The records of the Richard York Gallery, a New York gallery specializing in American art from early 1800s to 1950, measure 87.5 linear feet and date from circa 1865-2005, with the bulk of the material dating from 1981 to 2004. The collection contains artists' artwork files, documenting the sale and consignment of nearly 6,500 works of art. The gallery's activities are also recorded through correspondence, artists' files, client files, gallery invoices, inventories, business and financial records, printed materials, scrapbooks, photographic materials of artwork, and estate records for the John Marin estate and Sergio Stella estate (Joseph Stella).
Scope and Content Note:
The records of the Richard York Gallery, a New York gallery specializing in American art from early 1800s to 1950, measure 87.5 linear feet and date from circa 1865-2005, with the bulk of the material dating from 1981 to 2004. The bulk of the records are artists' artwork files, documenting the sale and consignment of nearly 6,500 works of art. The gallery's activities are also recorded through correspondence, artists' files, client files, gallery invoices, inventories, business and financial records, printed materials, scrapbooks, photographic materials of artwork, and estate records for the John Marin estate and Sergio Stella estate (Joseph Stella).
Correspondence includes both incoming and outgoing correspondence with collectors, clients, galleries and museums, primarily regarding appraisals, consignments, exhibitions, general inquiries, loans, and sales. Also found are scattered transactional records, information sheets for artwork, and photographic materials. Correspondence from the mid-late 1980s is poorly represented.
The sale and consignment of nearly 6,500 pieces of artwork at the Richard York Gallery are documented through transactional records, photographic materials, correspondence, and scattered printed materials found in the Artists' Artwork Files. Artists for which there are significant quantities of materials (over 50 folders) include Joseph Goldyne, Ellen Day Hale, John Henry Hill, John William Hill, Lester George Hornby, Louis Lozowick, Luigi Lucioni, Emma Fordyce MacRae, John Marin, Joseph Stella, William Henry Stevens, and Steve Wheeler. Also included are the files of the Richard York photography collection, which contained works by Robert Mapplethorpe.
Similar to the Artists' Artwork Files, Client Files document the sale and consignment of artwork, but are arranged by artist's and client's name. Materials found are primarily from the early 1990s and include correspondence, notes, photographic materials, photocopied client information cards, and printed materials.
The Richard York Gallery represented the John Marin estate and the Sergio Stella estate (Joseph Stella). The records of the John Marin estate are primarily artwork in-take sheets from 1998 and inventory lists from 2001. The Sergio Stella Estate records include correspondence, inventories of artwork by Joseph Stella, and some photographic materials.
Sales and inventory records contain a nearly complete set of gallery invoices from 1995-2000, and 2004. Inventories includes gallery inventory lists, and inventory cards of sold artwork from 1981-1997 (bulk 1981-1991).
The business and financial records include accounting records, bank deposit records, corporate records, index cards for contacts, invoices for gallery expenses, materials related to Richard York's involvement in the ADAA, mailing lists, records of payments to consignors, receipts, shipping records, and tax records. The gallery migrated from paper records to Artbase, an artwork management system, around 2000-2002. Included are two CDs of database data and digital images from Artbase, as well as inventories of the digital file names.
Printed materials contain advertising tear sheets from 1998-2002, exhibition catalogs, magazine and newspaper clippings of reviews and announcements, and other miscellaneous printed materials. Printed materials are also found in eight scrapbooks which document the activities of the Richard York Gallery, Richard York, and the gallery's exhibitions from 1981-2002. Materials in the scrapbooks include clippings, correspondence, photographs, exhibition catalogs, announcements, and invitations.
Photographic materials includes color photographs, transparencies, digital prints, and scattered printed materials, as well as over 600 slides of artwork, primarily works of art which were sold or consigned by the gallery. Artists for which there is significant volume of transparencies include Houghton Cranford Smith and Lockwood de Forest, Sr.
Artists' files consist mostly of photocopied newspaper and magazine clippings, writings about the artist, and exhibition catalogs. Some original copies of printed material, correspondence with collectors, curators, and gallerists, photographic materials, artwork records, and some exhibition records are also present.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged as 10 series:
Missing Title
Series 1: Correspondence, 1975-2005 (Boxes 1-7, 81; 6.4 linear feet)
Series 2: Artists' Artwork Files, circa 1865-2004 (Boxes 7-64; 56.85 linear feet)
Series 3: Client Files, 1965, circa 1981-circa 2004 (Box 64; 0.5 linear feet)
Series 4: Estate Records, 1983-circa 2004 (Boxes 64-65; 1.0 linear feet)
Series 5: Sales and Inventory Records, 1977-2004 (Boxes 65-70; 5.0 linear feet)
Series 6: Business and Financial Records, 1974-2005 (Boxes 70-77, 81; 6.25 linear feet)
Series 7: Printed Materials, 1980-2004 (Boxes 77-78; 1.1 linear feet)
Series 8: Scrapbooks, 1981-2002 (Boxes 78, 80; 1.0 linear feet)
Series 9: Photographic Materials, 1977-2004 (Boxes 78-79; 1.2 linear feet)
Series 10: Artists' Files, 1922-2008 (Boxes 81-89; 8 linear feet)
Historical Note:
Richard T. York (circa 1950-2003) opened his eponymous gallery in the spring of 1981 on East 65th Street in New York City. Specializing in American painting and sculpture from early 1800s to 1950, the Richard York Gallery dealt in the artwork of hundreds of artists including Albert Bierstadt, Charles Demuth, Arthur Dove, Lockwood de Forest, John Graham, Georgia O'Keeffe, John Singer Sargent, Charles Sheeler, and Steve Wheeler. It also represented the estates of artists John Marin and Joseph Stella.
Richard York passed away in April 2003, and the gallery closed in May 2004.
Provenance:
The Richard York Gallery records were donated to the Archives of American Art in 2006 by Kevin Scott, the executor of Richard York's estate; and in 2015 by Lisa Bush Hankin, former gallery director.
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.
Letters, 1922-1949, from his daughter Janet, and from Robin Feild, director of Newcomb College School of Art, Kleemann Galleries in New York, fellow Newcomb art instuctor Robert Scott, Curt Valentin, Van Dearing Perrine (an illustrated greeting card and letter), Josef Albers (unsigned), and museums, regarding exhibitions of Steven's work; price lists and shipping invoices regarding exhibitions; a statement by Stevens; two biographical accounts; two sketchbooks and 152 drawings of landscapes, marine life, and non-representational images; printed material, 1907-1950, including clippings, exhibition announcements and catalogs, and a flier (1934) for the Stevens Summer School of Painting, and photographs, 1922-1923, of Stevens, colleagues, art classes, and exhibition installations.
Biographical / Historical:
Painter, New Orleans, Louisiana. Studied at the Cincinnati Art Academy and in New York with Jonas Lie and Van Dearing Perrine. Taught at Newcomb College Art Dept, New Orleans, 1921-1948. In the 1930s and 1940s, he developed an individualized style of non-objective and abstract painting. Throughout his career he experimented with pigments and manufacturing his own painting materials and was an influential teacher at Tulane.
Provenance:
Donated 1989 by Janet McDowell, Stevens' daughter.
Restrictions:
Use of original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C., Research Center. Microfilmed materials must be consulted on microfilm. Contact Reference Services for more information.
Occupation:
Art teachers -- Louisiana -- New Orleans Search this
Seventeen black and white photographs (with negatives) taken by painter Louise Trimble Kepper and her mother. They show Will Henry Stevens, views of Tennessee in the vicinity of Stevens' summer art school in 1941, and scenes of Louisiana including his Newcomb Art School sketching class.
Provenance:
The photographs were selected and copied from the collection of donor Louise Trimble Kepper and were taken in Louisiana and Tennessee between 1941 and 1942, while Kepper was a student of Will Henry Stevens at Newcomb College, New Orleans.
Restrictions:
Use of original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C., Research Center. Microfilmed materials must be consulted on microfilm. Contact Reference Services for more information.
Occupation:
Amateur artists -- Louisiana -- New Orleans Search this
Art students -- Louisiana -- New Orleans Search this
18 Items (Reel 3134: (on a partial microfilm reel))
0.3 Linear feet (Unfilmed)
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Scrapbooks
Date:
1928-1964
Scope and Contents:
Biographical material (1928-1950), 6 letters (1953), 2 scrapbooks (1929-1964), printed material (1929-1964) and photographs concern the life and career of Henry Lee McFee.
Reel 3134: Photographs show McFee (1929) and 5 of his paintings. Printed material consists of 8 reproductions of his works and 4 clippings (1950-1964).
Unfilmed: Biographical material consists of 5 award and membership certificates (1928-1950). Letters consist of one Christmas card and 5 letters of condolence (1953). Printed material consists of clippings (1929-1950), reproductions of works of art, and a poster. Photographs show McFee, his studio, and his works.
Unfilmed: Two scrapbooks contain photographs of McFee and his works. One also includes photographs of gallery installations and printed reproductions of his works (1931-1950). The other, assembled by McFee's step-daughter, also contains clippings (1929-1964), 2 exhibition catalogs (undated and 1949), an advertisement and annotated galley proof for a book of reproductions of McFee's paintings (1950), 2 typescripts on painting by McFee, and photographs of colleagues including Charles Rosen, Eugene Speicher, and Will Henry Stevens.
Biographical / Historical:
Painter. After graduation from Kemper Military School in 1905, he entered art school in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in 1907. In the following year, he studied under Birge Harrison at the Art Students League summer classes in Woodstock, New York. In 1937 he was the director of the Museum School of Art in San Antonio, Texas. He moved to Claremont College in 1947 to teach in the graduate school.
Provenance:
Donated by McFee's stepdaughter, Marian S. Sweeney, who inherited the papers from her mother, Eleanor McFee.
Restrictions:
Use of original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C., Research Center. Microfilmed materials must be consulted on microfilm. Contact Reference Services for more information.
