Search Results

Author:

Middendorf/Lane Gallery  Search this

Women's Caucus for Art  Search this

Subject:

Bishop, Isabel 1902-1988  Search this

Burke, Selma 1900-  Search this

Neel, Alice 1900-1984  Search this

Nevelson, Louise 1899-1988  Search this

O'Keeffe, Georgia 1887-1986  Search this

Physical description:

32 p. : b ill. (some col.) 28 cm

Type:

Exhibitions

Date:

1979

20th century

Topic:

Art, American  Search this

Call number:

N8354 .W89

N8354.W89

Data Source:

Smithsonian Libraries

EDAN-URL:

edanmdm:siris_sil_128815

Creator:

Richardson, Edgar Preston, 1902-1985  Search this

Richardson, Constance, 1905-  Search this

Names:

Archives of American Art  Search this

Castano Galleries (Boston, Mass.)  Search this

Detroit Institute of Arts  Search this

Henry Francis du Pont Winterthur Museum  Search this

Historical Society of Pennsylvania  Search this

Macbeth Gallery  Search this

National Collection of Fine Arts (U.S.)  Search this

National Portrait Gallery (Smithsonian Institution)  Search this

Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts  Search this

Philadelphia Museum of Art  Search this

White House (Washington, D.C.)  Search this

Peale family  Search this

Allen, Joseph  Search this

Allston, Washington, 1779-1843  Search this

Andrews, Wayne  Search this

Aram, Siegfried F.  Search this

Bishop, Isabel, 1902-1988  Search this

Bostick, William A.  Search this

Bouché, Louis, 1896-1969  Search this

Boyd, Julian P. (Julian Parks), 1903-  Search this

Castano, Giovanni, 1896-1978  Search this

Cohn, Harold  Search this

Copeland, Lammot du Pont  Search this

Culver, Charles B. (Charles Beach), 1908-1967  Search this

Fleischman, Lawrence A. (Lawrence Arthur), 1925-1997  Search this

Flexner, James Thomas, 1908-2003  Search this

Frankenstein, Alfred V. (Alfred Victor), 1906-1981  Search this

Fredericks, Marshall M., 1908-1998  Search this

Freeman, Michael W.  Search this

Garrison, Eve Josephson, 1903-2003  Search this

Groce, George C., 1899-  Search this

Hardy, Jeremiah Pearson, 1800-1889  Search this

Heil, Walter, 1890-1973  Search this

Hopper, Edward, 1882-1967  Search this

Jungwirth, Irene G. (Irene Gayas), 1913-  Search this

Krentzin, Earl, 1929-  Search this

Kuniyoshi, Yasuo, 1889-1953  Search this

Lee-Smith, Hughie  Search this

Lewis, W. S. (Wilmarth Sheldon), 1895-1979  Search this

Lynes, Russell, 1910-1991  Search this

Marsh, Reginald, 1898-1954  Search this

Mast, Gerald, 1908-1971  Search this

McDermott, John Francis, 1902-  Search this

Middeldorf, Ulrich Alexander, 1901-  Search this

Morse, John D., 1906-  Search this

Moser, Liselotte, 1906-1983  Search this

O'Keeffe, Georgia, 1887-1986  Search this

Oliver, Andrew, 1906-  Search this

Peale, Charles Willson, 1741-1827  Search this

Pleasants, J. Hall (Jacob Hall), 1873-1957  Search this

Ripley, S. Dillon (Sidney Dillon), 1913-2001  Search this

Rockefeller, John D., 1906-  Search this

Rockefeller, Nelson A. (Nelson Aldrich), 1908-1979  Search this

Rutledge, Anna Wells  Search this

Sellers, Charles Coleman, 1903-  Search this

Sheeler, Charles, 1883-1965  Search this

Simper, Fred, 1914-  Search this

Simpson, Corelli C. W.  Search this

Soria, Regina, 1911-  Search this

Spark, Victor D. (Victor David), 1898-1991  Search this

Speck, Walter, 1895-  Search this

Stevens, William B.  Search this

Valentiner, Wilhelm Reinhold, 1880-1958  Search this

Vose, Robert C. (Robert Churchill), 1911-1998  Search this

Watkins, Franklin Chenault, 1894-1972  Search this

Wedda, John  Search this

Woolfenden, William E. (William Edward), 1918-1995  Search this

Wyeth, Andrew, 1917-2009  Search this

Extent:

28.7 Linear feet

Type:

Collection descriptions

Archival materials

Photographs

Manuscripts

Interviews

Diaries

Transcripts

Sketches

Lectures

Place:

Detroit (Mich.)

Date:

1814-1996

bulk 1921-1996

Summary:

The papers of art historian E. P. Richardson measure 28.7 linear feet and date from 1814-1996, with the bulk of the materials dating from 1921-1996. Within the papers are scattered biographical materials; acquisition files for Richardson's personal art collection; professional and personal correspondence with colleagues, art historians and critics, artists, museums, galleries, and dealers; numerous writings, including manuscripts and research files for his published books, articles, and lectures; general research notebooks and files compiled by Richardson on a wide variety of art-related topics and artists; professional and committee files; as well as a smaller amount of Constance C. Richardson's papers.

Scope and Contents:

The papers of art historian E. P. Richardson measure 28.7 linear feet and date from 1814-1996, with the bulk of the materials dating from 1921-1996. Within the papers are scattered biographical materials; acquisition files for Richardson's personal art collection; professional and personal correspondence with colleagues, art historians and critics, artists, museums, galleries, and dealers; numerous writings, including manuscripts and research files for his published books, articles, and lectures; general research notebooks and files compiled by Richardson on a wide variety of art-related topics and artists; professional and committee files; as well as a smaller amount of Constance C. Richardson's papers.

Biographical materials include certificates, awards, and honorary degrees, membership information, personal and family photographs, a few sketches, and a transcript of an oral history Interview with E.P. Richardson conducted by the National Endowment for the Humanities in 1982.

There are acquisitions files for the Richardsons' personal art collection that invoices, photographs, correspondence with galleries and collectors, appraisals, price lists, and artwork examination forms.

Correspondence is with colleagues, art dealers, collectors, museums and museum curators, foreign scholars, organizations, galleries, artists, art historians and critics, publishers, editors, librarians, friends, and family. Topics regard purchasing art for various collections, consultations about art and collecting including authentications and attributions, publishing, general art history, lectures, and personal matters, among other topics. There is correspondence with the Archives of American Art, Castano Galleries, Lawrence Fleischman, James Thomas Flexner, Alfred V. Frankenstein, George Croce, Walter Heil, Earl Krentzin, Wilmarth Lewis, Russel Lynes, John Francis McDermott, Philadelphia Museum of Art, J. Hall Pleasants, Anna Rutledge, Charles Sellers, Smithsonian Institution, Regina Soria, Victor Spark, William Stevens, Robert Vose, William Woolfenden, and many others. Scattered correspondence with artists is with Isabel Bishop, Louis Bouche, William Bostick, Eve Garrison, Edward Hopper, Irene Jungwirth, Yasuo Kuniyoshi, Hughie Lee-Smith, Reginald Marsh, Gerald Mast, Georgia O'Keefe, Charles Sheeler, Walt Speck, and John Wedda, among many others. The greatest extent of correspondence is with Andrew Wyeth, Harold Cohn, and Frederick Simper. There is also personal correspondence with family and friends, and between E.P. and Constance Richardson.

E.P. Richardson's prominence as an art historian, writer, and expert on collecting is well documented through his prolific writings. Materials include drafts, notes, typescripts, and outlines for articles, exhibition catalog essays, and lectures. Also found are research files and publishing documentation for Richardson's books, including Washington Allston: A Study of the Romantic Artist in America (1948), Painting in America (1956), Charles Willson Peale and his World (1983), and American Romantic Painting (1944). There are also miscellaneous notes and four diaries. Two of the diaries comment on the social and cultural life of Detroit; the authenticity of paintings; Richardson's reflections on contemporary American painting, thoughts about museums, dealers, artists, and art historians (especially Wilhelm R. Valentiner); and travel.

Notebooks compiled by Richardson on a wide variety art-related topics cover nearly six decades. There are also numerous research files organized Richardson about individual artists and art history. And, the art collector files contain reference materials about art collectors and their collections including Lamont du Pont Copeland, Michael W. Freeman, Nelson Rockefeller, Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Allen, and the Marquis de Somerlous. There are three index card file boxes containing bibliographic data on published books and articles.

Professional and committee files document Richardson's professional and consulting work for the Art Quarterly, Detroit Institute of Arts, National Collection of Fine Arts, the National Portrait Gallery, the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, the John D. Rockefeller III collection, Winterthur Museum, the White House, and the Historical Society of Pennsylvania.

Constance C. Richardson's papers include business and professional correspondence with various institutions, most extensively with the Macbeth Gallery. In addition, there is a smaller amount of personal correspondence, photographs and slides of her artworks, printed materials, two illustrated notebooks on her work, and miscellaneous notes. Also included is Constance's artist palette.

Biographical / Historical:

Art historian, museum director, and writer E. P. (Edgar Preston) Richardson (1902-1985) served as director of the Detroit Institute of Arts (1945-1962) and Winterthur Museum (1963-1966). He was also a board member of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts from 1966-1977 and, in 1954, co-founded the Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.

E. P. Richardson was born in 1902 in Glens Falls, New York and died in Philadelphia in 1985. He graduated from Williams College in Massachusetts in 1925 and studied painting at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts for the three years following graduation. In 1930 he became educational secretary at the Detroit Institute of Arts, was quickly named assistant director in 1933, and served as director from 1945 to 1962. He left Detroit to take the position of director of the Winterthur Museum, where he remained until 1966. Richardson married Constance Coleman in 1931. Born in Berlin, Germany in 1905, Constance Coleman Richardson was an award-winning and widely exhibited realist style painter of American landscapes. She gave up painting in the 1960s and died in 2002.

While at the Detroit Institute of Arts, E. P. Richardson co-founded the Archives of American Art with Lawrence Fleischman, and served as the Archives' first director. Richardson was also art advisor to John D. Rockefeller III for over ten years, editor of Art Quarterly from 1938 to 1967, and a member of various boards, including the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, the Smithsonian Arts Commission, and the National Portrait Gallery. He authored numerous books including ones on artists Washington Allston and Charles Willson Peale, and The Way of Western Art: American Romantic Painting (1939), Painting in America: The Story of Four Hundred and Fifty Years (1956), A Short History of Painting in America (1963), and American Art, an Exhibition of the Collection of Mr. and Mrs. John D. Rockefeller, 3d (1976).

Related Materials:

Related collections among the holdings of the Archives of American Art include an interview with E.P. Richardson dated February 6, 1978 conducted by Linda Downs; and several miscellaneous manuscripts that include an E.P. Richardson Letter to Rockwell Kent, June 15 1959; E.P. Richardson letters to Lawrence Arthur Fleischman, May 13, 1962 and August 22 1954; and a Yasuo Kunioshi letter to E.P. Richardson, July 25 1948.

Additional E.P. Richardson papers are found at the Detroit Institute of Arts and in the archives of the Henry Francis du Pont Winterthur Museum.

Separated Materials:

The Archives of American Art also holds material lent for microfilming (reel D46) including E.P. Richardson's research material on Jeremiah P. Hardy. These materials are housed at the Smithsonian American Art Museum Library and are not described in the collection container inventory.

Provenance:

Edith Wilkinson first donated a letter to E. P. Richardson from herself in 1957. E.P. Richardson donated papers to the Archives of American Art in 1958 and 1960 and lent materials for microfilming in 1961. Addition material was donated by Constance Richardson in 1985, and by Martha Fleischman in 2003.

Restrictions:

Use of original material requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C. Research Center. Contact References Services for more information.

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.

Occupation:

Authors -- Michigan -- Detroit  Search this

Art historians -- United States  Search this

Topic:

Art -- Collectors and collecting  Search this

Painting, American  Search this

Art, American  Search this

Romanticism  Search this

Art -- History -- Study and teaching  Search this

Genre/Form:

Photographs

Manuscripts

Interviews

Diaries

Transcripts

Sketches

Lectures

Citation:

Edgar P. Richardson papers, 1814-1996, bulk 1921-1996. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.

Sponsor:

Funding for the processing of this collection was provided by the Smithsonian Institution Collections Care and Preservation Fund.

Identifier:

AAA.richedga

See more items in:

E.P. (Edgar Preston) and Constance Richardson papers

Archival Repository:

Archives of American Art

GUID:

https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw9f0a154af-52ef-402b-b06d-60a290eec749

EDAN-URL:

ead_collection:sova-aaa-richedga

Interviewee:

Halpert, Edith Gregor, 1900-1970  Search this

Interviewer:

Phillips, Harlan B. (Harlan Buddington), 1920-  Search this

Names:

C.W. Kraushaar Art Galleries  Search this

Daniel Gallery  Search this

Downtown Gallery (New York, N.Y.)  Search this

Ferargil Galleries  Search this

Grand Central Art Galleries  Search this

M. Knoedler & Co.  Search this

Montross Gallery  Search this

New Gallery (New York, N.Y.)  Search this

Bacon, Peggy, 1895-1987  Search this

Barr, Alfred H., Jr., 1902-1981  Search this

Barrie, Erwin S., 1886-1983  Search this

Benton, Thomas Hart, 1889-1975  Search this

Brackman, Robert, 1898-  Search this

Bridgman, George Brant, 1864-1943  Search this

Brixey, Richard de Wolfe  Search this

Cahill, Holger, 1887-1960  Search this

Calder, Alexander, 1898-1976  Search this

Cary, Elisabeth Luther, 1867-1936  Search this

Chase, William Merritt, 1849-1916  Search this

Coleman, Glenn O., 1887-1932  Search this

Crowninshield, Frank, 1872-1947  Search this

Daniel, Charles, 1878-1971  Search this

Davis, Stuart, 1892-1964  Search this

Demuth, Charles, 1883-1935  Search this

Deskey, Donald, 1894-  Search this

Dove, Arthur Garfield, 1880-1946  Search this

Dudensing, F. Valentine, 1892-1967  Search this

Fergusson, John Duncan, 1874-1961  Search this

Field, Hamilton Easter  Search this

Force, Juliana, 1876-1948  Search this

Ford, Ford Madox, 1873-1939  Search this

Frost, Robert, 1874-1963  Search this

Fuller, R. Buckminster (Richard Buckminster), 1895-1983  Search this

Goodyear, A. Conger (Anson Conger), 1877-1964  Search this

Greenberg, Clement, 1909-1994  Search this

Halpert, Samuel, 1884-1930  Search this

Hartley, Marsden, 1877-1943  Search this

Hirsch, Stefan, 1899-1964  Search this

Hopkinson, Charles, 1869-1962  Search this

Hopper, Edward, 1882-1967  Search this

Johns, Jasper, 1930-  Search this

Kline, Franz, 1910-1962  Search this

Knox, Seymour H., 1898-1990  Search this

Kroll, Leon, 1884-1974  Search this

Kuhn, Walt, 1877-1949  Search this

Kuniyoshi, Yasuo, 1889-1953  Search this

Laurent, Robert, 1890-1970  Search this

Lawrence, Jacob, 1917-2000  Search this

Levine, Jack, 1915-2010  Search this

Levy, Julien  Search this

Locke, Charles, 1899-  Search this

Luks, George Benjamin, 1867-1933  Search this

Léger, Fernand, 1881-1955  Search this

Marin, John, Jr., 1915?-1988  Search this

McBride, Henry, 1867-1962  Search this

Mellon, Paul  Search this

Mercer, Henry Chapman  Search this

Montross, N. E. (Newman E), 1849-1932  Search this

Noguchi, Isamu, 1904-1988  Search this

O'Keeffe, Georgia, 1887-1986  Search this

Pascin, Jules, 1885-1930  Search this

Picasso, Pablo, 1881-1973  Search this

Pollock, Jackson, 1912-1956  Search this

Pound, Ezra, 1885-1972  Search this

Rivera, Diego, 1886-1957  Search this

Robinson, Edward G., 1893-1973  Search this

Rockefeller, Abby Aldrich  Search this

Saarinen, Aline B. (Aline Bernstein), 1914-1972  Search this

Saklatwalla, Beram K.  Search this

Sandburg, Carl, 1878-1967  Search this

Shahn, Ben, 1898-1969  Search this

Sheeler, Charles, 1883-1965  Search this

Siporin, Mitchell, 1910-1976  Search this

Soutine, Chaim, 1893-1943  Search this

Steichen, Edward, 1879-1973  Search this

Stein, Gertrude, 1874-1946  Search this

Stella, Frank  Search this

Stern, Louis E., 1886-1962  Search this

Stieglitz, Alfred, 1864-1946  Search this

Tannahill, Robert Hudson  Search this

Vollard, Ambroise, 1867-1939  Search this

Weber, Max, 1881-1961  Search this

Whitney, Gertrude Vanderbilt, 1875-1942  Search this

Williams, William Carlos, 1883-1963  Search this

Wittenberg, Philip, 1895-1987  Search this

Zerbe, Karl, 1903-1972  Search this

Zorach, Marguerite, 1887-1968  Search this

Zorach, William, 1887-1966  Search this

Extent:

436 Pages (Transcript)

Type:

Collection descriptions

Archival materials

Pages

Date:

1962-1963

Scope and Contents:

An interview of Edith Halpert conducted 1962-1963, by Harlan Phillips, for the Archives of American Art.

Halpert speaks of her childhood in Russia and growing up in New York City; working at Bloomindale's, Macy's, Stern Brothers, and Cohen Goldman; her marriage to artist Sam Halpert, his health, and living in Paris in 1925; becoming an art student at the Academy of Design and feeling that Leon Kroll was an excellent art teacher until he began to correct her drawings; when George Bridgman thought she was ruining his class; the Lincoln Square Arcade, when she and Ernest Fiener and Robert Brackman would rent Conan's studio evenings and bring in instructors; how Newman Montross influenced her more than anybody about showing her art that she loved; burning all of her work because Kroll said she had no talent; receiving a painting from John Marin; her friendship and working relationship with Abby Rockefeller and other family members.

She recalls opening the Downtown Gallery, in Greenwich Village, in 1926; a brief history of modern art; many artists helping decorate the new Daylight Gallery in 1930 and the first show being called "Practical Manifestations of Art"; meeting Robert and Sonia Delaunay in France; when she refused to allow Ezra Pound to speak at one of the gallery lectures because of his anti-Semite remarks and William Carlos Williams and Ford Madox Ford argued with her over it; experiencing jealousy and professional attacks from other dealers; the successful "Pop" Hart show and book in 1929; the "Thirty-three Moderns" show in 1930 at the Grand Central Galleries; the Jules Pascin show in 1930; in America, most of the art buyers supporters of culture were women, until the WPA and World War II, when it became fashionable for men to be involved; Ambroise Vollard's advice on selling art; handling the frustrations of working in the art field; friendships with Stuart Davis,Charles Sheeler, and Ben Shahn; how artists work through dry periods in their creativity and the "Recurrent Image" show; a discussion on modern art galleries of New York City, such as Daniel, Knoedler, Ferargil, the New Gallery, 291, the Grand Central, Kraushaar, and Montross; her travels through Pennsylvania and Maine for good examples of folk art for the gallery; the "The Artist Looks at Music" show; the non-competitive spirit of the early modern American artists; of being saved financially in 1940 by selling a William Harnett painting to the Boston Museum and then renting new space for the gallery.

Also, Mitchell Siporin bringing Halpert and Edmund Gurry to Mitchell Field during World War II for a camouflage show and consequently Downtown Gallery artists and others were enlisted in the camouflage corps for the U.S. Air Force; Charles Sheeler and his wife find Halpert a house in Newtown, Conn.; her decision in 1933 to push folk art for acquisition by the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery in Kansas City, Missouri; her great concern about what to do with her folk art literature collection; dismay and that no one writes about the history of folk art and those responsible for its creation and popularity; Louis Stern hiring her to organize a municipal exhibit in Atlantic City, N.J., with Donald Deskey designing the furniture and Holger Cahill managing the publicity; Joe Lillie helping her meet Fiorello La Guardia and Joe McGoldrick in 1934 about a municipal show in New York City, but it is moved to Radio City Music Hall through Nelson Rockefeller; the "Salons of America" show; wanting articles written about art for love rather than art for investment; working with Aline Saarinen on her book, "Proud Possessors;" letters from Stuart Davis, William Zorach and others that hurt her feelings; enjoying giving educational lectures and considering retirement because of ill health; the desire to write a book on the history of trade signs in folk art; feeling that the young artists are being ruined by too much support without working for it; planning to write a book entitled, "Unsung Heroes," about artists brave enough to experiment; organizing a show in Russia at her own expense; later representing the U.S. in art at the "American National Exposition"; the agitators and success of the exposition; Alfred Stieglitz and Georgia O'Keeffe.

Halpert also recalls Juliana Force, Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, Yasuo Kuniyoshi, Buckminster Fuller, George Luks, Edsel Ford, Max Weber, Danny Diefenbacker, Hamilton Easter Field, Frank Stella, Glenn Coleman, Margaret Zorach, Diego Rivera, Frida Kahlo, Henry Mercer, Romany Marie, Edward G. Robinson, Paul Mellon, Charles Pollet, Alex Brook, Lunca Curass, Dorothy Lambert, Duncan Candler, Frank Rhen, Louis Rittman, Bea Goldsmith, Arthur Craven, Robert Frost, Philip Wittenberg, Caesar de Hoke, Richard deWolfe Brixey, Seymour Knox, Walt Kuhn, Elisabeth Luther Cary, Charles Locke, Duncan Fergusson, Mrs. Solomon Guggenheim, Bob Tannahill, David Thompson, Marsden Hartley, Erwin Barrie, Robert Laurent, Conger Goodyear, Henry McBride, Edward Hopper, Charles Daniel, William Merritt Chase, Charles Hopkinson, Thomas Hart Benton, Frank Crowninshield, Alfred Barr, Lord Duveen, Jacob Lawrence, John Marin Jr., Karl Zerbe, Franz Kline, Arthur Dove, Julian Levy, Jack Levine, Valentine Dudensing, Peggy Bacon, Stefan Hirsch, Gertrude Stein, Isamu Noguchi, Jasper Johns, Chaim Soutine, B. K. Saklatwalla; Fernand Leger, Pablo Picasso, Ben Shahn, Charles Demuth, Alexander Calder, Jackson Pollock, Edward Steichen, Carl Sandburg, Clement Greenberg, and others.

Biographical / Historical:

Edith Halpert (1900-1970) was an art dealer from New York, N.Y.

General:

Originally recorded on 7 tape reels. Reformatted in 2010 as 27 digital wav files. Duration is 32 hrs., 27 min.

Provenance:

This interview is part of the Archives of American Art 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. The transcript was microfilmed in 1996.

Occupation:

Art dealers -- New York (State) -- New York  Search this

Topic:

Art -- Economic aspects  Search this

Camouflage  Search this

Folk art -- Collectors and collecting  Search this

Women art dealers  Search this

Sponsor:

Funding for the digital preservation of this interview was provided by a grant from the Save America's Treasures Program of the National Park Service.

Identifier:

AAA.halper62

Archival Repository:

Archives of American Art

GUID:

https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw94b057b9a-c3f9-4586-8d44-ee2d58857127

EDAN-URL:

ead_collection:sova-aaa-halper62

Creator:

Zigrosser, Carl, 1891-  Search this

Names:

American Artists Group  Search this

Armory Show (1913: New York, N.Y.)  Search this

Art Institute of Chicago  Search this

Art in America  Search this

Independent Citizens Committee for the Arts, Sciences, and Professions  Search this

John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation  Search this

Philadelphia Museum of Art  Search this

Print Club (Philadelphia, Pa.)  Search this

Print Council of America  Search this

Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum  Search this

Tamarind Lithography Workshop  Search this

Weyhe Gallery  Search this

Whitney Museum of American Art  Search this

Arms, John Taylor, 1887-1953  Search this

Barr, Alfred H., Jr., 1902-1981  Search this

Boyd, E., 1903-1974  Search this

Burchfield, Charles Ephraim, 1893-1967  Search this

Calder, Alexander, 1898-1976  Search this

Carrington, Fitz Roy, 1869-1954  Search this

Castellón, Federico, 1914-1971  Search this

Colker, Ed, 1927-  Search this

Cook, Howard Norton, 1901-1980  Search this

Dehn, Adolf, 1895-1968  Search this

Durieux, Caroline, 1896-1989  Search this

Dwight, Mabel, 1876-1955  Search this

Flannagan, John Bernard, 1895?-1942  Search this

Girard, André  Search this

Hayter, Stanley William, 1901-1988  Search this

Hopper, Edward, 1882-1967  Search this

Huntley, Victoria Hutson, 1900-1971  Search this

Ingersoll, R. Sturgis (Robert Sturgis), b. 1891  Search this

Kent, Rockwell, 1882-1971  Search this

Keppel, Frederick, 1845-1912  Search this

Kimball, Fiske, 1888-1955  Search this

Kohn, Misch, 1916-  Search this

Kuniyoshi, Yasuo, 1889-1953  Search this

Lankes, Julius J., 1884-1960  Search this

Lasansky, Mauricio, 1914-  Search this

Mauzey, Merritt, 1898-  Search this

McNulty, Kneeland  Search this

Michener, James A. (James Albert), 1907-  Search this

Mitchell, Marian  Search this

Nalbandian, Karnig  Search this

Norman, Dorothy, 1905-1997  Search this

O'Keeffe, Georgia, 1887-1986  Search this

Pach, Walter, 1883-1958  Search this

Rivera, Diego, 1886-1957  Search this

Ronnebeck, Arnold, 1885-1947  Search this

Rose, Ruth Starr, 1887-1965  Search this

Rosenwald, Lessing J. (Lessing Julius), 1891-1979  Search this

Ruellan, Andrée, 1905-2006  Search this

Schniewind, Carl Oscar, 1900-1957  Search this

Seidenberg, Roderick, 1889-1973  Search this

Spratling, William, 1900-1967  Search this

Spruance, Benton, 1904-1967  Search this

Sternberg, Harry, 1904-2001  Search this

Stieglitz, Alfred, 1864-1946  Search this

Teng, Kuei  Search this

Valentin, Curt, 1902-1954  Search this

Warneke, Heinz (Heinrich), 1895-1983  Search this

Weston, Edward, 1886-1958  Search this

Wickey, Harry  Search this

Wright, Frank Lloyd, 1867-1959  Search this

Yunkers, Adja, 1900-1983  Search this

Extent:

30 Linear feet ((on 63 microfilm reels))

Type:

Collection descriptions

Archival materials

Date:

1891-1971

Scope and Contents:

Personal and professional records including correspondence, writings, notes, printed material, subject files, photograph album, and diaries relating to Zigrosser's work as an authority on prints and printmaking and his personal relationships with artists.

Included are: correspondence with family and with over 900 printmakers, painters, sculptors, acquaintances, friends, associates, organizations, museums, publishers, and magazines; general correspondence, notes, clippings, and manuscripts pertaining to The Modern School Magazine; files of correspondence from Zigrosser's work at: the Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1932-1971; John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation; Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation and Museum, 1946-1971, including correspondence with Frank Lloyd Wright concerning the Guggenheim Memorial Museum; Print Council of America, 1954-1971, regarding exhibitions, council meetings and other matters; and the Tamarind Workshop, 1960-1971.

Of particular interest is material relating to the 1913 Armory Show, including Zigrosser's annotated catalog, notes and sketches. Also included are speeches and notes, 1930-1968; manuscripts for lectures and unpublished materials; memorabilia; a photo album of sculpture by John B. Flannagan; art work, including prints and drawings by Karig Nalbandian, prints by Rockwell Kent, and oversized works of art on paper by Mabel Dwight, Wanda Gag and Kent; family photograph album; journals and pamphlets (covers only); and diaries, 1916-1971, discussing personal and professional events such as art openings, conversations and activities with Rockwell Kent, Alfred Stieglitz, and Georgia O'Keeffe, among others.

Among the correspondents are: the American Artists Group, John Taylor Arms, Art in America magazine, Art Institute of Chicago, Alfred Barr, E. Boyd, Charles Burchfield, Alexander Calder, Fitz Roy Carrington, Federico Castellon, Ed Colker, Howard N. Cook, Crown Publishers, Adolf Dehn, Caroline Durieux, John Bernard Flannagan, Andre Girard, Stanley William Hayter, Edward Hopper, Victoria Hutson Huntley, Independent Citizens Committee for the Arts, Sciences and Professions, R. Sturgis Ingersoll, Frederick Keppel, Rockwell Kent, Fiske Kimball, Misch Kohn, Yasuo Kuniyoshi, Julius Lankes, Mauricico Lasansky, Merritt Mauzey, Kneeland McNulty, James A. Michener, Marian Mitchell,

Museum of Non-Objective Painting (Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum), Karnig Nalbandian, Dorothy Norman, Georgia O'Keeffe, Walter Pach, Harold Paris, Print Club (Philadelphia), Diego Rivera, Ruth Starr Rose, Arnold Ronnebeck, Lessing J. Rosenwald, Andre Ruellan, Carl Oscar Schniewind, Roderick Seidenberg, William Spratling, Benton Spruance, Alfred Stieglitz, Harry Sternberg, Tamarind Lithography Workshop, Kuei Teng, U.S. Office of War Information, Curt Valentin, Heinz Warneke, Edward Weston, Weyhe Gallery, Whitney Museum of American Art, Harry Wickey, and Adja Yunkers.

Biographical / Historical:

Print curator; Philadelphia, Pa.; d. 1975. Graduated Columbia University in literature. Worked with prints in New York City at Keppel and Co. and Weyhe Gallery; print curator at Philadelphia Museum of Art 1940-1963; author of books on prints and art works.

Provenance:

Lent for microfilming, 1991, by the University of Pennsylvania Special Collections Department, Van Pelt Library. Zigrosser donated the papers to the University in 1972. Portions of the papers not microfilmed include research files, manuscript materials for published work, family records, and journals.

Restrictions:

The Archives of American art does not own the original papers. Use is limited to the microfilm copy.

Rights:

Authorization to publish, quote or reproduce requires written permission from the Curator of Manuscripts, Rare Book & Manuscript Library, University of Pennsylvania. Contact Reference Services for more information.

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.

Occupation:

Artists -- United States  Search this

Printmakers -- United States  Search this

Museum curators -- Pennsylvania -- Philadelphia  Search this

Topic:

Art, American  Search this

Prints -- societies, etc  Search this

Prints -- Collectors and collecting  Search this

Prints, American  Search this

Prints, European  Search this

Identifier:

AAA.zigrcarl

Archival Repository:

Archives of American Art

GUID:

https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw9c88ba1db-1061-48d2-bae9-77dd7e7f65c5

EDAN-URL:

ead_collection:sova-aaa-zigrcarl

Interviewee:

Burlin, Paul, 1886-1969  Search this

Interviewer:

Seckler, Dorothy Gees, 1910-1994  Search this

Names:

American Artists' Congress  Search this

Downtown Gallery (New York, N.Y.)  Search this

National Academy of Design (U.S.) -- Students  Search this

United States. Works Progress Administration  Search this

Whitney Museum of American Art  Search this

Boas, Franz, 1858-1942  Search this

Gleizes, Albert, 1881-1953  Search this

Halpert, Edith Gregor, 1900-1970  Search this

Huneker, James, 1857-1921  Search this

Matisse, Henri, 1869-1954  Search this

O'Keeffe, Georgia, 1887-1986  Search this

Extent:

5 Items (Sound recording: 5 sound files (2 hr., 39 min.), digital, wav)

65 Pages (Transcript)

Type:

Collection descriptions

Archival materials

Pages

Interviews

Sound recordings

Place:

Europe -- description and travel

Southwestern States -- Description and Travel

Date:

1962

Scope and Contents:

Interview of Paul Burlin, conducted on December 5-6, 1962, by Dorothy Gees Seckler, for the Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.

Burlin speaks of his childhood education in England; working for the magazine Delineator; his education at the National Academy of Design; his travels in the American Southwest; his early exhibitions in New York; his first wife's writings on folk music; visiting Europe before the first World War; discovering Cubism and Fauvism; working on the WPA under the Whitney Museum; joining and then leaving the American Artists' Congress in protest; his thoughts on overtly political art; exhibiting at the Downtown Gallery; his image-making process; and his critique of Pop art. Burlin also recalls James Huneker, Franz Boas, Albert Gleizes, Henri Matisse, Edith Halpert, Georgia O'Keeffe, and others.

Biographical / Historical:

Paul Burlin (1886-1969) was a painter in New York, New York.

General:

Originally recorded on 5 sound tape reels. Reformatted in 2010 as 5 digital wav files. Duration is 2 hr., 39 min.

Provenance:

This interview is 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.

Topic:

Art, American  Search this

Art -- Political aspects  Search this

Cubism  Search this

Fauvism  Search this

Painters -- New York (State) -- Interviews  Search this

Pop art  Search this

Genre/Form:

Interviews

Sound recordings

Sponsor:

Funding for the digital preservation of this interview was provided by a grant from the Save America's Treasures Program of the National Park Service.

Identifier:

AAA.burlin62

Archival Repository:

Archives of American Art

GUID:

https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw9eb9c540b-b1e1-4898-9d25-193966292e9b

EDAN-URL:

ead_collection:sova-aaa-burlin62

Creator:

Whitney Museum of American Art  Search this

Names:

Whitney Studio Club  Search this

Whitney Studio Galleries  Search this

Baziotes, William, 1912-1963  Search this

Bellows, George, 1882-1925  Search this

Benton, Thomas Hart, 1889-1975  Search this

Bloom, Hyman, 1913-  Search this

Burchfield, Charles Ephraim, 1893-1967  Search this

Burlin, Paul, 1886-1969  Search this

Cadmus, Paul, 1904-1999  Search this

Cassatt, Mary, 1844-1926  Search this

Curry, John Steuart, 1897-1946  Search this

Davis, Stuart, 1892-1964  Search this

De Creeft, José, 1884-1982  Search this

Dickinson, Edwin Walter, 1891-1978  Search this

Eilshemius, Louis M. (Louis Michel), 1864-1941  Search this

Evergood, Philip, 1901-1973  Search this

Feininger, Lyonel, 1871-1956  Search this

Gatch, Lee, 1902-1968  Search this

Glackens, William J., 1870-1938  Search this

Gorky, Arshile, 1904-1948  Search this

Graves, Morris, 1910-  Search this

Gross, Chaim, 1904-1991  Search this

Grosz, George, 1893-1959  Search this

Harnett, William Michael, 1848-1892  Search this

Hartley, Marsden, 1877-1943  Search this

Henri, Robert, 1865-1929  Search this

Hofmann, Hans, 1880-1966  Search this

Hopper, Edward, 1882-1967  Search this

Inness, George, 1825-1894  Search this

Karfiol, Bernard, 1886-1952  Search this

Kuhn, Walt, 1877-1949  Search this

Kuniyoshi, Yasuo, 1889-1953  Search this

Lachaise, Gaston, 1882-1935  Search this

Lawson, Ernest, 1873-1939  Search this

MacIver, Loren, 1909-1998  Search this

Marin, John, 1870-1953  Search this

Marsh, Reginald, 1898-1954  Search this

Motherwell, Robert  Search this

Mount, William Sidney, 1807-1868  Search this

Nevelson, Louise, 1899-1988  Search this

O'Keeffe, Georgia, 1887-1986  Search this

Pereira, I. Rice (Irene Rice), 1902-1971  Search this

Pollock, Jackson, 1912-1956  Search this

Prendergast, Maurice Brazil, 1858-1924  Search this

Pène Du Bois, Guy, 1884-1958  Search this

Reder, Bernard, 1897-1963  Search this

Rimmer, William, 1816-1879  Search this

Rivers, Larry, 1925-2002  Search this

Rothko, Mark, 1903-1970  Search this

Ryder, Albert Pinkham, 1847-1917  Search this

Schnakenberg, H. E. (Henry Ernest), 1892-1970  Search this

Sheeler, Charles, 1883-1965  Search this

Sloan, John, 1871-1951  Search this

Smith, David, 1906-1965  Search this

Stella, Joseph, 1877-1946  Search this

Tobey, Mark  Search this

Twachtman, John Henry, 1853-1902  Search this

Tworkov, Jack  Search this

Walkowitz, Abraham, 1880-1965  Search this

Weber, Max, 1881-1961  Search this

Wyant, A. H. (Alexander Helwig), 1836-1892  Search this

Young, Mahonri Mackintosh, 1877-1957  Search this

Zorach, William, 1887-1966  Search this

Extent:

78 Microfilm reels

Type:

Collection descriptions

Archival materials

Microfilm reels

Date:

1914-1966

Scope and Contents:

REELS N591-N597: Photographs of the Museum, Juliana Force, Herman Moore; scrapbooks on the Whitney Studio Club, Whitney Studio Galleries and the Museum, 1927-1965.

REELS N599-N604: Notebooks of Edwin W. Dickinson; photographs and provenance information for works by Philip Evergood; a catalog of information and some photographs of Chinese ink drawings and other works by Reginald Marsh; and photographs and information on Bernard Reder, Jack Tworkov, Max Weber (portions also microfilmed on reel NY59-8 (fr. 497-658), reel NY59-9 (fr. 1-51), and William Zorach.

REELS N604-N609: Exhibition catalogs, 1946-1966, for artists and groups shows at the Museum, including Robert Feke, William Rimmer, Ralph Blakelock, Albert Maurer, Albert Pinkham Ryder, Yasuo Kuniyoshi, Thomas Cole, Max Weber, Arshile Gorky, Mark Tobey, John Sloan, Loren MacIver, I. Rice Pereira, George Grosz, Reginald Marsh, Charles Burchfield, Morris Graves, Theodore Roszak, John Marin, Hans Hofmann, Bradley Tomlin, Stuart Davis, Milton Avery, Lee Gatch, Jose De Creeft, Maurice Prendergast, Edward Hopper, Hyman Bloom, Robert E. Jones, Balcomb Greene, Karl Zerbe, Arthur G. Dove, William Zorach, Philip Evergood, Bernard Reder, Herbert Feber, Oliver O'Connor Barrett,Arthur B. Davies, Jose De Rivera, Paul Burlin, Joseph Stella, Jack Tworkov, Ivan Albright, Stuart Davis, Edwin Dickinson, John Quidor, and Niles Spencer.

REELS N646-N694: Artists' files on: Oliver O'Connor Barrett,William Baziotes, George Bellows, Thomas Hart Benton, Peter Blume, James Brooks, Patrick Henry Bruce, Charles Burchfield, Paul Burlin, David Burliuk, Paul Cadmus, Mary Cassatt, Thomas Cole, Glenn Coleman, Jon Corbino, John Steuart Curry, Jo Davidson, Arthur B. Davies, Jose DeCreeft, Charles Demuth, Jose De Rivera, Arthur Dove, Guy Pène du Bois, Stuart Davis, Frank Duveneck, Ralph Earl, Eastman Johnson, The Eight, Philip Evergood, Robert Feke, Lyonel Feininger, Ernest Fiene, George Fuller, Lee Gatch, William Glackens, Arshile Gorky, Balcomb Greene, Chaim Gross, George Grosz, William Harnett, Marsden Hartley, Childe Hassam, John Heliker, Robert Henri, Hans Hofmann, George Inness, Leon Kelly, Franz Kline, Karl Knaths, Leon Kroll, Walt Kuhn, Yasuo Kuniyoshi, Gaston Lachaise, Robert Laurent, Ernest Lawson, Jack Levine, Seymour Lipton, George B. Luks,

Stanton Macdonald-Wright, Loren MacIver, John Marin, Reginald Marsh, Alfred Maurer, K. H. Miller, Robert Motherwell, William Mount, Jerome Myers, Louise Nevelson, Georgia O'Keeffe (portions also microfilmed on reels NY59-13 (fr. 98-115, 406-424, 586-685), reel NY59-14 (entire), and reel NY59-15 (fr. 1-140, 145-153), I. Rice Pereira, Bernard Perlin, Joseph Pollett, Jackson Pollock, Reginald Pollack, Henry V. Poor, Richard Pousette-Dart, Maurice Prendergast, Abraham Rattner, Bernard Reder, Ad Reinhardt, William Rimmer, Larry Rivers, Hugo Robus, Theodore Roszak, Mark Rothko, Concetta Scarvaglione, Henry Schnakenberg, Ben Shahn, John Sloan, David Smith, Eugene Speicher, Theodoros Stamos, Joseph Stella, Maurice Sterne, Mark Tobey, Bradley Tomlin,Trajan, Allen Tucker, John Twachtman, Jack Tworkov, Abraham Walkowitz (also on reel NY/59-15) , Max Weber, James M. Whistler, Gertrude Whitney, Grant Wood, Alexander Wyant, Mahonri Young, and William Zorach.

REELS NWH 1-NWH 7: Artist files on Charles Sheeler, Bernard Karfiol, Louis Eilshemius; scatterred records of the Whitney Studio Club and Museum, 1914-1945, including minutes, Oct. 15, 1930, and Whitney Studio ledgers, 1928-1931; catalogs of one-man shows, 1932-1945; catalogs of annual painting exhibitions, 1932-1940, sculpture, watercolor and drawing exhibitions, 1933-1945, and group exhibitions, 1932-1945; and clippings, Oct. 1935-1936.

REELS NY59/8 (fr. 256-end)-NY59/10: Files on Max Weber, including biographical material, lists of work, and miscellany. Also found (NY59/8 frames 354-383) are ca.20 letters from Weber to Abraham Walkowitz, 1907-1924.

Biographical / Historical:

Whitney Museum of American Art is an American art museum in New York, New York. Founded by Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and formally opened in 1931. Previous to its opening as a museum it was known as the Whitney Studio Club (1914-28) and Whitney Studio Galleries (1928-30).

Provenance:

The Weber files on reels NY59/8-10 were lent for microfilming 1959 by the Whitney Museum of American Art; the remainder was lent 1964-1967; additional material from the Museum was lent at the same time, and subsequently donated, including the papers of Lloyd Goodrich, Juliana Force, Thomas B. Clarke, the American Art Research Council, and Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney; these have each been cataloged separately. Portions of Weber, and O'Keeffe material that was microfilmed in 1959 were refilmed in 1967.

Restrictions:

The Archives of American art does not own the original papers. Use is limited to the microfilm copy.

Topic:

Art, Modern -- 20th century -- United States  Search this

Artists -- Exhibitions -- New York (State) -- New York  Search this

Art, American  Search this

Function:

Art museums -- New York (State)

Identifier:

AAA.whitmuse

Archival Repository:

Archives of American Art

GUID:

https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw990da7b91-a3b8-4ace-b8ba-b5c08cfe3284

EDAN-URL:

ead_collection:sova-aaa-whitmuse

Creator:

Warner, Keith, 1895-1959  Search this

Names:

"291" (Gallery)  Search this

American Place (Gallery)  Search this

Whitney Museum of American Art  Search this

Calder, Alexander, 1898-1976  Search this

Dorcely, Roland  Search this

Macdonald-Wright, Stanton, 1890-1973  Search this

Marin, John, 1870-1953  Search this

Mondrian, Piet, 1872-1944  Search this

O'Keeffe, Georgia, 1887-1986  Search this

Rosenburg, Paul  Search this

Russell, Morgan, 1886-1953  Search this

Stieglitz, Alfred, 1864-1946  Search this

Weber, Max, 1881-1961  Search this

Extent:

0.7 Linear feet

Type:

Collection descriptions

Archival materials

Photographs

Illustrated letters

Sketches

Date:

1935-1975

Summary:

The papers of American art collector Keith Warner measure 0.7 linear feet and date from 1935 to 1975. Correspondence, collecting files, and artwork detail Warner's role as a collector of art in the mid-twentieth century. Present in the collection are materials related to Alexander Calder, Roland Dorcely, Stanton MacDonald-Wright, Piet Mondrian, Alfred Stieglitz, and Max Weber.

Scope and Contents:

The papers of American art collector Keith Warner measure 0.7 linear feet and date from 1935 to 1975. Correspondence, collecting files, and artwork detail Warner's role as a collector of art in the mid-twentieth century. Present in the collection are materials related to Alexander Calder, Roland Dorcely, Stanton MacDonald-Wright, Piet Mondrian, Alfred Stieglitz, and Max Weber.

Warner's relationships with artists are documented in extensive letters which make up the bulk of the collection. Subjects range from exhibitions, the art market, artists' methods and works, art criticism, and collecting to personal subjects. Letters from Roland Dorcely and Alexander Calder include illustrated letters and postcards. Letters from Calder discuss a mix of business and personal matters, including a discussion of the design of jewelry commissioned for Warner's wife, Edna. Letters from Dorcely document Warner's cultivation, criticism, and collection of Dorcely's work, as well as the hardships of Haitian artists and Dorcely's views on art. The letters are in French with some English translations.

Correspondence with Alfred Stieglitz documents his common endeavor with Warner in collecting the paintings of John Marin, and Stieglitz's gallery, An American Place. Letters associated with An American Place continue after Stieglitz's death in 1946. Found with Alfred Stieglitz's letters are two letters from Georgia O'Keeffe. Max Weber letters include comments on his painting and sculpting, his retrospective show at the Whitney, the art press, national politics, and also refer to Stieglitz and Marin. An extensive group of correspondence with Stanton MacDonald-Wright is mostly undated; MacDonald-Wright writes freely about Stieglitz, the "291" group of artists, and his partner in Synchromism, Morgan Russell. Also included are letters from Piet Mondrian related to collecting, as well as letters from unidentified correspondents.

Warner's collecting files consist of diverse materials concerning his research, writing, and relationships with artists whose paintings he collected, particularly Roland Dorcely and Stanton MacDonald-Wright. Included are biographical sketches; writings about and by the artists, including manuscripts and published materials; newspaper and magazine clippings; exhibition announcements and catalogs; and photographs of works of art. Writings by Roland Dorcely, on the subject of his artistic process and perspective, include handwritten essays in French as well as typed English translations. Published articles from Script magazine (1945-1946) by Stanton MacDonald-Wright document his career as an art critic. Writings on Alexander Calder and Paul Rosenburg, taken from Warner's journal on Calder, and on the early relationship of Alfred Stieglitz and Georgia O'Keeffe, documented on a visit with Stieglitz on May 3, 1944, are also present.

Artwork consists of work by Alexander Calder and Roland Dorcely. Calder's work includes sketches proposing mobiles with notations as to material, scale, and cost. Dorcely's work includes sketches in graphite and ink of abstract figures and objects.

Arrangement:

The collection is arranged as 3 series.

Missing Title

Series 1: Correspondence, 1940-1963 (0.4 linear feet; Box 1-2)

Series 2: Collecting Files, circa 1940-1975 (12 folders; Box 2, OV 3)

Series 3: Artwork, circa 1945-circa 1965 (2 folders; Box 2)

Biographical / Historical:

Keith Warner (1895-1959) was an American art collector. Warner was born and lived in Gloversville, New York, and maintained a manufacturing business that took him to New York City intermittently. Warner began collecting Chinese porcelains after World War I, and a few years later his interest shifted to American abstract painting. Warner retired from business in 1944. His collection was sold gradually after his death, mostly to private collectors, though some works are in museums in the United States and Japan.

Provenance:

The Keith Warner papers were donated in 1992 by Edna K. Allen, wife of Keith Warner.

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.

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.

Topic:

Art -- Collectors and collecting -- New York (State)  Search this

Artists -- United States  Search this

Art -- Haiti  Search this

Art, Abstract -- Collectors and collecting  Search this

Art criticism  Search this

Art, Modern -- 20th century -- Collectors and collecting  Search this

Synchromism (Art)  Search this

Art, American  Search this

Genre/Form:

Photographs

Illustrated letters

Sketches

Citation:

Keith Warner papers, 1935-1975. 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.warnkeit

See more items in:

Keith Warner papers

Archival Repository:

Archives of American Art

GUID:

https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw97cf79e0a-b1cc-4c06-bf03-80608f90eb97

EDAN-URL:

ead_collection:sova-aaa-warnkeit

Creator:

Marshall, Richard, 1947-2014  Search this

Names:

Lever House (New York, N.Y.)  Search this

Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego  Search this

Whitney Museum of American Art  Search this

Basquiat, Jean-Michel, 1960-1988  Search this

Bourgeois, Louise, 1911-2010  Search this

Calder, Alexander, 1898-1976  Search this

Mapplethorpe, Robert  Search this

Mitchell, Joan, 1926-1992  Search this

O'Keeffe, Georgia, 1887-1986  Search this

Pierson, Jack, 1960-  Search this

Ruscha, Edward  Search this

Extent:

15.8 Linear feet

26.07 Gigabytes

Type:

Collection descriptions

Archival materials

Gigabytes

Interviews

Sound recordings

Photographs

Video recordings

Date:

1969-2014

Summary:

The papers of New York-based curator and art consultant Richard D. Marshall measure 15.8 linear feet and 26.07 GB and date from 1969-2014. The interviews, exhibitions and research files, client files, other professional files, printed material, photographic material of artwork, and born-digital material primarily reflect Marshall's work outside his role at the Whitney Museum. The exhibition and research files make up the bulk of the collection and document his independent curatorial and writing projects on artists Jean-Michel Basquiat, Alexander Calder, Robert Mapplethorpe, Jack Pierson, and Ed Ruscha, as well as his role in building the Lever House Art Collection. Sound and video recordings are also found in the collection, primarily with interviews and exhibition and research material.

Scope and Contents:

The papers of New York-based curator and art consultant Richard D. Marshall measure 15.8 linear feet and 26.07 GB and date from 1969-2014. The interviews, exhibitions and research files, client files, other professional files, printed material, photographic material of artwork, and digital material predominantly reflect Marshall's work outside his role at the Whitney Museum. Sound and video recordings are also found in the collection, primarily with interviews and exhibition and research material.

Thirteen interviews with artists are in the form of transcripts and sound recordings. Interviews are with many artists that Marshall had organized exhibitions for, including Louise Bourgeois, Robert Mapplethorpe, Ed Ruscha, and many featured in the exhibition New Image Painting at the Whitney in 1978.

Exhibition and research files may contain correspondence with artists, galleries, and museums; writings and notes; printed and research material; press packages; photographic material; and administrative documentation related to exhibition logistics, such as floors plans, items lists, consignment records, and shipping receipts. The most robust files and groups of files relate to the artists that Marshall worked with repeatedly over the course of his career, including Jean-Michel Basquiat, Alexander Calder, Robert Mapplethorpe, Joan Mitchell, Georgia O'Keeffe, Jack Pierson, and Ed Ruscha. Files relating to the Lever House Art Collection are also found here. The series contains sound and video recordings, as well as digital records containing broadcasts, documentaries, exhibition related material, writings, photographic material, and promotional material about artists from galleries.

Client files include correspondence, invoices, photographic material, floor plans, digital records, and other documentation related to Marshall's business as an independent art consultant.

Other professional files consists of business cards, Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego (MCASD) Board of Trustee's files, and photographic material Marshall accumulated as art editor of the Paris Review.

Printed and digital material consists of books, exhibition announcements, catalogs, press packages, posters, and other material. Material relates to artists and movements Marshall was interested in.

Photographic material is of artworks and is largely unsorted and not identified with any specific project. Formats include black and white photographs, slides, digital photographs, and transparencies.

Arrangement:

The collection is arranged as seven series

Missing Title

Series 1: Interviews, 1972-2009 (0.4 linear feet; Box 1, 0.173 GB; ER01)

Series 2: Exhibition and Research Files, circa 1970-2014 (11.5 linear feet; Box 1-12, OV 17-19, 23.40 GB; ER02-ER49)

Series 3: Client Files, 1998-2014 (1.5 linear feet; Box 12-14, 0.077 GB; ER50-ER51)

Series 4: Other Professional Files, circa 1980-2014 (0.9 linear feet; Box 14)

Series 5: Printed Material, 1969-2014 (0.5 linear feet; Box 15, OV 20, 2.27 GB; ER52)

Series 6: Photographic Material, 1990s-2000s (0.9 linear feet; Box 15-16, 0.145 GB; ER53)

Series 7: Unidentified Electronic Records, circa 2005 (1 folder; 1 folder)

Biographical / Historical:

Richard D. Marshall (1947-2014) was a New York-based curator and art consultant. Born in Los Angeles, Marshall attended the University of California, Irvine, and in 1973 moved to New York to attend the Independent Study Program at the Whitney Museum. He then became a curator at the Whitney from 1974-1993, organizing many biennials and solo exhibitions. While at the Whitney, Marshall also worked as art editor of the Paris Review (1975-1990), and organized exhibitions at other institutions of artists including Louise Bourgeois, Alexander Calder, and Robert Mapplethorpe. In 2003, he became curator of The Lever House Art Collection in New York, and worked with collectors Aby Rosen and Alberto Mugrabi to commission works for the lobby of the building by Tom Sachs, Urs Fischer, Liza Lou, Paula Hayes, and others. Marshall has also published monographs on Ed Ruscha, Jack Pierson, Alex Katz, Georgie O'Keeffe, Joan Mitchell, and Kenny Scharf.

Provenance:

Donated in 2015 by the Richard D. Marshall Estate, via William T. Georgis, executor.

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.

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.

Occupation:

Art consultants -- New York -- New York  Search this

Topic:

Transcripts  Search this

Curators -- New York (State) -- New York  Search this

Genre/Form:

Interviews

Sound recordings

Photographs

Video recordings

Citation:

Richard D. Marshall papers, 1969-2014. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.

Identifier:

AAA.marsrich

See more items in:

Richard D. Marshall papers

Archival Repository:

Archives of American Art

GUID:

https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw9643ff989-b36c-4012-b44c-5f5de1c4aafa

EDAN-URL:

ead_collection:sova-aaa-marsrich

Painter:

O'Keeffe, Georgia 1887-1986  Search this

Medium:

Oil on canvas

Type:

Paintings

Owner/Location:

Walker Art Center Vineland Place Minneapolis Minnesota 55403 Accession Number: 54.9

Date:

1927

Topic:

Architecture exterior--Farm--Barn  Search this

Landscape--New York--Lake George  Search this

Control number:

IAP 89810428

Data Source:

Art Inventories Catalog, Smithsonian American Art Museums

EDAN-URL:

edanmdm:siris_ari_390101

Painter:

O'Keeffe, Georgia 1887-1986  Search this

Medium:

Pastel on peper mounted on board

Type:

Paintings

Owner/Location:

Museum of Fine Arts 465 Huntington Avenue Boston Massachusetts 02115 Accession Number: 1990.430

Date:

1922

Topic:

Waterscape--Weather--Storm  Search this

Waterscape--Weather--Lightning  Search this

Control number:

IAP 20492760

Data Source:

Art Inventories Catalog, Smithsonian American Art Museums

EDAN-URL:

edanmdm:siris_ari_372553

Painter:

O'Keeffe, Georgia 1887-1986  Search this

Medium:

Oil on canvas

Type:

Paintings

Owner/Location:

Phillips Academy Addison Gallery of American Art Andover Massachusetts 01810 Accession Number: 1947.33

Date:

1928

Topic:

Landscape--Coast  Search this

Landscape--Time--Night  Search this

Control number:

IAP 20110250

Data Source:

Art Inventories Catalog, Smithsonian American Art Museums

EDAN-URL:

edanmdm:siris_ari_379109

Painter:

O'Keeffe, Georgia 1887-1986  Search this

Medium:

Watercolor on paper

Type:

Paintings

Owner/Location:

Brooklyn Museum 200 Eastern Parkway Brooklyn New York 11238 Accession Number: 58.76

Date:

1916

Topic:

Abstract  Search this

Control number:

IAP 89810053

Data Source:

Art Inventories Catalog, Smithsonian American Art Museums

EDAN-URL:

edanmdm:siris_ari_387772

Painter:

O'Keeffe, Georgia 1887-1986  Search this

Medium:

Pastel

Type:

Paintings

Date:

1914

Topic:

Abstract  Search this

Control number:

IAP 8G280064

Data Source:

Art Inventories Catalog, Smithsonian American Art Museums

EDAN-URL:

edanmdm:siris_ari_480044

Painter:

O'Keeffe, Georgia 1887-1986  Search this

Medium:

Oil

Type:

Paintings

Date:

1927

Topic:

Abstract  Search this

Control number:

IAP 8G280065

Data Source:

Art Inventories Catalog, Smithsonian American Art Museums

EDAN-URL:

edanmdm:siris_ari_480045

Painter:

O'Keeffe, Georgia 1887-1986  Search this

Medium:

Oil

Type:

Paintings

Owner/Location:

Downtown Gallery New York New York

Date:

1930

Topic:

Abstract  Search this

Control number:

IAP 8G280066

Data Source:

Art Inventories Catalog, Smithsonian American Art Museums

EDAN-URL:

edanmdm:siris_ari_480046

Interviewee:

Landon, Edward, 1911-1984  Search this

Interviewer:

Brown, Robert F.  Search this

Names:

American Artists' Congress  Search this

Artists' Union (New York, N.Y.)  Search this

Federal art project (Mass.)  Search this

National Serigraph Society  Search this

Abbott, Berenice, 1898-1991  Search this

Bridgman, George Brant, 1864-1943  Search this

Dove, Arthur Garfield, 1880-1946  Search this

Gottlieb, Harry, 1895-  Search this

Hartley, Dennis  Search this

Hughes, Marian  Search this

Lozowick, Louis, 1892-1973  Search this

Marin, John, 1870-1953  Search this

Mark, Henry  Search this

Mauer, Alfred  Search this

McCausland, Elizabeth, 1899-1965  Search this

O'Keeffe, Georgia, 1887-1986  Search this

Olds, Elizabeth, 1896-1991  Search this

Perry, Marvo  Search this

Rebay, Hilla, 1890-1967  Search this

Rogers, William T.  Search this

Sabbath, Bernie  Search this

Stein, Gertrude, 1874-1946  Search this

Stieglitz, Alfred, 1864-1946  Search this

Strand, Paul, 1890-1976  Search this

Weber, Max, 1881-1961  Search this

Extent:

39 Pages (Transcript)

Type:

Collection descriptions

Archival materials

Pages

Sound recordings

Interviews

Date:

1975 Apr. 17-May 28

Scope and Contents:

An interview of Edward Landon conducted 1975 Apr. 17-May 28, by Robert Brown, for the Archives of American Art.

Landon speaks of working with the local theater in high school; leaving Hartford at age 17 or 18 for Greenwich Village in New York and the Art Students League; studying figure drawing with George Bridgman; getting married and moving to Springfield, Mass.; exhibiting with the Springfield Art League; the Artist Union and the Artist Congress in the 1930s; spending a summer with Georgia O'Keeffe and Paul Strand in Taos, N.M.; the cooperation amongst artists that lasted into the 1950s to establish serigraphs as an American fine art print medium; when he received the Solomon Guggenheim Scholarship for Non-objective Art in 1939; when he made furniture and picture frames and the publishing of his book on making picture frames in 1946; when he began working as an easel painter in the Massachusetts Federal Art Project of the WPA in 1933; becoming president of the Western Chapter of the Artists Union in 1934; when he corresponded and visited Arthur Dove; his friendship with Elizabeth McCausland; his introduction to Harry Gottlieb and silk screen printing; the love of color and currently trying for emotional effects in his work; initiating silk screen exhibitions in the Springfield Museum; the beginning of the National Serigraph Society and his work as the exhibition secretary; his teaching approach; the first class held in his garage with fellow artists; more on his relationship with Elizabeth McCausland; Arthur Dove's influence on a recent painting Landon finished; his trip to Taos in 1930 and the importance of artist colonies for him early on; the feeling of not having roots, but being comfortable with the idea; the purpose of the National Serigraph Society; his feelings about printmakers moving away from traditional printing; organized exhibitions for the United States Information Service; his enjoyment in organizing things; the commercialization of creating "prints;" how photo-realism does not translate well in the print medium; the importance of trying to convey an idea in his work; his success in covering small boxes, address books and other items, as well as book binding; his preference for printing small editions of 25 to 35 prints; of a description of his method of printing; his Fulbright Fellowship in 1950 to travel to Norway and lecture; an interest in early Scandinavian art; publishing a silkscreen portfolio of pre-Viking art for the American Scandinavian Foundation; traveling through Europe; his influence as an innovator in France and Scandinavia; meeting with silk screen artists in Oslo; art forms in his work at this time; his inclusion in "Who's Who in American Art;" the avoidance of art movements; how by the 1950s the reason for the National Serigraph Society no longer existed because the medium was popular by that time; his move to Vermont in 1957 or 1958; work as a color mixer, book binder, and returning to framing because of health reasons; his second illness changing what he found important in his life; and how the content of his work became more emotional. Landon also recalls Louie Lozowick, Gertrude Stein, Marian Hughes, Elizabeth Olds, John Marin, Alfred Stieglitz, Berenice Abbott, Marvo Perry, Hilla Rebay, Sir William T. Rogers, Max Weber, Dennis Hartley, Alfred Maurer, Bernie Sabbath, and Henry Mark.

Biographical / Historical:

Edward Landon (1911-1984) was a printmaker from Weston, Vt.

General:

Originally recorded on 1 sound tape reel. Reformatted in 2010 as 2 digital wav files. Duration is 1 hr., 39 min.

Provenance:

These interviews are 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 others.

Topic:

Art, American  Search this

Printmakers -- Vermont -- Weston -- Interviews  Search this

Printing -- Technique  Search this

Function:

Artist colonies

Genre/Form:

Sound recordings

Interviews

Sponsor:

Funding for the digital preservation of this interview was provided by a grant from the Save America's Treasures Program of the National Park Service.

Identifier:

AAA.landon75

Archival Repository:

Archives of American Art

GUID:

https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw9fc2f6099-4ac6-4cf6-b0a9-962e4fb7ba9b

EDAN-URL:

ead_collection:sova-aaa-landon75

Creator:

Ayer (N W) Incorporated.  Search this

Names:

American Telephone and Telegraph Company -- Advertisements  Search this

Cunningham & Walsh.  Search this

Hixson & Jorgenson  Search this

United Air Lines, Inc. -- Advertisements  Search this

Ayer, Francis Wayland  Search this

De Kooning, Willem, 1904-1997  Search this

O'Keeffe, Georgia, 1887-1986  Search this

Extent:

270 Cubic feet (1463 boxes, 33 map-folders, 7 films)

Type:

Collection descriptions

Archival materials

Business records

Interviews

Oral history

Print advertising

Proof sheets

Proofs (printed matter)

Scrapbooks

Trade literature

Tear sheets

Advertisements

Date:

1817-1851

1869-2006

Summary:

Collection consists of records documenting one of the oldest advertising agencies created in Philadelphia. The company then moves to New York and expanses to international markets. During its history NW Ayer & Sons acquires a number of other advertising agencies and is eventually purchased. The largest portion of the collection is print advertisements but also includes radio and television. NW Ayer is known for some of the slogans created for major American companies.

Scope and Contents:

The collection consists primarily of proof sheets of advertisements created by NW Ayer & Son, Incorporated for their clients. These materials are in series one through thirteen and consist primarily of print advertisements. There are also billboards, radio and television commercials. The advertisements range from consumer to corporate and industrial products. The majority of the advertisements were created for Ayer's New York, Chicago, Los Angeles and international offices. Printed advertisements created by Cunningham & Walsh, Hixson & Jorgensen and Newell-Emmett are also included among these materials. Researchers who are interested in records created by Ayer in the course of operating an advertising agency will find these materials in Series fourteen-nineteen.

Series fourteen consists of advertisements created by NW Ayer & Son to promote their services to potential clients.

Series fifteen are scrapbooks of some of the earliest advertisements created by the company. Series sixteen are publications. Some of the publications were created by Ayer while others were about Ayer or the advertising industry in general. Provides good background materials and puts the company in perspective. Series eighteen are the legal records. Materials relating to employees including photographs, oral histories etc. are found in series nineteen.

Series twenty is one of the smallest amounts of materials and includes information relating to the history of NW Ayer & Son.

The container lists for series one-thirteen are part of a database and are searchable. The list has been printed for the convenience of the researcher and is included in this finding aid. Series fourteen-twenty container lists are also a part of the finding aid but are not in a searchable format.

Series 1, Scrapbooks of Client Advertisements, circa 1870-1920, is arranged into three boxes by chronological date. There are two bound scrapbooks and one box of folders containing loose scrapbook pages. NW Ayer & Son compiled an assortment of their earliest ads and placed them into scrapbooks. Besides the earliest advertisements, the scrapbooks contain requests to run advertisements, reading notices and listings of papers Ayer advertised in. The early advertisements themselves range from medical remedies to jewelry to machines to clothing to education and more. Most of the advertisements in the bound scrapbooks are dated.

Series 2, Proofsheets, circa 1870-1930, NW Ayer was fond of creating scrapbooks containing proofsheets. The series contains proofsheets created between 1892 and 1930, organized into 526 boxes. For convenience of storage, access and arrangement, the scrapbooks were disassembled and the pages placed in original order in flat archival storage boxes. The proofsheets are arranged by book number rather than client name. Usually the boxes contain a listing of the clients and sometimes the dates of the advertisements to be found within the box.

Series 3, Proofsheets, circa 1920-1975, is organized into 532 oversize boxes, and contain proofsheets and tearsheets created between 1920 and 1972. Within this series, materials are arranged alphabetically by company name (occasionally subdivided by brand or product), and thereunder chronologically by date of production. Many major, national advertisers are represented, including American Telephone & Telegraph, Armour Company, Canada Dry, Cannon Mills, Carrier Corporation, Domino Sugar, Caterpillar tractor company, Ford Motor Company, General Electric, Goodyear, Hills Bros. Coffee, Ladies Home Journal, National Dairy, Plymouth (Chrysler Corporation), Steinway, TV Guide, United Airlines and the United States Army. Also contained in this series are three scrapbooks of client advertisements including Canada Dry, Ford Motor, and Victor Talking Machine.

Series 4, 2001 Addendum, circa 1976-2001, is organized into ninety three oversized boxes,one folder and contains proofsheets for select Ayer clients, created between 1975 and 2001. Within this series, materials are arranged alphabetically by client name and there under chronologically by date of production. Major national advertisers represented include American Telephone & Telegraph, Avon, the United States Army, DeBeers Consolidated Diamond Mines, Dupont, TV Guide, Sealtest, Kraft Foods, Gillette, General Motors, Cannon Mills.

Series 5, Billboards, circa 1952-1956, consists of mounted and un-mounted original art/mock-ups. Twenty-two pieces of original art created as mock-ups for Texaco billboards.

Series 6, Film and Video Commercials, 1967-1970,

Series 7, Radio and Television Materials, 1933-1993, undated, is arranged into eight boxes and includes radio scripts, television scripts, and story boards for commercials.

Subseries 7.1, Scripts and storyboards for Radio and Television Commercials, dates Scripts for radio and television commercials includes title, date, length of commercial, advertising agency, client information

NW Ayer's radio and television materials mainly focus on the American Telegraph and Telephone account. Some of Ayer's materials relate to Bell Telephone Hours.

Storyboards are used in television and film to assist the director in working with crew to tell the story. To show the viewer through the use of figures, visual effects and camera angles. When directors first start thinking about their storyboard they create a story in their mind. They think of all the camera angles, visual effects and how the figures will interact in their mind. They try to create an extraordinary story in their head to attract the viewer (YOU) In order for the storyboard to be entirely effective it can't be a passive document. When done properly, a storyboard serves as a central design, meeting the needs of many team members including graphics artists, video personnel and programmers.

Another function of a storyboard is to help the team communicate during the training development process. This communication is very important in working with a large team as in the movie King, produced in 1996. Figures help the director explain to the crew how they are going to record the film and how to present it to the audience. Sometimes the director wants special effects to be added to the film, but his budget might not be that big so the director will have to change the story to fit their budget.

The Visual Effects are an important part in the storyboards it adds a special touch of creativity to your film. Camera angles are an important expects in your film because the camera angles determine where the viewing audience will look. If you want your audience to look at a certain object you must turn their attention to it by focusing on that object and maybe you might try blocking something out. Then you will have your audience's attention and you may do whatever else you have to, it could be scaring them are just surprising them or whatever you do.

Also included is talent information and log sheets relating to the storage of the commercials.

Bell Telephone Hour Program, 1942-[19??], The Bell Telephone Hour, also known as The Telephone Hour, was a five minute musical program which began April 29, 1940 on National Broadcasting Company Radio and was heard on NBC until June 30, 1958. Sponsored by Bell Telephone showcased the best in classical and Broadway music, reaching eight to nine million listeners each week. It continued on television from 1959 to 1968.

Earlier shows featured James Melton and Francia White as soloists. Producer Wallace Magill restructured the format on April 27, 1942 into the "Great Artists Series" of concert and opera performers, beginning with Jascha Heifetz. Records indicate that the list of talents on the program included Marian Anderson, Helen Traubel, Oscar Levant, Lily Pons, Nelson Eddy, Bing Crosby, Margaret Daum, Benny Goodman, José Iturbi, Gladys Swarthout and .The series returned to radio in 1968-1969 as Bell Telephone Hour Encores, also known as Encores from the Bell Telephone Hour, featuring highlights and interviews from the original series.

National Broadcasting television specials sponsored by the Bell System, 1957-1987includes information relating to Science series, Bell system Theshold Series, Bell telephone hour and commercial and public sponsored programs

Series 8, Chicago Office Print Advertisements, 1954-1989, is arranged alphabetically by the name of the client in ninety boxes and six oversize folders. Clients include Illinois Bell Telephone (1955-1989), Microswitch (1969-1989), Teletype (1975-1984), John Deere (1974-1989) and Caterpillar (1966-1972) are particularly well represented. Other clients of interest include Dr. Scholl's shoes (circa 1968-1972), the Girl Scouts (1976-1980), Sunbeam Personal Products Company (1973-1981), Bell and Howell (1974-1983) and Alberto Culver shampoos (1967-1971), Honeywell, Incorporated, Blue Cross and Blue Shield Associations, Kraft, Incorporated, Sears, Roebuck and Company, and YMCA.

Series 9, Los Angeles Office Materials, 1950s-1987, include printed advertisements created by this office and information relating to the employees.

Subseries 9.1, Print Advertisements, 1977-1987, printed advertisements arranged in one box alphabetically by client. There is a sparse sampling of clients from this particular Ayer branch office. The majority of the advertisements contained within this series are from Pizza Hut (1986-1987). Also included are Computer Automation (1977-1978), State of the Art, Incorporated (1982) and Toshiba (1986).

Subseries 9.2, Personnel Files, 1950s-1970s, includes cards of employees who worked in the Los Angeles office. Information on the cards includes name, address, telephone number, birthday, date hired, departure date and why (retired, terminated, resigned, etc) and position. Not all cards have all information. There is also a photograph of the employees on the cards.

Series 10, Foreign Print Advertisements, 1977-1991, undated, NW Ayer maintained partnerships with international companies such as Sloanas Ayer in Argentina, Connaghan & May Paton Ayer in Australia, Moussault Ayer in Belgium, NW Ayer, LTD. in Canada, GMC Ayer in France, Co-Partner Ayer in Germany, Wong Lam Wang in Hong Kong, MacHarman Ayer in New Zealand, Grupo de Diseno Ayer in Spain, Nedeby Ayer in Sweden, and Ayer Barker in United Kingdom. This group of material is a small sampling of advertisements created from these International offices. It is arranged alphabetically by client. There are quite a few automobile advertisements (i.e. Audi, Fiat, General Motors, Mercedes-Benz, and Volkswagen). In addition there are numerous advertisements for various personal items from MacLean's toothpaste to Quick athletic shoes to Labello lip balm, etc. Most of the advertisements have the creator's name printed on the advertisements.

Series 11, Cunningham & Walsh, Incorporated Materials, 1915-1987, undated contains 98 boxes 11 folders materials from the New York advertising agency acquired by NW Ayer in the 1960s. The company began with Newel-Emmett, an agency of nine men which broke up in 1949. Two of the men Fred Walsh and Jack Cunningham formed this agency in bearing their names in 1950. The agency created "let your fingers for the walking campaign for American Telephone & Telegraph, Mother Nature for Chiffon, and Mrs. Olson for Folgers's coffee and let the good times roll for Kawasaki motorcycle. In 1986, NW Ayer Incorporated purchased Cunningham & Walsh Incorporated.

Subseries 11.1, Print Advertisements, 1915-1987, are contained in ninety eight boxes of primarily print advertisements arranged alphabetically by client name. Clients that are particularly well represented are Graybar (electrical implements, circa1926-1937), Johns-Manulle (circa1915-1971), Smith and Corono typewriters (circa 1934-1960), Sunshine Biscuit Company (circa 1925-1961), Texaco Company (circa 1936-1961), Western Electric (circa 1920- 1971) and Yellow Pages (circa 1936-1971). Cunningham and Walsh also represented several travel and tourism industry clients, including Cook Travel Services (circa 1951-1962), Italian Line (circa 1953-1961), Narragansett and Croft (circa 1956-1960) and Northwest Airlines (circa 1946-1955). There are photographs of Texaco advertisements dating from 1913-1962. There is also a scrapbook of advertisements from the Western Electric Company dating from 1920-1922.

Subseries 11.2, Radio and Television Advertisements, 1963-1967, consist of materials created for Western Electric. Materials are arranged in chronological order.

Subseries 11.3, Company Related Materials, 1962-1986, undated include client lists, information relating to NW Ayer purchase and annual report 1962.

Series 12, Hixson & Jorgensen Materials, 1953-1971, a Los Angeles advertising company, merged with Ayer in 1969. This series is housed in one box. Within the box are four scrapbooks and folders with a hodgepodge of materials relating to advertising. Of most interest are the scrapbooks. Two scrapbooks deal with Hixson and Jorgensen's self promotion ad campaign "the right appeal gets action" (1953-1957). The other two scrapbooks contain news clippings about the company and its activities (1959-1971).

Series 13, Newell-Emmet, 1942-1957, founded in 1919 and governed in the 1940s by a partnership of nine men. The partnership broke up in 1949 when the men went their separate ways. The materials consist of print advertisements for one of client, Permutit Company, a water conditioning company. The materials are arranged in one box in chronological order.

Series 14, House Print Advertisements, 1870-1991, 16 boxes consists of advertisements or self-promotion advertisements to campaign for new clients. The series is arranged chronologically by date into fifteen boxes. Within the series are two scrapbooks containing self promotion ads from 1888-1919 and 1892-1895. Numerous house ads relate to Ayer's "Human Contact" campaign. In addition to the self promotion ads, Ayer ran advertisements expounding about particular concepts or themes for example, one month the concept would "understand" while another month would be "teamwork" and yet another would be on "imagination". Some of the self promotion ads target specific groups like Philadelphia businessmen. Other advertisements incorporate the fine arts.

Series 15, Scrapbooks, 1872-1959, relates to company events, records and news clippings about Ayer's history. The six boxes are arranged by chronological date. Two of the boxes focus solely on the death of founder F.W. Ayer (1923). Another box houses a scrapbook that showcases Ayer's annual Typography Exhibition (1931-1959). One box contains a scrapbook that specifically deals with correspondences relating to Ayer's advertising. Yet another box's contents are folders of loose pages from scrapbooks that have newspaper clippings, order forms, correspondences and other company records. In one box, a bound scrapbook houses a variety of materials relating to Ayer and advertising (i.e. newspaper clippings, competitor's advertisements, NW Ayer's advertisements, correspondences for advertisements, clippings regarding the "theory of advertising."

Series 16, Publications, 1849-2006, are housed in thirty four boxes and are arranged into three main categories.

Subseries 16.1, House Publications, 1876-1994, covers diverse topics; some proscriptive works about the Ayer method in advertising, some commemorating people, anniversaries or events in the life of the agency. Materials consist of scattered issues of the employee newsletter The Next Step 1920-1921. The materials are arranged in chronological order by date of publication. Ayer in the News, The Show Windows of an Advertising Agency, 1915, book form of advertisements published on the cover of Printer's Ink, highlighting Ayer's relations with advertisers. The Story of the States, 1916, Reprint in book form of a series of articles published in Printer's Ink for the purpose of adding some pertinent fact, progressive thought and prophetic vision to the Nationalism of Advertising highlights major businesses, manufacturer, natural resources and other qualities or attractions of each state. The Book of the Golden Celebration, 1919, includes welcome address and closing remarks by founder F. Wayland Ayer, The Next Step, 1920 employee newsletter with photographs, employee profiles, in-house jokes, etc., Advertising Advertising: A Series of Fifty-two Advertisements scheduled one time a week. Twenty-seven, thirty and forty inches, a day of the week optional with publisher, 1924

Subseries 16.2, Publications about NW Ayer, 1949-2006, includes a book first published in 1939. Includes articles, documenting events and is arranged chronologically by date of publication.

Subseries 16.3, General Publications about Advertising, 1922-1974, are arranged chronologically by date of publication and relate primarily to the history of advertising.

Subseries 16.4, Publications about Other Subjects, 1948-1964, include four books about the tobacco industry primarily the history of the American Tobacco Company and Lorillard Company from the Cunningham and Walsh library.

Series 17, Business Records, circa 1885-1990s

Subseries 17.1, Contracts, 1885-1908, undated, are arranged alphabetically and span from 1885-1908. The majority of the contracts are with newspaper and magazine publishers from around the country.

Subseries 17.2, General client information, 1911-1999, undated, including active and cancelled lists with dates, client gains, historical client list, (should move this to series 20) Ayer Plan User Guide Strategic Planning for Human Contact, undated

Subseries 17.3, Individual Client Account Information, 1950s-1990s, undated, contain information used by Ayer to create advertisements for some of its clients. American Telephone &Telegraph Corporate Case History, American Telephone &Telegraph Corporate advertisement memo, commissioned artists for DeBeers advertisements, DeBeers information relating to the creative process and photography credits, a case history for DeBeers Consolidated Mines, Ltd., The Diamond Engagement Ring, Managing Communication at all levels, DuPont publications, JC Penny Marketing Communication Plan Recommendation, Leaf, Incorporated, Saturn presentation, and USAREC oral presentation.

Subseries 17.4, Potential Clients, 1993, includes grouping has a questionnaire sent to Ayer by a potential client. Questionnaire response for Prudential Securities, 1993 Prudential Securities advertising account review, 1993.

Subseries 17.5, Financial Records, 1929-1938, includes balance sheet, 1929 May 1 Balance sheet and adjustments Consolidated statement of assets and liabilities, Expenses 191936-37 Business review and expenses, 1937 and 1938 Business review and expenses comparative statement, 1937 and 1938.

Series 18, Legal Records, circa 1911-1982, Ayer's legal records are arranged by twelve subject groupings within four boxes. The twelve groupings are advertising service agreements (circa 1918-1982), bylaws, copyright claims, correspondences, international correspondences, dissolution of trusts, stock information, agreements between partners, incorporation materials, reduction of capital, property information and miscellaneous materials. The bulk of the materials are the advertising service agreements. These agreements are between Ayer and their clients and state the services Ayer will offer and at what cost. The bylaws are Ayer's company bylaws from 1969 and 1972. The copyright claims are certificates stating Ayer's ownership over certain published materials (i.e. "Policy", Media Equalizer Model, and Don Newman's Washington Square Experiment). The correspondences relate to either the voting trust and receipts for agreement or the New York Corporation. The international correspondences are from either Ayer's Canadian office or London office. The dissolutions of trusts contains materials about the dividend trust of Wilfred F. Fry, the investment trust of Winfred W. Fry, the voting trust, and the New York corporation. The stock information has stock certificates and capital stock information. The agreements between partners (1911-1916) specify the terms between F.W. Ayer and his partners. The incorporation materials (circa 1929-1977) deal with Ayer advertising agency becoming incorporated in the state of Delaware. The reduction of capital grouping is a notification that shares of stock have been retired. The property information grouping contains property deeds and insurance policy (circa 1921-1939), a property appraisal (1934), and a bill of sale (1948). The miscellaneous grouping contains a house memo regarding a set of board meeting minutes and a registry of foreign companies in Commonwealth of Pennsylvania (1929-1954).

Subseries 18.1, Advertising Service Agreements, 1918-1982

Subseries 18.2, Bylaw Materials, 1969-1972

Subseries 18.3, Copyright Claims, 1962-1969

Subseries 18.4, Correspondence, 1928-1933

Subseries 18.5, International Office Correspondence, 1947-1948

Subseries 18.6, Dissolution of Trusts, 1934-1937

Subseries 18.7, Stock Information, 1934-1974

Subseries 18.8, Agreements between Partners, 1911-1916

Subseries 18.9, Incorporation Materials, 1929-1977

Subseries 18.10, Certificates of Reduction of Capital, 1937; 1975

Subseries 18.11, Property Information, 1921-1948

Subseries 18.12, Miscellaneous Materials, 1929-1977

Series 19, Personnel Records, circa 1889-2001, are arranged into eight groupings within eight boxes. The groupings are employee card files, photographs, Ayer alumni, biographies, speeches, recollections, oral histories, and miscellaneous. Typed manuscript of book A Copy Writer Speaks by George Cecil, NW Ayer, Incorporated copy head 1920s-1950s

Subseries 19.1, Employee card files, circa 1892-1915; 1929-1963, consists of index cards with the name, age, job title, date and wage increases, date of hire/fire, as well as remarks about the employee's service and/or reasons for seeking or leaving the job. Materials are arranged alphabetically by the last name of the employee within three boxes.

Subseries 19.2, Photographs, circa 1924-1984, undated, are housed in two boxes. The photographs grouped together by subjects i.e. personnel, company events, Ayer buildings, and miscellaneous. This grouping primarily consists of personnel photographs. Includes a glass plate negative dated 1924 of NW Ayer.

Subseries 19.3, Ayer Alumni, circa 1989-98, include employees who have left Ayer. There is a listing of Ayer "graduates" and their current job. Emeritus, Ayer's alumni newsletter 1989-1996, makes up the majority of materials in this grouping. The newsletter keeps the alumni up to date with the happenings of Ayer and what has become of former Ayer employees. Emeritus is a quarterly newsletter devoted to the activities, thoughts and feelings of Ayer alumni a body of people who consists of retirees and former employees.

Subseries 19.4, Biographical Information, circa 1889-1994, undated, prominent members of Ayer's operations had biographical sketches completed of them. This was true for the bio sketches of Robert Ervin, Louis T. Hagopian, and George A. Rink. There is a substantial file on Dorothy Dignam ("Mis Dig"), a leading woman in the advertising world from the 1930s to the 1950s. Also of interest is a video ("The Siano Man") compiled by Ayer employees to commemorate Jerry Siano's retirement from Ayer in 1994. The series is arranged alphabetically by last name.

Subseries 19.5, Speeches, circa 1919-1931; 1975, contains speeches made by Wilfred W. Fry and Neal W. O'Connor. Wilfred W. Fry had various speaking engagements connected with Ayer. Contained in this group is a sampling of his speeches from 1919 to 1931. Neal O'Connor's speech "Advertising: Who Says It's a Young People's Business" was given at the Central Region Convention for the American Association of Advertising Agencies in Chicago on November 6, 1975. The speeches are arranged alphabetically by the speaker's last name.

Subseries 19.6, Recollections, 1954-1984, undated, are arranged alphabetically by last name. These are recollections from Ayer employees about the company and its advertisements. Some recollections are specifically about certain types of advertisements, like farm equipment while others reflect on F. W. Ayer and the company.

Subseries 19.7, Oral History Interview Transcripts, 1983-1985; 1989-1991, include interviews with key NW Ayer personnel, conducted by Ayer alumnae Howard Davis, Brad Lynch and Don Sholl (Vice President creative) for the Oral History Program. The materials are arranged alphabetically by the last name of the interviewee.

Subseries 19.8, Oral History Interview Audio Tapes, 1985-1990, include interviews on audiotape the materials are arranged alphabetically by the last name of the interviewee.

Subseries 19.9, Internal Communications, 1993-1999, includes information sent to employees relating to retirements, management changes, awards won by the company, promotions, potential new accounts, free items, grand opening of Ayer Café, donation events, sponsorship programs, holiday schedules, discounts for employees from clients, Ayer joins MacManus Group.

Subseries 19.10, General Materials, 1940; 1970, includes agency directory entry including a list of the employees, 1970s, annual banquet program for the Curfew Club May 22, 1940 a group formed by the Philadelphia employee in 1938. It sponsored numerous sports, social and educational activities. Groups were formed in public speaking, music appreciation and a series of talks on Monday evenings title the modern woman. The front page was a series of talks for general interest. A list of officers, 1991, Twenty five year club membership, 1973 December 1, List of NW Ayer graduates, 1970, List of Officers, 1991 May 31, Obituary for Leo Lionni, 1999 October 17, List of photographers of advertisements, 2001

Series 20, Background and History Information, 1817-1999, undated includes a chronology, 1817-1990, quick reference timeline, 1848-1923, loose pages from a scrapbook containing examples of correspondence, envelopes, advertisements dating from 1875-1878; slogans coined by NW Ayer & Sons, Incorporated, 1899-1990, history of management, 1909-1923, articles and photographs about the building and art galleries, 1926-1976, publications about the Philadelphia building, 1929, pamphlet relating to memories of NW Ayer & Sons, Incorporated, 1930s-1950s, television history, 1940-1948, Article about the history of the company, 1950 January, pocket guide, 1982, AdWeek reports about standings for advertising agencies, information relating to Human Contact which is NW Ayer's Information relating to Human Contact, undated which is their philosophy on advertising.

Series 21, Materials Created by other Advertising Agencies, 1945-1978, undated, consists of print advertisements collected by Ayer from other major advertising companies. The companies include Doyle Dane Bernback, Incorporated, Leo Burnett Company, Grey Advertising Agency, D'Arcy Ad Agency, Scali, McCabe, Sloves, Incorporated and Erwin Wasey Company. The materials are arranged in alphabetical order by client and include products from Ralston Purina and Van Camp (Chicken of the Sea), Kellogg, American Export Lines and No Nonsense Fashions.

Series 22, 2010 Addendum of Print Advertisements, circa 1879s-1999, undated, includes material given to the Archives Center in 2010. It is organized into seventy one oversized boxes and contains proofsheets of print advertisements for select Ayer clients. These are arranged alphabetically by client name and include substantial quantities of materials from American Telephone &Telegraph (1945-1996), Bahamas Ministry of Tourism (1967-1987), Carrier (1971-1981), Citibank (1973-1991), DeBeers (1940s-1960s and1990s), Electric Companies Advertising Program [ECAP] (1942-1970s), General Motors (1989-1998), J.C. Penney (1983-1986), Newsweek (1966-1975), and Proctor and Gamble (1980s-1890s). There are also numerous other clients represented by smaller quantities of materials.

Subseries 22.1, Print Advertisements, 1930-1990, undated

Subseries 22.2, Print Advertisements on Glass Plate Negatives, 1879-1881, undated, include Cannon towels, Cheny Brothers silks, Cornish & Company organs and pianos, Enterprise Manufacturing Company, 1879 sad iron, an ad from Harper's Weekly 1881 for ladies clothing, Ostermoor & Company mattresses, Pear's soap, Porter's cough balsam, Steinway pianos.

Series 23, Microfilm of Print Advertisements, circa 1908-1985, consists of three boxes of printed advertisements for the American Telephone and Telegraph Company. Some of the same advertisements might also be found in series two, three and four.

Arrangement:

The collection is arranged into twenty-three series.

Series 1: Scrapbooks of Client Print Advertisements, circa 1870-1920

Series 2: Proofsheets, circa 1870-1930

Series 3: Proofsheets, circa 1920-1975

Series 4: 2001 Addendum, circa 1976-2001

Series 5: Billboards, circa 1952-1956

Series 6: Audiovisual Materials

Series 7: Radio and Television Materials, 1933-1993, undated

Series 8: Chicago Office Print Advertisements, 1954-1989

Series 9: Los Angeles Office Materials, 1950s-1987

Subseries 9.1: Printed Advertisements, 1977-1987

Subseries 9.2: Personnel Files, 1950s-1970s

Series 10: Foreign Print Advertisements, 1977-1991, undated

Series 11: Cunningham & Walsh Incorporated Materials, 1915-1987, undated

Subseries 11.1: Printed Advertisements, 1915-1987

Subseries 11.2: Radio and Television Advertisements, 1963-1967

Subseries 11.3: Company Related Materials, 1962-1986, undated

Series 12: Hixson & Jorgensen Materials, 1953-1971, undated

Series 13: Newell-Emmet, 1942-1957

Series 14: House Print Advertisements, 1870-1991

Series 15: Scrapbooks, 1872-1959

Series 16: Publications, 1849-2006

Subseries 16.1: House Publications, 1876-1994

Subseries 16.2: Publications about NW Ayer, 1949-1995

Subseries 16.3: General Publications about Advertising, 1922-2006

Subseries 16.4: Publications about other Subjects, 1948-1964

Series 17, Business Records, circa 1885-1990s

Subseries 17.1: Contracts, 1885-1908, undated

Subseries 17.2: General Client Information, 1911-1999, undated

Subseries 17.3: Individual Client Account Information, 1950s-1990s, undated

Subseries 17.4: Potential Clients, 1993

Subseries 17.5: Financial Records, 1929-1938

Series 18: Legal Records, circa 1911-1984

Subseries 18.1: Advertising Service Agreements, 1918-1982

Subseries 18.2: Bylaw Materials, 1969-1972

Subseries 18.3, Copyright Claims, 1962-1969

Subseries 18.4: Correspondence, 1928-1933

Subseries 18.5: International Office Correspondence, 1947-1948

Subseries 18.6: Dissolution of Trusts, 1934-1937

Subseries 18.7: Stock Information, 1934-1974

Subseries 18.8: Agreements between Partners, 1911-1916

Subseries 18.9: Incorporation Materials, 1929-1977

Subseries 18.10: Certificates of Reduction of Capital, 1937; 1975

Subseries 18.11: Property Information

Subseries 18.12: Miscellaneous Materials, 1929-1977

Series 19: Employee Materials, circa 1889-2001

Subseries 19.1: Employee Card files, circa 1892-1915; 1929-1963

Subseries 19.2: Photographs, circa 1924-1984, undated

Subseries 19.3: Alumni Publications, circa 1989-1998

Subseries 19.4: Biographical Information, circa 1889-1994

Subseries 19.5: Speeches, circa 1919-1931; 1975

Subseries 19.6: Recollections, 1954-1984, undated

Subseries 19.7: Oral History Interview Transcripts, 1983-1985; 1989-1991

Subseries 19.8: Oral History Audiotapes, 1985-1990

Subseries 19.9: Internal Communications, 1993-1999

Subseries 19.1: General Materials, 1940-2001

Series 20: History and Background Information about the Company, 1817-1999, undated

Series 21: Materials Created by other Advertising Agencies, 1945-1978, undated

Series 22: 2010 Addendum of Print Advertisements, circa 1879s-1990s, undated

Subseries 22.1: Print Advertisements, 1930-1990, undated

Subseries 22.2: Print Advertisements on Glass Plate Negatives, 1879-1881, undated

Series 23: Microfilm of Print Advertisements, circa 1908-1985

Biographical / Historical:

Founded in Philadelphia in 1869, NW Ayer & Son is one of the oldest and largest advertising agencies in America. For most of its history, it was the undisputed leader and innovator in the field of advertising. In 1876, NW Ayer & Son pioneered the "open contract", a revolutionary change in the method of billing for advertising which became the industry standard for the next hundred years. NW Ayer pioneered the use of fine art in advertising and established the industry's first art department. It was the first agency to use a full-time copywriter and the first to institute a copy department. The agency relocated to New York City in 1974. During its long history, the agency's clients included many "blue-chip" clients, including American Telephone & Telegraph, DeBeers Consolidated Diamond Mines, Ford Motor Company, Nabisco, R. J. Reynolds and United Airlines. However, in later years, the Ayer's inherent conservatism left the agency vulnerable to the creative revolution of the 1960s and 1970s, the advertising industry restructuring of the 1980s and the economic recession of the early 1990s. The agency was bought out by a Korean investor in 1993. In 1996, NW Ayer merged with another struggling top twenty United States advertising agency, Darcy, Masius, Benton & Bowles, under the umbrella of the McManus Group. Ayer continues to operate as a separate, full-service agency.

Through a series of buyouts and mergers, Ayer traces its lineage to the first advertising agency founded in the United States, a Philadelphia agency begun by Volney Palmer in 1841. Palmer began his career in advertising as a newspaper agent, acting as middleman between newspaper publishers and advertisers across the country. By 1849, Palmer had founded his own newspaper, V. B. Palmer's Register and Spirit of the Press, and had developed a complete system of advertising which included securing advertising space and placing ads in scores of commercial, political, religious, scientific and agricultural journals across the country. Palmer went one step further than the "space jobbers" of the day when he began offering "advertisements carefully drawn for those who have not the time to prepare an original copy." Always an enthusiastic promoter of advertising as an incentive to trade and American economic growth, Palmer promised advertisers that "every dollar paid for advertising in country newspapers will pay back twenty-fold" and encouraged skeptical consumers that "he who wishes to buy cheap should buy of those who advertise." When Palmer died in 1863, the agency was bought by his bookkeeper, John Joy, who joined with another Philadelphia advertising agency to form Joy, Coe & Sharpe. That agency was bought out again in 1868 and renamed Coe, Wetherill & Company. In 1877, Coe, Wetherill and Company was bought out by the newly formed NW Ayer & Son.

Francis Wayland Ayer was an ambitious young schoolteacher with an entrepreneurial streak. Having worked for a year soliciting advertisements on a commission basis for the publisher of the National Baptist weekly, Francis Ayer saw the potential to turn a profit as an advertising agent. In 1869, Ayer persuaded his father, Nathan Wheeler Ayer, to join him in business, and with an initial investment of only $250.00, NW Ayer & Son was born. Notwithstanding a smallpox epidemic in Philadelphia in 1871 and the general economic depression of the early 1870s, the agency flourished. The senior Ayer died in 1873, leaving his interest in the agency to his wife, but Francis W. Ayer bought her out, consolidating his interest in the company's management. In 1877, with Coe, Wetherill & Company (the successor to Palmer's 1841 agency) on the verge of bankruptcy and heavily indebted to Ayer for advertising it had placed in Ayer publications, Ayer assumed ownership of that agency. Thus did NW Ayer lay claim to being the oldest advertising agency in the country.

Both Nathan Wheeler and Francis Wayland Ayer began their careers as schoolteachers, and one of their legacies was a commitment to the cause of education: correspondence schools and institutions of higher learning were historically well-represented among Ayer clients. Just after World War I, the agency was heralded as "co-founder of more schools than any citizen of this country" for its conspicuous efforts to advertise private schools. Well into the 1960s, an "Education Department" at Ayer prepared advertisements for over three hundred private schools, camps and colleges, representing almost half the regional and national advertising done for such institutions. In fact, to its clients Ayer presented advertising itself as being akin to a system of education. In 1886, Ayer began promoting the virtues of the Ayer way advertising with the slogan, "Keeping Everlastingly at It Brings Success."

The agency's goals were simple: "to make advertising pay the advertiser, to spend the advertiser's money as though it were our own, to develop, magnify and dignify advertising as a business." Initially, Ayer's fortunes were tied to newspapers, and the agency began to make a name for itself as compiler and publisher of a widely used American Newspaper Annual. During the first years, Ayer's singular goal was "to get business, place it [in newspapers] and get money for it"; after several years as an independent space broker, however, Francis Ayer resolved "not to be an order taker any longer." This decision led NW Ayer and Son to a change in its mode of conducting business which would revolutionize the advertising industry: in 1876, Ayer pioneered the "open contract" with Diggee & Conard, Philadelphia raised growers and agricultural suppliers. Prior to the open contract, NW Ayer & Sons and most agencies operated as "space-jobbers," independent wholesalers of advertising space, in which the opportunities for graft and corrupt practices were virtually unlimited. In contrast, the open contract, wherein the advertiser paid a fixed commission based on the volume of advertising placed, aligned the advertising agent firmly on the side of the advertiser and gave advertisers access to the actual rates charged by newspapers and religious journals. The open contract with a fixed commission has been hailed by advertising pioneer Albert Lasker as one of the "three great landmarks in advertising history." (The other two were Lasker's own development of "reason-why" advertising copy and J. Walter Thompson's pioneering of sex appeal in an advertisement for Woodbury's soap.) Although the transition to the open contract did not happen overnight, by 1884, nearly three-quarters of Ayer's advertising billings were on an open contract basis. Since Ayer was, by the 1890s, the largest agency in America, the switch to direct payment by advertisers had a significant impact on the advertising industry, as other agencies were forced to respond to Ayer's higher standard. Just as important, the open contract helped to establish N W Ayer's long-standing reputation for "clean ethics and fair dealing" -- a reputation the agency has guarded jealously for over a century. The open contract also helped to establish Ayer as a full service advertising agency and to regularize the production of advertising in-house. From that point forward, Ayer routinely offered advice and service beyond the mere placement of advertisements. Ayer set another milestone for the industry in 1888, when Jarvis Wood was hired as the industry's first full-time copywriter. Wood was joined by a second full time copywriter four years later, and the Copy Department was formally established in 1900. The industry's first Art Department grew out of the Copy Department when Ayer hired its first commercial artist to assist with copy preparation in 1898; twelve years later Ayer became the first agency to offer the services of a full time art director, whose sole responsibility was the design and illustration of ads.

Ayer's leadership in the use of fine art in advertising has roots in this period, but achieved its highest expression under the guidance of legendary art director Charles Coiner. Coiner joined Ayer in 1924, after graduating from the Chicago Academy of Fine Arts. Despite early resistance from some clients, Coiner was adamant that "the use of outstanding palette and original art forms bring a greater return in readership, in impact and prestige for the advertiser." To this end, Coiner marshaled the talents of notable painters, illustrators and photographers, including N.C. Wyeth and Rockwell Kent (Steinway), Georgia O'Keefe (Dole), Leo Lionni (DuPont), Edward Steichen (Steinway, Cannon Mills), Charles Sheeler (Ford), and Irving Penn (DeBeers). Coiner believed that there was a practical side to the use of fine art in advertising, and his success (and Ayer's) lay in the marriage of research and copywriting with fine art, an arrangement Coiner termed "art for business sake." Coiner's efforts won both awards and attention for a series completed in the 1950s for the Container Corporation of America. Titled "Great Ideas of Western Man" the campaign featured abstract and modern paintings and sculpture by leading U.S. and foreign artists, linked with Western philosophical writings in an early example of advertising designed primarily to bolster corporate image. In 1994, Charles Coiner was posthumously named to the American Advertising Federation's Hall of Fame, the first full time art director ever chosen for that honor.

Coiner and fellow art director Paul Darrow also created legendary advertising with the "A Diamond Is Forever" campaign for DeBeers; ads featured the work of Pablo Picasso, Salvador Dali and other modernist painters. The "A Diamond is Forever" tagline was written in 1949 by Frances Gerety, a woman copywriter at Ayer from 1943 to 1970. In 1999, Ad Age magazine cited "A Diamond is Forever" as the most memorable advertising slogan of the twentieth century.

Coiner also earned respect for his volunteer government service during World War II; he designed the armbands for civil defense volunteers and logos for the National Recovery Administration and Community Chest. As a founding member of the Advertising Council in 1945, Ayer has had a long-standing commitment to public service advertising. In the mid-1980s, Ayer became a leading force in the Reagan-era "War on Drugs". Lou Hagopian, Ayer's sixth CEO, brokered the establishment of the Partnership for a Drug-Free America, a media coalition which generated as much as a million dollars a day in donated advertising space and time to prevent the use and abuse of illegal drugs. Famous names appear among NW Ayer's clientele from the very earliest days of the agency. Retailer John Wanamaker, Jay Cooke and Company, and Montgomery Ward's mail-order business were among the first Ayer clients. The agency has represented at least twenty automobile manufacturers, including Cadillac, Chrysler, Ford, General Motors, Plymouth, and Rolls-Royce. Other major, long-term clients through the years have included American Telephone & Telegraph, Canada Dry, Cannon Mills, Hills Bros. Coffee Company, Kellogg's, R. J. Reynolds, Steinway and Sons, United Airlines, and the United States Army. By the time of Ayer's hundredth anniversary in 1969, some of these companies had been Ayer clients for decades if not generations, and the longevity of those relationships was for many years a source of Ayer's strength.

But the advertising industry began to change in the late 1960s and 1970s, due in part to a "creative revolution." Small advertising agencies won attention with provocative copywriting and art direction that more closely resembled art than advertising. Advances in market research allowed clients to more narrowly tailor their advertising messages to distinct groups of consumers, and this led to a rise in targeted marketing which could more readily be doled out to specialized small agencies than to larger, established firms like NW Ayer & Son. The civil rights and anti-war movements also contributed to increasing public skepticism with the values of corporate America, and by extension, with some national advertising campaigns. Older, more conservative firms like Ayer were hard pressed to meet these new challenges.

About 1970, in an effort to meet these challenges and to establish a foothold on the West Coast, Ayer bought out two smaller agencies--Hixson & Jorgenson (Los Angeles) and Frederick E. Baker (Seattle). The agency relocated from Philadelphia to New York City in 1974 in an attempt both to consolidate operations (Ayer had operated a New York office since the 1920s) and to be closer to the historic center of the advertising industry. Riding the wave of mergers that characterized the advertising industry in the late 1980s and 1990s, Ayer continued to grow through the acquisition of Cunningham & Walsh in 1986 and Rink Wells in 19xx.

During this transitional period, Ayer received widespread acclaim for its work for the United States Army, which included the widely recognized slogan "Be All You Can Be". Ayer first acquired the Army recruitment account in 1967 and with help from its direct marketing arm, the agency was widely credited with helping the Army reach its recruitment goals despite an unpopular war and plummeting enlistments after the elimination of the draft in 1973. Ayer held the account for two decades, from the Vietnam War through the Cold War, but lost the account in 1986 amid government charges that an Ayer employee assigned to the account accepted kickbacks from a New York film production house. Despite Ayer's position as the country's 18th largest agency (with billings of $880 million in 1985), the loss of the agency's second largest account hit hard.

NW Ayer made up for the loss of the $100 million dollar a year Army account and made headlines for being on the winning end of the largest account switch in advertising history to date, when fast food giant Burger King moved its $200 million dollar advertising account from arch-rival J. Walter Thompson in 1987. Burger King must have had drive-thru service in mind, however, and Ayer made headlines again when it lost the account just eighteen months later in another record-breaking account switch. Another devastating blow to the agency was the loss of its lead position on the American Telegraph and Telephone account. Ayer pioneered telecommunications advertising in 1908, when the agency was selected to craft advertising for the Bell System's universal telephone service. Despite valiant efforts to keep an account the agency had held for most of the twentieth century, and for which they had written such memorable corporate slogans as American Telephone &Telegraph "The Voice with a Smile" and "Reach Out and Touch Someone", the agency lost the account in 1996.

After a wave of mergers and acquisitions in the late 1980s, the economic recession of the early 1990s hit Madison Avenue hard, and Ayer was particularly vulnerable. Despite the agency's long history and roster of "blue-chip" clients, Ayer was not known for cutting-edge creative work. Moreover, though the agency had offices overseas, Ayer had never built a strong multinational presence, and many of the smaller international offices were sold during the financial turmoil of the 1980s. This left a real void in the new climate of global marketplace consolidation. By about 1990, earnings were declining (although Ayer was still among the top twenty United States agencies in billings), and the agency was suffering from client defections, high management turnover, expensive real estate commitments and deferred executive compensation deals, all fallout of the high-flying 1980s. This was the atmosphere in 1993, when W.Y. Choi, a Korean investor who had already assembled a media and marketing empire in his homeland, began looking for an American partner to form an international advertising network. Jerry Siano, the former creative director who had recently been named Ayer's seventh CEO, was in no position to refuse Choi's offer of $35 million to buy the now floundering agency. The infusion of cash was no magic bullet, however. Choi took a wait-and-see approach, allowing his partner Richard Humphreys to make key decisions about Ayer's future, including the purging of senior executives and the installation of two new CEOs in as many years.

The agency's downward trend continued with the loss of another longtime client, the DeBeers diamond cartel in 1995. Adweek reported that Ayer's billings fell from $892 million in 1990 to less than $850 million in 1995. Several top executives defected abruptly, and the agency failed to attract major new accounts. Ayer was facing the loss not merely of revenue and personnel, but the loss of much of the respect it once commanded. Ayer remained among the twenty largest U.S. agencies, but an aura of uncertainty hung over the agency like a cloud. A new CEO was appointed, and Mary Lou Quinlan became the agency's first woman CEO in 1995. A year later, Ayer and another struggling top twenty agency, D'arcy, Masius, Benton & Bowles, combined as part of the McManus Group of companies. In 1998, the McManus Group had worldwide billings of more than $6.5 billion.

Under the McManus Group, Ayer was able to expand its international operations and begin to rebuild a stronger global presence. Several important new clients were won in 1997 and 1998, including Avon, General Motors, Kitchenaid, several Procter & Gamble brands and, most notably, Continental Airlines worldwide accounts. Born in the nineteenth century, Ayer may be one of a very few advertising agencies to successfully weather the economic and cultural transitions of both the twentieth and twentieth first centuries. Ayer was eventually acquired by the Publicis Groupe based in Paris, France which closed down the N.W. Ayer offices in 2002.

Related Materials:

Materials in the Archives Center

Warshaw Collection of Business Americana (AC0060)

Hills Bros. Coffee Incorporated Records (AC0395)

Provenance:

The collection was donated by N W Ayer ABH International, April 15, 1975 and by Ayer & Partners, October 30, 1996.

Restrictions:

The collection is open for research use.

Physical Access: Researchers must use microfilm copy. Researchers must handle unprotected photographs with gloves. Researchers must use reference copies of audiovisual materials. When no reference copy exists, the Archives Center staff will produce reference copies on an "as needed" basis, as resources allow.

Technical Access: Viewing the film portion of the collection without reference copies requires special appointment, please inquire; listening to audio discs requires special arrangement. Do not use original materials when available on reference video or audio tapes.

Rights:

Publication and production quality duplication is restricted due to complex copyright, publicity rights, and right to privacy issues. Potential users must receive written permission from appropriate rights holders prior to obtaining high quality copies. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.

Topic:

Advertising agencies  Search this

advertising  Search this

Genre/Form:

Business records -- 1840-2000

Interviews -- 1980-2000

Oral history -- 1980-1990

Print advertising

Proof sheets

Proofs (printed matter)

Scrapbooks -- 1840-1990

Trade literature

Tear sheets

Advertisements

Citation:

NW Ayer & Sons, incorporated Advertising Agency Records, Archives Center, National Museum of American History

Identifier:

NMAH.AC.0059

See more items in:

N W Ayer Advertising Agency Records

Archival Repository:

Archives Center, National Museum of American History

GUID:

https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/ep8920ed035-d211-4a58-9047-b31fa79464bd

EDAN-URL:

ead_collection:sova-nmah-ac-0059

Creator:

O'Keeffe, Georgia, 1887-1986  Search this

Citation:

Georgia O'Keeffe printed material, 1905. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.

Topic:

Illustration of books  Search this

Women artists  Search this

Women painters  Search this

Theme:

Women  Search this

Lives of artists  Search this

Record number:

(DSI-AAA_CollID)9206

(DSI-AAA_SIRISBib)211401

AAA_collcode_okeegepm

Theme:

Women

Lives of artists

Data Source:

Archives of American Art

EDAN-URL:

edanmdm:AAADCD_coll_211401

Creator:

O'Keeffe, Georgia, 1887-1986  Search this

Subject:

Stieglitz, Alfred  Search this

Citation:

Georgia O'Keeffe letters to Claudia O'Keeffe, 1940-1962. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.

Topic:

Women artists  Search this

Women painters  Search this

Theme:

Women  Search this

Lives of artists  Search this

Record number:

(DSI-AAA_CollID)10637

(DSI-AAA_SIRISBib)214213

AAA_collcode_okeegeor

Theme:

Women

Lives of artists

Data Source:

Archives of American Art

EDAN-URL:

edanmdm:AAADCD_coll_214213

Creator:

Miller, Dorothy Canning, 1904-2003  Search this

Names:

Betty Parsons Gallery  Search this

Chase Manhattan Bank -- Art collections  Search this

Federal Art Project  Search this

Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden  Search this

Mark Rothko Foundation  Search this

Municipal Art Exhibition (1st : 1934 : New York, N.Y.)  Search this

PepsiCo, Inc.  Search this

Port Authority of New York and New Jersey -- Art collections  Search this

Rockefeller University  Search this

Smith College -- Students  Search this

Smith College. Museum of Art  Search this

World Trade Center (New York, N.Y.) -- Art collections  Search this

Asher, Elise, 1914-  Search this

Barr, Alfred H., Jr., 1902-1981  Search this

Bontecou, Lee, 1931-  Search this

Byars, James Lee  Search this

Cahill, Holger, 1887-1960  Search this

Calder, Alexander, 1898-1976  Search this

Canady, John  Search this

Charlton, Maryette  Search this

Christo, 1935-  Search this

Chryssa, 1933-  Search this

Coggeshall, Calvert, 1907-1990  Search this

Copley, Alfred L.  Search this

Davis, Stuart, 1892-1964  Search this

DeFeo, Jay, 1929-1989  Search this

Feininger, Lyonel, 1871-1956  Search this

Feitelson, Lorser, 1898-1978  Search this

Gorky, Arshile, 1904-1948  Search this

Guggenheim, Peggy, 1898-1979  Search this

Hartigan, Grace  Search this

Hicks, Edward, 1780-1849  Search this

Horwitt, Will  Search this

Johns, Jasper, 1930-  Search this

Karpel, Bernard, 1911-1986  Search this

Levy, Julien  Search this

Mather, Eleanore Price, 1910-  Search this

Matisse, Pierre, 1900-1989  Search this

Nevelson, Louise, 1899-1988  Search this

Newman, Barnett, 1905-1970  Search this

Noguchi, Isamu, 1904-1988  Search this

O'Keeffe, Georgia, 1887-1986  Search this

Pereira, I. Rice (Irene Rice), 1902-1971  Search this

Picasso, Pablo, 1881-1973  Search this

Rauschenberg, Robert, 1925-2008  Search this

Reinhardt, Ad, 1913-1967  Search this

Rockefeller, Nelson A. (Nelson Aldrich), 1908-1979 -- Art collections  Search this

Rothko, Mark, 1903-1970  Search this

Sage, Kay  Search this

Scharf, William, 1927-  Search this

Sheeler, Charles, 1883-1965  Search this

Sterne, Hedda, 1910-2011  Search this

Still, Clyfford, 1904-1980  Search this

Extent:

34.6 Linear feet

Type:

Collection descriptions

Archival materials

Photographs

Sketches

Christmas cards

Drawings

Date:

1853-2013

bulk 1920-1996

Summary:

The papers of contemporary and folk art curator, historian, and consultant Dorothy C. Miller measure 34.6 linear feet and date from 1853-2013, with the bulk of the material dating from 1920 to 1996. The papers primarily concern Miller's private art consulting work outside of her curatorial work at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City. Found are scattered biographical materials, extensive correspondence and subject files, and project files for her art consulting work for the Rockefeller family, Rockefeller University, Chase Manhattan Bank, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, the World Trade Center, and other miscellaneous corporate and private clients. Miller's work as a trustee and committee member of various public and private boards and commissions is also represented here. Additionally, the papers contain Miller's research files on Edward Hicks and folk art, and a small number of files of her husband Holger Cahill about his work as Director of the Federal Art Project. There is a scattered documentation of Miller's early curatorial work with Holger Cahill on the First Municipal Art Exhibition (1934) held at the RCA Building in Rockefeller Center. Also found is Dorothy Miller's collection of artists' Christmas cards and photographs of Miller and others. An addition to the papers includes biographical material; family papers; correspondence; professional files; art collection and client files; printed material; and photographic material. While a small number professional files are included, the majority of the addition relates to her personal life, including correspondence with her husband Holger Cahill, and files pertaining to her personal art collection.

Scope and Content Note:

The papers of contemporary and folk art curator, historian, and consultant Dorothy C. Miller measure 34.6 linear feet and date from 1853-2013, with the bulk of the material dating from 1920 to 1996. The papers primarily concern Miller's art consulting work outside of her curatorial work at the Museum of Modern Art in New York city. Found are scattered biographical materials, extensive correspondence and subject files, and project files for her art consulting work for the Rockefeller family, Rockefeller University, Chase Manhattan Bank, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, and other miscellaneous corporate and private clients. Her work as a trustee and committee member of various public and private boards and commissions is also represented here. Additionally, the papers contain Miller's research files on Edward Hicks and folk art, and a small number of files related to Miller's husband Holger Cahill and his work as Director of the Federal Art Project. There is important documentation of Miller's early curatorial work with Holger Cahill on the First Municipal Art Exhibition (1934) held at the RCA Building in Rockefeller Center. Artwork includes scattered sketches and drawings enclosed with correspondence and original Christmas cards sent to Miller by various artists. Photographs of Miller date from 1926 - circa 1950.

Scattered biographical material mostly concerns Miller's education at Smith College and awards and honorary degrees that she received. Extensive correspondence and subject files document her professional and personal relationships with family, friends, colleagues, museums, art dealers and artists, as well as her research interests. Individual files may contain a mix of correspondence with, as well as about, the person or subject, compiled research documents, printed materials, and scattered photographs. Files are found for Lewin Alcopley, Alfred Barr, Betty Parsons Gallery, Cahill family members, Lee Bontecou, James Byars, Holger Cahill, Alexander Calder, Christo, Chryssa, Calvert Coggeshall, John Canaday, Maryette Charlton, Stuart Davis, Jay DeFeo, Lorser Feitelson, Arshile Gorky, Peggy Guggenheim, Grace Hartigan, Will Horwitt, Jasper Johns, Julien Levy, Pierre Matisse, Louise Nevelson, Barnett Newman, Isamu Nauchi, Georgia O'Keeffe, Pablo Picasso, Robert Rauschenberg, Ad Reinhardt, Kay Sage, Charles Sheeler, Hedda Sterne, travel, Clyfford Still, William Scharf, among many others.

Detailed records of Miller's art consulting and advisory work for the Rockefeller family include correspondence with Nelson A. Rockefeller and David Rockefeller about building their personal collections of contemporary and folk art, meeting notes and minutes, research notes and writings, and printed materials. The largest group of records concerns the writing and publication of The Nelson A. Rockefeller Collection: Masterpieces of Modern Art. Miller's curatorial work for David Rockefeller and the Rockefeller University's Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Hall art collection is documented in Series 4 through curatorial files, correspondence, printed materials, photographs and slides, artists files, and design records.

Series 5 contains files relating to Miller's work as the first art consutant to the Chase Manhattan Bank and the building of the corporation's extensive collection of contemporary art. There is a draft of Miller's text for the bank's published catalog, Art At Work: Chase Manhattan Bank Collection. A smaller set of records is found in Series 6 documenting Miller's work on the Art Committee of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, including files about selecting artwork for the World Trade Center during the early 1970s. Files concerning Miller's advisory work with additional public and private clients, boards, and commissions are arranged in Series 7 and 8 and concern the Amstar Corporation, Fidelity International Bank, First National Bank of Tampa, First National City Bank, Inmont Corporation, Pepsico, United Mutual Savings Bank, the Empire State Plaza Art Commission, the Hancock Shaker Village, the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, the Mark Rothko Foundation, the Museum of American Folk Art, and the Smith College Museum of Art.

Miller's papers include a small group of files relating to the WPA Federal Art Project (FAP)created by her husband Holger Cahill when he was director of the FAP, Holger Cahill. A small series is devoted to Miller's work with Eleanore Price Mather researching and writing Edward Hicks: His Peaceable Kingdom and Other Paintings. A series of general research files contain miscellaneous research notes and photographs related to Miller's interests in early American art and folk art. Series 12 contains important documentation of Miller's early curatorial work with Holger Cahill on the First Municipal Art Exhibition (1934) held at the RCA Building in Rockefeller Center.

Works of art are primarily in the form of Christmas cards sent to Miller by various artists including Elise Asher, Lyonel Feininger, Bernard Karpel, and Irene Rice Pereira. A small group of photographs includes photographs of Miller from 1926-circa 1950 and a few photographs of others.

The addition includes biographical material; family papers; correspondence; professional files; art collection and client files; printed material; and photographic material. While a small number of professional files are found here, the majority of material relates to Miller's personal life, including correspondence with her husband Holger Cahill, and files pertaining to her personal art collection. Scattered correspondence, inventories, research, and notes created by curator and donor of the papers, Wendy Jeffers, are found throughout the collection. These materials date from the 1980s-2000s.

Arrangement:

The collection is arranged as 15 series:

Missing Title

Series 1: Biographical Material, 1917-1986 (Box 1; 0.3 linear ft.)

Series 2: Correspondence and Subject Files, circa 1912-1992 (Boxes 1-8, OV 27; 7.2 linear ft.)

Series 3: Rockefeller Family Art Collections, circa 1949-1985 (Boxes 8-12, 25; 3.9 linear ft.)

Series 4: Rockefeller University Collection, 1923-1984 (Boxes 12-13, OV 27; 1.0 linear ft.)

Series 5: Chase Manhattan Bank Collection, 1959-circa 1985 (Boxes 13-14, 26; 1.4 linear ft.)

Series 6: Port Authority of New York and New Jersey Art Committee, circa 1965-1987 (Boxes 14-15, OV 27; 0.8 linear ft.)

Series 7: Other Corporate and Private Clients, 1968-1984 (Boxes 15-16; 1.3 linear ft.)

Series 8: Other Boards, Committees and Commissions, 1925, 1949-1985 (Boxes 16-20; 3.6 linear ft.)

Series 9: Works Project Administration Federal Art Project Files, 1935-1979 (Box 20, OV 27; 0.5 linear ft.)

Series 10: Edward Hicks Catalog, 1934-1984 (Boxes 20-22; 1.5 linear ft.)

Series 11: Research Files, 1930s-1980 (Boxes 22-23; 0.8 linear ft.)

Series 12: Exhibition Files, 1932-1986 (Box 23; 0.6 linear ft.)

Series 13: Works of Art, circa 1924-circa 1982 (Boxes 23-25; 1.5 linear ft.)

Series 14: Photographs, 1926-circa 1970s (Boxes 24-25; 0.3 linear ft.)

Series 15: Addition to the Dorothy C. Miller Papers, 1853-2003, bulk 1920-1996 (Boxes 28-38, OVs 39-41; 9.9 linear ft.)

Biographical Note:

Dorothy Canning Miller (1904-2003) worked in New York City as a highly influential curator of contemporary and folk art at the Museum of Modern Art and as the first curator of the museum. Later, she was the primary art consultant for Nelson A. Rockefeller, the Rockefeller family, Rockefeller University, Chase Manhattan Bank, and the Port Authority of and New Jersey. Dorothy Miller was also married to Holger Cahill, director of the WPA Federal Art Project.

Dorothy C. Miller was born in Hopedale, Massachusetts in 1904 and received her Bachelor of Arts from Smith College in 1925. She was first introduced to modern art through classes at the Newark Museum taught by John Cotton Dana and Holger Cahill. Miller joined the curatorial staff of the Newark Museum in 1926. The museum was one of the first to organize exhibitions of American folk art, American Primitives (1930-1931) and American Folk Sculpture (1931-1932). Miller worked with Cahill and others on the exhibition and developed a life-long interest in folk art.

After four years at the Newark Museum, Miller moved to New York city, hoping to get involved with the newly opened Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), and, likely, to be with Holger Cahill, with whom she lived with on 8th Street prior to their marriage in 1938. Between 1930 and 1932 she took odd jobs and worked with Mrs. Henry Lang cataloging, researching and installing Lang's collection of Native American art Lang donated to the Montclair Art Museum. At the same time, Holger Cahill was serving as Acting Director of the Museum of Modern Art during an absence of Director Alfred H. Barr. In 1932, Cahill asked Miller to assist him with curating the American Painting and Sculpture, 1862-1932 exhibition at MoMA, and together they also curated the First Municipal Art Exhibition, 1934 at the Rockefeller Center.

In 1934, Barr hired Miller as his assistant and one year later appointed her as MoMA's first curator. Miller spent the next 35 years organizing many of this country's most important exhibitions of contemporary art and building personal relationships with new artists and photographers, as well as the collections of MoMA. Miller retired from MOMA in 1969 and focused more on her art consulting work begun in the late 1950s.

Dorothy Miller's most notable client was Nelson A. Rockefeller. She assisted and advised Rockefeller as he acquired a vast personal collection of modern art - some of which was later donated to MoMA. Just prior to her retirement, Miller organized a large exhibition of Rockefeller's collection. The exhibition catalog written by Miller was the basis for the book she worked on with Rockefeller up until and following his death in 1979, ultimately published as The Nelson A. Rockefeller Collection: Masterpieces of Modern Art. In the preface, Rockefeller credited Miller with being one of the four people to whom he was indebted "for the understanding and endless joy I have found in the collecting of modern art in all forms."

Miller also served as the primary art consultant for projects to furnish federal spaces, including Henry Kissinger's State Department office suite, and the official Vice-Presidential residence at the Admiral's House in Washington D.C.

In 1959 Miller was invited to join the art collection committee of the Chase Manhattan Bank and served on the committee until the mid-1980s, contributing her expertise to the development of one of this country's oldest and largest corporate collections of modern and contemporary art.

Miller was also an advisor to other members of the Rockefeller family, including David Rockefeller, and assisted with developing the art collections of Rockefeller Institute/University. From 1960 through the late 1980s Miller was a member of the art committee for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey (PANJY) and was responsible for selecting much of the artwork for the World Trade Center in the 1970s. She served on numerous boards and commissions, including the Hancock Shaker Village, the Smithsonian Institution's Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, the Empire State Plaza in Albany, Smith College Museum of Art, and the Museum of American Folk Art. She also became a member of the Mark Rothko Foundation Board of Directors after the litigation following Rothko's death between Rothko's executors and his daughter.

In the mid-1970s Miller assisted the Whitney Museum of American with planning an exhibition and supporting catalog of the work of folk artist Edward Hicks. Although the exhibition and catalog were only partially realized in 1980, Miller and Eleanore Price Mather compiled and published a book on Hicks, Edward Hicks: His Peaceable Kingdoms and Other Paintings, published in 1983.

In 1982-1983 Miller received the Art Dealers Association Special Award, an honorary degree from Williams College, and the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture governor's award. In 1984 she was named honorary trustee of the Museum of Modern Art. In 1985 the Smith College Museum of Art honored her important contributions to museum connoisseurship with the exhibition Dorothy C. Miller: With An Eye to American Art.

Dorothy Miller died in 2003 at the age of 99 at her home in Greenwich, New York.

Related Material:

The Archives of American Art holds two oral history interviews with Dorothy C. Miller. The first was conducted by Paul Cummings between May 26, 1970 and September 28, 1971, and details Miller's life from childhood up to, and including, her years at the Museum of Modern Art. The second was conducted by Avis Berman on May 14, 1981 and covers Miller's relationships with Mark Rothko and Clyfford Still. Also found among the holdings of the Archives are the papers of Holger Cahill, Dorothy Miller's husband and colleague.

The Museum of Modern Art Achives holds Dorothy Miller's papers related to her curatorial work at the museum.

Provenance:

The collection was donated by Dorothy C. Miller via Wendy Jeffers between 1986 and 1997, and Reid White, Executor of Miller's estate, in 2004. Two subsequent additions were donated by Wendy Jeffers in 2014 and 2015.

Restrictions:

Use of original papers requires an appointment.

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.

Occupation:

Art historians -- New York (State) -- New York  Search this

Topic:

Art museum curators -- New York (State) -- New York  Search this

Corporations -- Private collections  Search this

Art -- Private collections  Search this

Folk art  Search this

Women museum curators  Search this

Women art historians  Search this

Genre/Form:

Photographs

Sketches

Christmas cards

Drawings

Citation:

Dorothy C. Miller papers, 1853-2013, bulk 1920-1996. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.

Sponsor:

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

Identifier:

AAA.milldoro

See more items in:

Dorothy C. Miller papers

Archival Repository:

Archives of American Art

GUID:

https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw9f1ed6cb6-f194-4b76-a8dd-fce3352c09b8

EDAN-URL:

ead_collection:sova-aaa-milldoro