An interview of Carol Eckert conducted June 18-19, 2007 by Jo Lauria, for the Archives of American Art's Nanette L. Laitman Documentation Project for Craft and Decorative Arts in America, in the artist's home and studio in Tempe, Arizona.
Eckert speaks of moving from North Carolina to New York during her childhood; her interest in making things as a child; her love of reading and a particular interest in mythology, legends, and fairy tales; choosing to pursue painting as an art major at Arizona State University; working as a substitute teacher after graduation; teaching herself the needle arts; and teaching painting and drawing classes at a local community arts center.
She also discusses experimenting with clay; the process that guides her work; the influence of her painting training on her color and composition choices; her marriage to furniture maker Tom Eckert; the development of the basketry field over the past decades; participating in exhibitions and shows; teaching workshops at Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts and Haystack Mountain School of Crafts; the cross-cultural animal symbolism present in her pieces; the working environment in her studio; the importance of craft publications; the development in her own work towards larger pieces; her commitment to the longevity and preservation of her work; and upcoming exhibitions.
Eckert recalls Steven Covey, Barbara Rose Okun, Jane Sauer, Sandy Blaine, Lillian Elliot, Joanne Segal Branford, John Garrett, John McQueen, Leon Niehues, Norma Minkowitz, Sarah and David Lieberman, Janet Koplos, Marcia Docter, Doug and Dale Anderson, Karen Johnson Boyd, Rudy Turk, Marcia Manhart, Joanne Rapp, and others.
Biographical / Historical:
Carol Eckert (1945- ) is a fiber artist from Tempe, Arizona. Jo Lauria is a curator and arts wrtier from Los Angeles, California.
General:
Originally recorded 3 sound discs. Reformatted in 2010 as 4 digital wav files. Duration is 2 hr., 40 min.
Provenance:
This interview is part of the Archives of American Art Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and administrators.
Restrictions:
Transcript is available on the Archives of American Art's website.
An interview of Tom Eckert conducted 2007 June 19, by Jo Lauria, for the Archives of American Art's Nanette L. Laitman Documentation Project for Craft and Decorative Arts in America, at the artist's home and studio in Tempe, Arizona.
Eckert speaks of his childhood interest in drawing; his first art lessons as a child; working as a cabinetmaker after high school; the decision to attend Arizona State University (ASU); earning very poor grades at ASU and enrolling at Phoenix College, where his art teacher inspired him to pursue art more seriously; returning to ASU to earn his BFA and MFA.; being hired to teach at ASU; creating and heading a wood program there; and helping to design the wood studio at Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts. He continues discussing his fascination with Flemish painting during his art history education; the sense of illusion present in much of his work; being drawn to wood as a medium because of its ability to be shaped into an infinite amount of forms his experience making a few large scale works of art; feeling a certain spirituality towards his studio and the tools and equipment related to his craft; the importance of first satisfying a personal creative drive, then of showing the work produced, and finally in selling the work; the ways in which galleries and museums assist in attaining those three goals; being invited to participate in a show at Galerie Lieve Hemel in Amsterdam; incorporating the Internet and new technology into the design process; mixing his own colors using pigments; his desire to create larger works in the future; and contentment with and excitement for his life as an artist. Eckert recalls William B. Dunning, James Krenov, Bob Stocksdale, Nanette L. Laitman, David Ellsworth, John Jordan, Wendell Castle, Martyle and Jerry Reinsdorf, Cervini Haas, Michael Himovitz, Joanne Rapp, James Rapp, and others.
Biographical / Historical:
Tom Eckert (1942- ) is a wood artist from Tempe, Arizona. Jo Lauria is a curator and arts writer from Los Angeles, California.
General:
Originally recorded on 3 sound discs. Reformatted in 2010 as 3 digital wav files. Duration is 2 hr., 44 min.
Provenance:
This interview is part of the Archives of American Art Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and administrators.
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 and born-digital records with no duplicate access copies requires advance notice.
Collection Rights:
The Archives of American Art makes its archival collections available for non-commercial, educational and personal use unless restricted by copyright and/or donor restrictions, including but not limited to access and publication restrictions. AAA makes no representations concerning such rights and restrictions and it is the user's responsibility to determine whether rights or restrictions exist and to obtain any necessary permission to access, use, reproduce and publish the collections. Please refer to the Smithsonian's Terms of Use for additional information.
Collection Citation:
Jeff Donaldson papers, 1918-2005, bulk 1960s-2005. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Sponsor:
Funding for the digitization of the Jeff Donaldson papers was provided by the Walton Family Foundation.
The Warren Buxton photograph collection includes photographic prints and slides made by Buxton in three different Native Communities. Series 1: Bruce Wynne (Spokane) and Family, 1965-1981, includes photographic prints of Spokane Artist and Leader Bruce Wynne and his family in Wellpinit, Washington. Series 2: U.S. Air Force Weather Station, Padloping Island (Baffinland Inuit), 1949-1950, makes up the bulk of the collection and includes black and white photographic prints and color slides from when Buxton was stationed at Padloping Island. Images in this series highlight the Baffinland Inuit islanders who worked with the USAF crew at the weather station and includes portraits as well as event images. Series 3: Diné (Navajo) Sheep Camp, New Mexico or Arizona and Hopi Potter, 1970-1979, includes photographic prints Buxton took of Diné (Navajo) shepherds and their families at a sheep camp in the 1970s as well as a photograph of Hopi potter Emma Adams.
Arrangement:
This collection is arranged in three series. Series 1: Bruce Wynne (Spokane) and Family, 1965-1981 [P32262-P32238] Series 2: U.S. Air Force Weather Station, Padloping Island, 1949-1950 [P32269-P32311, S04820-S04875], and Series 3: Diné (Navajo) Sheep Camp, New Mexico or Arizona and Hopi Potter, 1970-1979 [P32312-P32330]. The photographs were left in the order that they were originally cataloged in.
Biographical / Historical:
Warren F. Buxton was born in 1929 in Arlington, Massachusetts, the third child to Frank Everett and Gertrude Marie Arendt Buxton. During World War II while a junior in high school he was hired by the Metallurgy Department at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as a laboratory assistant to replace a young man just drafted into the service. Buxton enlisted in the Air Force in 1948, at age 19, and was trained as a meteorologist and climatologist. From 1949-1950 Warren served a year in a remote outpost at the Padloping Island Weather station in the Canadian Arctic. He then served three years at Frankfurt-am-Main Germany and one year with NATO headquarters in Naples, Italy.
Warren met his future wife Josephine "Jo" while both were serving in the United States Air Force in Frankfurt, Germany where she was secretary to a general in the counter intelligence department. They were married there in 1954. After both electing to take discharges in 1956, Buxton joined Tran World Airlines as a High Altitude Wind Route Specialist serving in Kansas City Missouri and at Idlewild Airport (now JFK International Airport) in New York City. In the meantime, Jo had been hired by Sinclair Oil Company as an accounting assistant. On Warren's transfer to New York, she received a promotion and was transferred to Sinclair's Headquarters there.
In 1959 Warren returned to college at the University of Missouri at Kansas City where he received his baccalaureate degrees in Mathematics and Master of Arts in Business and Educational Education. In 1963 Buxton was hired by Phoenix College in Arizona to teach their first courses in data processing and serve as interim manager of the new data processing center. When Maricopa Technical College (now Gateway Community College) was added to the district's system he asked to transfer to that site to set up a vocational program in data processing and to serve as Director of Data Processing for the college district. During this time Jo volunteered with both the Heard Museum and the Friends of Mexican Art. Warren in the meantime was elected to serve as Secretary of the newly formed Mexican Chamber of Commerce. During a sabbatical leave in 1972 Warren received his PhD in the Administration of Higher Education from Arizona State University.
In 1986, Buxton transferred to Paradise Valley Community College where he served as a faculty member teaching Computer Information Systems. He served in that capacity until his retirement in 2002. Following Jo's death in 1996, Buxton donated their art collection to Maricopa Community College. In 2004 paintings by Bruce Wynne as well as photographs taken by Buxton were donated to the National Museum of the American Indian.
Biographical information formerly found on the Maricopa Community College website (http://www2.pvc.maricopa.edu/buxton/started.html). Edits by Rachel Menyuk, processing archivist.
Separated Materials:
Warren Buxton also donated seven paintings by Bruce Wynne (Spokane) to the NMAI which can now be found in the Modern and Contemporary Arts collection with catalog numbers 26/5016-26/5022.
Provenance:
Gift of Warren Buxton, 2004.
Restrictions:
Access to NMAI Archive Center collections is by appointment only, Monday - Friday, 9:30 am - 4:30 pm. Please contact the archives to make an appointment (phone: 301-238-1400, email: nmaiarchives@si.edu).
Rights:
Permission to publish materials from the collection must be requested from National Museum of the American Indian Archive Center. Please submit a written request to nmaiphotos@si.edu. For personal or classroom use, users are invited users to download, print, photocopy, and distribute the images that are available online without prior written permission, provided that the files are not changed, the Smithsonian Institution copyright notice (where applicable) is included, and the source of the image is identified as the National Museum of the American Indian.
Identification of specific item; Date (if known); Warren Buxton photograph collection, Box and Folder Number; National Museum of the American Indian Archive Center, Smithsonian Institution.
