, and George Talbot. Negatives include images for the Farm Security Administration. Bibliography cards and photographs of artwork from the Library of Congress can be found on microfilm reels within the collection.
Also found are fourteen unidentified sound recordings.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged as 10 series.
Series 1: Biographical Materials, 1894-1992 (0.5 linear feet; Box 1)
Series 2: Correspondence, 1933-1992 (1.5 linear feet; Box 1-2)
Series 3: Interviews, 1967-1992 (1.5 linear feet; Box 2-4)
Series 4: Writings and Notes, 1887-1992 (4.0 linear feet; Box 4-8)
Series 5: Diaries, 1926-1990 (0.5 linear feet; Box 8)
Series 6: Reference Files, 1877-1992 (2.5 linear feet; Box 8-10, 26)
Series 7: Project Files, 1935-1990 (3.0 linear feet; Box 10-13)
Series 8: Professional Files, 1854-1991 (11.7 linear feet; Box 13-24)
Series 9: Photographic Materials, 1912-1980s (0.5 linear feet; Box 24)
Series 10: Sound Recordings, circa 1980s (0.5 linear feet; Box 24-25)
Biographical / Historical:
Paul Vanderbilt (1905-1992) was a librarian, curator, and photographer active in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Washington, D.C. and Madison, Wisconsin.
Paul Vanderbilt was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts and educated in Germany, Switzerland, and Massachusetts. He attended Amherst College from 1923 to 1925 before transferring to Harvard where he graduated with a BA in art history in 1927. After graduation, Vanderbilt traveled to Europe where he studied at the American School of Librarianship in Paris and the Institut de Psychologie Bibliogique in Lausanne. In 1929, he returned to the United States and became a librarian at the Philadelphia Museum of Art and director of the Union Library Catalog project for the Philadelphia area.
In 1941 Vanderbilt began working under Roy Stryker cataloging the extensive photographic survey collection of the Farm Security Administration and U.S. Office of War Information. The collection is a rich resource of images of American life between 1935 and 1944. In 1943, the FSA photograph collection was transferred to the Library of Congress and Vanderbilt went with it as the curator of the newly formed Prints and Photographs Division, eventually becoming the Division chief of fine arts.
During the early 1950s, Vanderbilt also served as the director of the Graphic History Society of America. There he published a quarterly bulletin Eye to Eye and developed a guide to iconography in Iran. In 1954, he became the Curator of Iconographic Collections at the State Historical Society of Wisconsin and worked there until he retired in 1972.
Vanderbilt remained active after retirement. He became an artist-in-residence at the Apeiron Workshops, worked as a photographer for the Seagram courthouse project and the George Eastman House, and was a presenter at multiple conferences. Vanderbilt devoted much of his later life to working on his book titled Between the Landscape and its Other which was published posthumously after Vanderbilt's death in 1992.
Related Materials:
Also found at the Archives of American Art is an oral history interview with Paul Vanderbilt conducted by Richard Doud on November 10, 1964.
Provenance:
The collection was donated in 1981 by Paul Vanderbilt and in 1993 by his estate through John W. Winn, executor.
Restrictions:
Use of original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Washington, D.C. Research Center. Use of archival audiovisual recordings with no duplicate access copy requires advance notice.
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.
Biographical information, correspondence, photographs, writings, research and subject files, works of art, motion picture film, interview transcripts, financial material, printed material and miscellany relating to Mitchell Siporin.
Personal photographs of Siporin, stage sets and art work by him.
Circa 1000 letters relating to his painting, his teaching, his service as a war artist during World War II and the Federal Art Project, including letters from Sheldon Cheney, Edith Halpert, Edward Rowan, Holger Cahill, Edward Millman, Max Abramowitz, Lee Nordness, and others; biographical material; notes and lectures; art history research files; sketches; price lists for his art works; expense accounts and tax records; blueprints and architectural plans; photographs, including WWII photographs and photographs of his art work; reproductions of his art work; exhibition catalogs; and clippings.
Letters from Siporin to his brother and sister-in-law, Seymour and Mary Sipporin, as well as letters to Siporin from Jack Levine and Carl Holty. Writings, including scripts for lectures, journal articles, an unfinished novel by Siporin, a journal describing his experience in North Africa during WWII as a war photographer and painter, notes taken during sabbaticals, and a eulogy written by Siporin for Henry Varnum Poor. Photographs of Siporin with friends and family, including Yasuo Kuniyoshi, Peter Pollack, Edward Millman, and Philip Guston and a portrait of Siporin by Arnold Newman, as well as Siporin's artwork. Subject files, including the Woodstock Art Conference, American Artists' Congress, the American Federation of Arts, WWII, the Army at War exhibit, Siporin's involvement in the WPA, as well material on Siporin's Haymarket drawings used for a 1934 issue of Left Front magazine. Works of art including two studies for St. Louis, Missouri, Post Office murals, and a sketch of Siporin by S.P. Kaufman.
A VHS video and DVD copy, transferred from 16mm motion picture film, showing Siporin at work on his St. Louis frescoes (b&w, 3 min., no sound). Interview transcripts of an interview with Siporin conducted by Geofrrey Swift as well as an interview with Siporin conducted by Melvyn Bragg for the BBC. Financial records, including sales contracts. Printed material, including exhibition catalogs and programs, and newspaper clippings as well as an exhibition poster from Babcock Galleries. Also included is a small amount of material relating to Jennie Siporin, Mitchell Siporin's mother.
Biographical / Historical:
Mitchell Siporin (1910-1976) was a painter and photographer from Newton, Massachusetts.
Provenance:
The collection has been donated in several installments beginning in 1978 when Siporin's widow Miriam lent materials for microfilming (reels 1328 and 1332). She also donated materials at that time and again in 1992, at which time it was also microfilmed (reels 2011-12 and 2061). In 2003, Judith Siporin, Siporin's daughter, donated the materials previously lent on reel 1332 and 16mm motion picture film. In 2005 Mary Siporin, Mitchell Siporin's sister-in law donated papers, and in 2008 Judith donated another installment.
Restrictions:
Use of original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C., Research Center. Contact Reference Services for more information.
An interview of Todd Webb conducted 1990 September 4-1992 May 22, by Robert F. Brown, for the Archives of American Art. Webb speaks of his childhood in Detroit and Ontario, Canada; friendship with photographer Harry Callahan and the influence of a course by Ansel Adams on them both; service as a Navy photographer in World War II; development of a close friendship with Alfred Stieglitz and Georgia O'Keeffe during the late 1940s; photographic assignments with FORTUNE magazine for Standard Oil Company under Roy Stryker, and in England and France under Rene Leonhardt, a photo agency; writing and photographic essays on the American West; assignments in 1960s for the United Nations; sale, in the 1970s, of negatives and work to date to the collector George Rinhart; residence in Maine; and his frequent travels.
Biographical / Historical:
Todd Webb (1905-2000) was a photographer and writer from Bath, Maine. Born Charles Clayton Webb III, in Detroit, Michigan, in 1905. Studied with Ansel Adams.
General:
Originally recorded on 3 sound cassettes. Reformatted in 2010 as 5 digital wav files. Duration is 3 hrs., 32 min.
Provenance:
These interviews are part of the Archives' Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and others.
An interview of Gordon Parks conducted 1964 Dec. 30, by Richard Doud, for the Archives of American Art, in New York, N.Y.
Parks speaks of his background; his early interest in photography; influences on him; his early career as a fashion photographer; joining the Farm Security Administration; his early impressions of the FSA; Roy Stryker's influence and guidance; how being Black and the experience of racism influenced his ability to relate to his subjects; memorable people he met during the FSA years; his post-FSA career, including his novels and his work for LIFE; and his opinions about the FSA's impact on people and on photography.
Biographical / Historical:
Gordon Parks (1912-2006) was a filmmaker, author, photographer, and composer from New York, N.Y.
General:
Originally recorded on 1 sound tape reel. Reformatted in 2010 as 1 digital wav files. Duration is 1 hr., 1 min.
Provenance:
This interview conducted as part of the Archives of American Art's New Deal and the Arts project, which includes over 400 interviews of artists, administrators, historians, and others involved with the federal government's art programs and the activities of the Farm Security Administration in the 1930s and early 1940s.
Restrictions:
Transcript available on the Archives of American Art website.
Occupation:
Photographers -- New York (State) -- New York Search this
Filmmakers -- New York (State) -- New York Search this
Authors -- New York (State) -- New York Search this
Composers -- New York (State) -- New York Search this
An interview of Ben Shahn conducted 1964 April 14, by Richard K. Doud, for the Archives of American Art New Deal and the Arts Project.
Shahn speaks of his travels and work for the Farm Security Administration (FSA); the American image as portrayed by FSA photographs; techniques and materials; exhibitions and publications of his work; and the effectiveness of the FSA project overall. He recalls Roy Stryker, Walker Evans, Arthur Rothstein, Edwin Rosskam and Dorothea Lange.
Biographical / Historical:
Ben Shahn (1898-1969) was a painter and photographer from Roosevelt, N.J.
General:
Originally recorded 1 sound tape reel. Reformatted in 2010 as 2 digital wav files. Duration is 1 hr., 23 min.
Provenance:
This interview conducted as part of the Archives of American Art's New Deal and the Arts project, which includes over 400 interviews of artists, administrators, historians, and others involved with the federal government's art programs and the activities of the Farm Security Administration in the 1930s and early 1940s.
Restrictions:
Transcript available on the Archives of American Art website.
An interview of Dorothea Lange conducted 1964 May 22, by Richard Doud, for the Archives of American Art.
Lange speaks of her decision of photography as a career; working in commercial photography; the development of her individual style; the organization of the Farm Security Administration and her association with it; camaraderie among the FSA staff; Roy Stryker's influence and guidance and political abilities; the subjects of photographs and their reactions to being photographed; the people she encountered and her feelings about them, including migratory workers and Dust Bowl farmers; opinions of her colleagues; what made the FSA a success; trends in the field of photography and photojournalism and its future.
She recalls Walker Evans, Arthur Rothstein, John Vachon and Paul Vanderbilt.
Biographical / Historical:
Dorothea Lange (1895-1965) was a photographer in California. Lange worked on FSA photograph project during the Depression.
General:
Originally recorded on 1 sound tape reel. Reformatted in 2010 as 2 digital wav files. Duration is 1 hr., 51 min.
Provenance:
This interview conducted as part of the Archives of American Art's New Deal and the Arts project, which includes over 400 interviews of artists, administrators, historians, and others involved with the federal government's art programs and the activities of the Farm Security Administration in the 1930s and early 1940s.
Restrictions:
Transcript available on the Archives of American Art website.
Topic:
Documentary photography -- United States Search this
Photographers -- California -- Interviews Search this
An interview of Russell and Jean Lee conducted 1964 June 2, by Richard Doud, for the Archives of American Art.
Russell speaks of his background and education; his early interest in photography; meeting Roy Stryker and Ben Shahn; early assignments with FSA covering floods and droughts in the Midwest; overcoming technical problems while traveling around; cameras he experimented with; working in small towns and rural areas; working under Roy Stryker. He recalls John Vachon, Arthur Rothstein, and Walker Evans. Jean speaks of her first association with the FSA and working under Paul Vanderbilt. Both give personal opinions of the value of the work produced by the FSA, and speak of feelings toward the rural people who were the focus of the FSA project.
Biographical / Historical:
Russell Lee (1903-1986) was a photographer with the Farm Security Administration. Jean Russell was an administrator under Paul Vanderbilt with the Farm Security Administration of Austin, Tex.
General:
Originally recorded on 1 sound tape reel. Reformatted in 2010 as 2 digital wav files. Duration is 1 hr., 44 min.
Provenance:
This interview conducted as part of the Archives of American Art's New Deal and the Arts project, which includes over 400 interviews of artists, administrators, historians, and others involved with the federal government's art programs and the activities of the Farm Security Administration in the 1930s and early 1940s.
Occupation:
Arts administrators -- Texas -- Austin -- Interviews Search this
An interview of Marion Post Wolcott conducted 1965 January 18, by Richard Doud, for the Archives of American Art, at the artist's home, in Mill Valley, California.
Wolcott speaks of her background in photography; experimenting with cameras; working as a photojournalist; joining the Farm Security Administration project; her first assignment photographing West Virginia coal miners; the camaraderie among the FSA photographers; the propagandistic aspects of the work; how the program was run and work assigned; her interest in landscapes; problems of being a woman photographer; the learning experience of meeting Americans all over the country; and the FSA project's long-term value. She recalls Roy Stryker.
Biographical / Historical:
Marion Post Wolcott (1910-1990) was a photographer from San Francisco, California.
General:
Originally recorded on 1 sound cassette. Reformatted in 2010 as 1 digital wav file. Duration is 1 hr., 4 min.
Provenance:
This interview conducted as part of the Archives of American Art's New Deal and the Arts project, which includes over 400 interviews of artists, administrators, historians, and others involved with the federal government's art programs and the activities of the Farm Security Administration in the 1930s and early 1940s.
Restrictions:
Transcript available on the Archives of American Art website.
Topic:
Women photographers -- California -- San Francisco -- Interviews Search this
