Correspondence, bulletins, reports and catalogs relating to the 13th region (New Mexico and Arizona) of the Public Works of Art Project.
Biographical / Historical:
Nusbaum was director of Region 13 of the Public Works of Art Project (PWAP). It was the first of the New Deal art programs, established under the Department of the Treasury in December 1933 to assist unemployed artists by enabling them to work on the decoration of non-federal public buildings. Although it lasted only until the following summer, it engaged nearly 4,000 artists in all parts of the country and served as an important precedent for subsequent federal art programs, such as the Federal Art Project of the Works Progress Administration. It existed until June 1934.
Provenance:
Lent for microfilming 1963 by Jesse L. Nusbaum.
Restrictions:
The Archives of American art does not own the original papers. Use is limited to the microfilm copy.
An interview of Joy Yeck Finke conducted by Sylvia Loomis on 1964 Jan. 9 for the Archives of American Art.
Fincke speaks of her background in Washington state and Oregon; going to work for the Federal Emergency Releif Administration (later the Works Progress Administration); meeting Vernon Hunter and becoming his secretary; how artists were selected for the project and how work was assigned; the work that was done by the Index of American Design in the Southwest; how Vernon Hunter supervised the project; art centers that were run by the project; community and public perception of the project; and the project's effect on artists' careers; She recalls Patrocino Barela.
Biographical / Historical:
Secretary to director of Index of American Design; Albuquerque, N.M. Index of American Design director in New Mexico was Vernon Hunter.
General:
Interviews of Louie H. and Virginia Ewing conducted by S. Loomis are also on this tape.
Provenance:
This interview conducted as part of the Archives of American Art's New Deal and the Arts project, which includes over 400 interviews of artists, administrators, historians, and others involved with the federal government's art programs and the activities of the Farm Security Administration in the 1930s and early 1940s.
Restrictions:
Transcript: Patrons must use microfilm copy.
Occupation:
Arts administrators -- New Mexico -- Albuquerque -- Interviews Search this
Official correspondence of the Public Works of Art regional committee for New Mexico and Arizona. Correspondents include: Edward Bruce, Jesse L. Nusbaum, Forbes Watson, Emil Bisttram, and others.
Biographical / Historical:
Architect, committee member of Public Works of Art regional committee--Region 13; Santa Fe, New Mexico.
Provenance:
Lent for microfilming 1965 by John Gaw Meem.
Restrictions:
The Archives of American art does not own the original papers. Use is limited to the microfilm copy.
United States -- Economic conditions, 1918-1945 -- Washington (State)
Date:
circa 1840s-1997
Summary:
The papers of artist, photographer, museum director, anthropologist, and writer Robert Bruce Inverarity are dated circa 1840s-1997 and measure 12.7 linear feet. Biographical information, correspondence, writings and notes, subject files, art work, scrapbooks, sound recordings, printed material and photographs are found within the papers. They document Inverarity's work as Director of the Federal Art Project in Seattle and Director of the Art and Craft Project for the State of Washington, as well as his other professional work. Nineteenth century material consists of a Japanese print, printed material, and photographs.
Scope and Content Note:
The papers of artist, photographer, museum director, anthropologist, and writer Robert Bruce Inverarity are dated circa 1840s-1997 and measure 13.8 linear feet. Biographical information, correspondence, writings and notes, subject files, art work, scrapbooks, sound recordings, printed material and photographs are found within the papers. They document Inverarity's work as Director of the Federal Art Project in Seattle and Director of the Art and Craft Project for the State of Washington, as well as his other professional work. Nineteenth century material consists of a Japanese print, printed material, and photographs.
Among the biographical information are awards and certificates, biographical and genealogical notes, and educational records. Correspondence concerns Inverarity's activities as Director of the WPA Federal Arts Project in Washington State, 1936-1941. Additional personal and professional correspondence, 1929-1993, documents his activities as a museum director, consultant, collector, and writer. Among the friends and colleagues with whom he corresponded are: Max Ernst and Dorothea Tanning, Rockwell and Sally Kent, Stanton MacDonald-Wright, Wolfgang Palen, Juliet and Man Ray, Mark Tobey, Edward Weston, and various individuals associated with the WPA.
Manuscripts of a few of Inverarity's many articles on topics such as anthropology, museology, and information storage and retrieval are among his writings and notes. Also included are the manuscript of an unpublished book, Tobey Remembered, along with drafts, notes, correspondence, research materials, and photocopies of Tobey's letters to him and others. Other writings consist of book reviews, children's books, a catalog of the Inverarity Collection, and a copy of his 1946 master's thesis, "The Social-Economic Position of the American Artist." Several journals, 1928-1966, survive, including one that records his 1932 trip to study the Haida Indians of the Queen Charlotte Islands.
Subject files include general subjects such as "Folk Art" and "Preservation." Files on the museums where Inverarity was the director contain some official records as well as general information. Art work by Inverarity includes eight volumes of sketch books, 1928-1942, commercial work for Boeing, notes and drawings for book designs. Among the work by other artists are drawings, paintings and prints by friends. Of particular interest are display panels for a small exhibit on airbrush stencil prints produced by the Washington State WPA Federal Art Project. Other noteworthy items are pencil sketches and a watercolor by Mark Tobey, and prints by Hiroshige and Jan Matulka.
Five scrapbooks, 1928-1979, contain newspaper clippings, miscellaneous printed items, and a small number of photographs and letters. Three volumes document his career as an artist and museum director. One consists of biographical information and items designed by Inverarity, and another concerns publication and marketing of his monograph Art of the Northwest Coast Indians.
Sound recordings consist of interviews and conversations. An extensive interview with Inverarity about his life and career was conducted by Craig Gilborn in 1990. Bruce and Jane Inverarity in conversation with former colleague Ernie Johnson and his wife Helen about his departure from the Museum of International Folk Art were recorded in 1980. Also included is a 1981 conversation with Grace T. Stevenson containing references to Mark Tobey and Morris Graves.
Printed material includes many items about or produced by the WPA Federal Art Project. Among the items written by Inverarity are many articles on a wide variety of topics, his book Art of the Northwest Coast Indians, and two published portfolios. Printed material by other authors includes articles, books and reports about or mentioning Inverarity, and books designed or illustrated by him. Among the miscellaneous printed items are catalogs and brochures of the schools where Inverarity taught and studied, and a few ephemeral items designed by him.
Photographs are of art work, people, places, the Washington State WPA Federal Art Project, and miscellaneous subjects. All photographs known to be by Inverarity are clearly marked. Art work includes views of Inverarity's collection of his own work and that of other artists hanging in his home. Photographs of people include artists, friends, colleagues, and various groups. Of special interest are Inverarity's portraits of artists, among them Marcel Duchamp, Max Ernst, Morris Graves, Hilaire Hiler, Rico Le Brun, Stanton Macdonald-Wright, Man Ray, Dorothea Tanning, and Mark Tobey. Photographs of places include the museums where Inverarity was director, places in which he lived, and travel pictures. Of note are a large group of photographs (copy prints) taken in 1932 while studying the Haida Indians in British Columbia. Nineteenth century photographs of family homes, Europe, and South America may have been taken by his father. Photographs of the Washington State WPA Federal Arts Project are of individual works of art, exhibition installations, mosaic procedures and local art centers. Many, probably intended for display, are mounted in groups on large cardboard panels. Miscellaneous subjects include art photographs by Inverarity and the microreader he invented.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged as nine series. Correspondence is in chronological order, Biographical Information and Subject Files are arranged alphabetically by folder title. Other series have been organized into subseries and arrangement is as described in the Series Descriptions/Container List below. Unless noted otherwise, material within folders is arranged chronologically.
Series 1: Biographical Information, 1934-1997, undated (Box 1, OV 18; 0.25 linear ft.)
Series 2: Correspondence, 1928-1993, undated (Box 1; 0.75 linear ft.)
Series 3: Writings and Notes, 1928-1993, undated, (Boxes 2-3; 1.5 linear ft.)
Series 4: Subject Files, 1938-1990, undated (Boxes 3-6, OV 19-20; 2.5 linear ft.)
Series 5: Art Work, circa 1840s-1969, undated (Boxes 6, 12, 16, OV 21; 1.3 linear ft.)
Series 6: Scrapbooks, 1928-1991, undated (Boxes 7-8; 1.1 linear ft.)
Series 7: Sound Recordings, 1980-1990 (Box 8; 3 folders)
Series 8: Printed Material, 1902-1995, undated (Boxes 8-11, 13, OV 22; 3.4 linear ft.)
Series 9: Photographs, circa 1870s-1990, undated (Boxes 11, 14-17, OV 23; 3.0 linear ft.)
Biographical Note:
Robert Bruce Inverarity (1909-1999) showed artistic leanings as a boy, and from an early age was fascinated by puppetry and Northwest Coast native culture. During much of his youth, Inverarity's family lived in Canada, but returned to their native Seattle when he was a teenager. After graduating from high school, he made a 500 mile journey on foot along the coasts of the Vancouver Islands, collecting Indian artifacts and studying the area's tribal legends.
He studied briefly with Mark Tobey in Seattle, where the two shared a studio; when Tobey departed for Chicago, Inverarity succeeded him as an art teacher at the Cornish School. He spent the next few years in California working as an artist, exhibiting, and occasionally teaching. From there, he moved to Vancouver where he was Director of the School of Creative Art. In 1932, Inverarity made a three month trip to the Queen Charlotte Islands, British Columbia, for the purpose of studying the Haida Indians.
Upon his return to the United States in 1933, Inverarity joined the University of Washington Drama School as a puppetry instructor; in 1938 he published a highly regarded Manual of Puppetry. During 1936-37, he took a leave of absence from the university to assume the position of State Director of the Federal Art Project, where he remained until 1939. He then became State Director of the Art and Crafts Project (1939-1941). The U.S. Navy appointed Inverarity Chief of Design for Camouflage (1941-1943) and he later served as an Official Navy War Artist (1943-1945).
During his early years as a teacher and administrator, Inverarity continued making art and participated in a wide variety of exhibitions. He published a portfolio, 12 Photographs by R. B. Inverarity (1940). In the following year, Movable Masks and Figures of the North Pacific Coast Indians, a portfolio of his watercolors reproduced as silkscreen prints, appeared. Although Inverarity stopped exhibiting in 1941, he continued to produce art; notable work of this period includes photographic portraits of a number of artist friends (Max Ernst, Dorothea Tanning, Marcel Duchamp, and Man Ray).
After World War II, Inverarity completed his formal education. He earned a Bachelor's degree in art and anthropology from the University of Washington (1946), and then studied with Hilaire Hiler at Freemont University in Los Angeles, where he was awarded a Master's degree in fine arts (1947) and a Ph.D. (1948).
Inverarity began his museum career in 1949 when he was appointed the first director of the Museum of International Folk Art in Santa Fe, New Mexico, a position that combined his interest in, and knowledge of, anthropology and art. While in Santa Fe, he published Art of the North West Coast Indians (1950). During his five year tenure as director, the museum participated in a pilot study for coding visual files, a project of the anthropological group, Human Resources Area Files, Inc. When Inverarity was dismissed from the Museum of International Folk Art in 1954, most of the staff resigned in protest, and the American Association of Museums investigated the situation.
Inverarity then became the first director of the Adirondack Museum, Blue Mountain Lake, New York, where he remained for eleven years. In addition to planning the museum's building, and developing collections and programs, Inverarity continued his involvement with the visual files project of the Human Resources Area Files, Inc., studying information storage and retrieval, developing a "microreader," and publishing Visual Files Coding Index (1960). In addition, he published many articles on a variety of topics and was active in organizations for anthropologists and museum professionals.
After his 1965 departure from the Adirondack Museum, Inverarity went to California and worked as an illustrator and book designer at the University of California Press. He returned to the east coast in 1969 to assume the directorship of the Philadelphia Maritime Museum. During this period, he remained active in professional associations and traveled to study museums abroad. He retired in 1976 and moved to La Jolla, California.
Robert Bruce Inverarity died in 1999.
Separated Material:
Originals of most of the drawings and sketches loaned by Mr. Inverarity were returned to him after filming and were not subsequently donated. This material is available on 35 mm microfilm reel D/NDA/I, frames 392-409.
Provenance:
Robert Bruce Inverarity donated his papers to the Archives in several installments between 1965 and 1993. Additional papers were received from his estate in 1999. He also loaned a small number of additional drawings and sketches for microfilming which were returned to him. A few of these drawings were included with the papers he subsequently donated to the Archives of American Art.
Restrictions:
The collection is open for research. Use requires an appointment.
Rights:
The Robert Bruce Inverarity papers are owned by the Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution. Literary rights as possessed by the donor have been dedicated to public use for research, study, and scholarship. The collection is subject to all copyright laws.
1 Microfilm reel (21 items on partial microfilm reel)
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Microfilm reels
Place:
United States -- Social conditions -- 1933-1945
United States -- Economic conditions -- 1918-1945
Date:
1933-1938
Scope and Contents:
This microfilm collection of the Kenneth Miller Adams papers consists of a letter, dated December 1933, from a Public Works of Art Project official on a routine matter, and a letter, dated May 1933, from Cecil H. Jones of the Treasury Relief Art Project in which Jones tells Adams he is trying to have him transferred to the WPA Federal Arts Project. Also included is correspondence, 1936-1937, with Edward Rowan and others of the Section of Fine Arts regarding Section mural competitions. This correspondence includes contracts for two murals painted by Adams – one in Goodland, Kansas (1936) depicting a scene with a figure and a buggy, and one in Deming, New Mexico (1937) entitled Mountains and Yucca. A photograph of each of the murals is also included.
Biographical / Historical:
Kenneth Miller Adams (1897-1966) was a painter, muralist, and lithographer in New Mexico. Born in Topeka, Kansas, he studied at the Art Institute of Chicago and the Art Students League before serving in World War I. In 1924 he moved to Taos, New Mexico and joined the Taos Society of Artists. In 1933 he worked for the Treasury Relief Art Project and the Public Works of Art Project. He moved to Albuquerque in 1938 and later taught at the University of New Mexico until he retired in 1963. Adams was elected to the National Academy of Design in 1961.
Related Materials:
The Archives of American Art also holds the oral history interview with Kenneth M. Adams, 1964 April 23 conducted by Sylvia Glidden Loomis.
Provenance:
Lent for microfilming 1964 by Kenneth Miller Adams.
Restrictions:
The Archives of American art does not own the original papers. Use is limited to the microfilm copy.
Papers relating to work done for the Federal Art Project; business and personal letters; printed material; biographical data; correspondence; and photographs.
REEL 79: Correspondence, memoranda, and other material relating to federal art programs in New Mexico and Arizona. Includes correspondence with Public Works of Art Project administrators about a mural in Taos County Court House done by Bisttram, Bert G. Phillips, and Victor Higgins; memoranda; press releases and reports; catalogs of Treasury Department art projects shown at the Corcoran Gallery; and Federal Art Project dismissals and a proposal for a Bureau of Fine Arts.
REEL 581: Business and personal letters to and from Bisttram, including a letter from Lily and Eero Saarinen, and letters from Raymond Jonson; clippings; 91 catalogs; 22 reproductions of Bisttram's work; newspaper and magazine articles describing the artist colony at Taos and Santa Fe.
REEL 2787: Baptismal and naturalization records; correspondence; a photograph of Bisttram; clippings and printed material.
REELS 2892-2894: Biographical material; one or more letters from Ray Jonson, Stanton Macdonald-Wright; Oscar Berninghaus, Mrs. Walter Ufer, and other artists; correspondence with Olin Dows and others involved in the Treasury Relief Art Project, with galleries, museums, art organizations, and students; writings and notes; the draft for a book about Dynamic Symmetry; drafts for a book The Creative Process in the New Age; sketches and drawings; business, financial, and legal records; exhibition catalogs and announcements; certificates and awards; transcripts of interviews of Bisttram; and photographs of Bisttram and his paintings.
Biographical / Historical:
Painter; Taos, N.M. Was an exponent of Dynamic Symmetry, a painting technique.
Provenance:
Papers microfilmed on reel 581were lent for microfilming 1973, and some was subsequently donated with a gift in 1983 (and refilmed on reels 2892-2894).
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.
United States -- Social conditions -- 1933-1945 -- New Mexico
Date:
[undated] and 1914-1970
Scope and Contents:
Correspondence with John Sloan and others, writings, poems, original art works, scrapbooks, photographs, and Shuster's own descriptions of his work.
Reel NDA 3: Instructions, releases, speeches, manuscripts notes, photographs of Shuster's PWAP murals in New Mexico; and a typescript of a comedy written by Shuster.
Reels 169-177: 400 letters, 1917-1968, including correspondence with Robert Henri, Edgar Varese, John S. Velie, Walter Karig, and family members. Other materials consist of diaries, 1918, 1928, 1933-1934, 1937-1962, and 1964-1969; photographs of Shuster, family, and friends, and his work; original drawings, watercolors, oils and etchings; sketchbooks; poems, lectures, and stories by Shuster; a record of his works; scrapbooks, 1920-1928, 1923-1935, and 1935-1963; and material relating to John Sloan, who was Shuster's close friend and his teacher in 1920.
Reel 277: Materials relating to John Sloan, including letters from him 1922-1951; notes by Winifield Townley Scott recording conversations with Helen Shuster and Mrs. Sloan after Sloan's death and commenting on Sloan's work, tributes by Oliver LaFarge and others, and clippings. Additional correspondents are John Sheridan, Robert Henri, Warren Wheelock, Willard Nash, and the Veterans Administration, concerning Shuster's medical disability. Also included are poems by Shuster, 1925-1939, and other Santa Fe residents, including Scott; and correspondence and printed material relating to Shuster's participation in various Santa Fe festivals.
Reel 4283: Five letters from Sloan to Shuster. Three letters are illustrated and contain detailed instructions and advice on etching technique. A fourth letter, dated Jan 2, 1922, includes a recipe for gesso preparation and an offer from Sloan to pay Shuster's entry fee to "show in the Independents." Sloan in his two page letter, dated January 3, 1947, comments on the pace of his work; his participation in a "Mr. & Mrs. Exhibition" at the Laurel Gallery; a production of Eugene O'Neill's "The Ice Man Cometh"; and the Whitney Annual.
Arrangement:
Letters arranged chronologically.
Biographical / Historical:
Painter, printmaker, and writer active in Santa Fe, N.M.; b. 1893; d. 1969
Provenance:
The material borrowed from Will Shuster in October 1964 (reel NDA 3) was part of a project of AAA to document New Deal art projects throughout the U.S. The bulk of the Will Shuster papers (reels 169-177, 277) were lent by his widow, Selma Dingee Shuster. Five letters from John Sloan (Reel 4283) were lent in 1989 by her estate.
Restrictions:
The Archives of American art does not own the original papers. Use is limited to the microfilm copy.
An interview of Boris Gilbertson conducted 1964 June 25 by Sylvia Loomis for the Archives of American Art.
Gilbertson speaks of his background; his education at the Art Institute of Chicago; starting out as a sculptor; his early involvement with the Treasury Relief Art Project; his work in Wisconsin for the project; how the Project functioned and how his work was supervised; the TRAP's effect on the politics of the time; his views of abstract art; the uses of humor in sculpture and in art; animal subject matter in his work.
Biographical / Historical:
Sculptor; Santa Fe, N.M.
General:
An unrelated interview of Gene Kloss conducted by S. Loomis is also on this tape.
Provenance:
This interview conducted as part of the Archives of American Art's New Deal and the Arts project, which includes over 400 interviews of artists, administrators, historians, and others involved with the federal government's art programs and the activities of the Farm Security Administration in the 1930s and early 1940s.
An interview of Merle Armitage conducted 1964 February 6, by Sylvia Loomis, for the Archives of American Art.
Armitage speaks of his role as Public Works of Art Project regional chairman of Southern California, including his supervision of 126 artists involved in painting, drawing, sculpture, lithography and mural projects; experimental work in PWAP easel painting projects; censorship of subject matter in a mural for the Frank Wiggins Trade School; his opposition to government subsidized art programs; his impressions of Edward Bruce, Dalzell Hatfield, James Milford Zornes, and others associated with the PWAP. Armitage also speaks of the American Institute of Graphic Arts and contemporary book design.
Biographical / Historical:
Merle Armitage (1893-1975) was an art administrator and graphic artist of Santa Fe, New Mexico.
General:
Originally recorded on 1 sound tape reel. Reformatted in 2010 as 1 digital wav file. Duration is 48 min.
Provenance:
This interview conducted as part of the Archives of American Art's New Deal and the Arts project, which includes over 400 interviews of artists, administrators, historians, and others involved with the federal government's art programs and the activities of the Farm Security Administration in the 1930s and early 1940s.
United States -- Economic conditions -- 1918-1945 -- New Mexico
United States -- Social conditions -- 1933-1945 -- New Mexico
Date:
1935-1961
Scope and Contents:
Six photographs of Morris' oil paintings done for the Federal Art Project in New Mexico; a list of his works, 1960; a list of collections and exhibitions where his work had appeared, 1960; and a clipping.
Biographical / Historical:
Painter, Santa Fe, New Mexico. Worked on the Federal Art Project in New Mexico during the Depression.
Provenance:
The materials appear to be from a personal scrapbook, perhaps Morris' own, but the origin is uncertain.
Restrictions:
The Archives of American art does not own the original papers. Use is limited to the microfilm copy.
Photographs of works by FAP New Mexico artists: Gene Kloss, Manville Chapman, Zena Kavin, and James S. Morris, from the collection of the Museum of New Mexico Fine Arts Gallery; and a checklist of the photographed work.
Biographical / Historical:
Federal aid art project during the Depression. The Federal Art Project (FAP) fell under the jurisdiction of Federal Project No. 1 of the Works Progress Administration (WPA), established in May 1935 specifically as a work relief program for unemployed artists. Each state and territory had its own programsand were administered aid from the federal government via a local agency.
Provenance:
Prints purchased from Fine Arts Gallery, Museum of New Mexico, 1964.
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.
United States -- Economic conditions -- 1918-1945 -- New Mexico
United States -- Social conditions -- 1933-1945 -- New Mexico
Date:
1936-1951
Scope and Contents:
Correspondence concerning Treasury Department art programs, including letters from Edward B. Rowan and Forbes Watson; information on mural competitions; Section of Fine Arts bulletins; and miscellaneous papers and printed material concerning Hurd's murals for the Section of Fine Arts in Texas and New Mexico.
Biographical / Historical:
Muralist, painter, and writer, New Mexico; b. 1904; d. 1984 Painted murals for the Section of Fine Arts during the Depression.
Provenance:
Lent for microfilming 1964 by Peter Hurd.
Restrictions:
The Archives of American art does not own the original papers. Use is limited to the microfilm copy.
United States. Work Projects Administration Search this
United States. Works Progress Administration Search this
Extent:
90 Items ((on partial microfilm reel))
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Date:
1936-1938
Scope and Contents:
Manuscripts and printed material relating to art in New Mexico, including: articles about Spanish colonial, Indian, and modern art; about the Taos art colony; Vernon Hunter; art in specific cities; biographical data on several New Mexico artists; lists of artists and newspaper clippings.
Biographical / Historical:
The Federal Writers' Project was established in 1935 under Federal Project No. One of the Works Progress Administration (WPA). Its primary objective was to create and provide jobs for the individuals, particularly those of the white collar field, who would have otherwise been left unemployed and destitute. Areas covered on FWP programs include cartography, history, art and a variety of other topics.
Provenance:
Lent for microfilming 1970 by the New Mexico State Records Center.
Restrictions:
The Archives of American art does not own the original papers. Use is limited to the microfilm copy.
Reports of work in the 13th region (New Mexico), written by the supervisor, Gustave Baumann. Included are detailed personal and professional comment on numerous artists in the Santa Fe, Taos, and Albuquerque projects, among them Emil Bisttram, Tom Lea, Ward Lockwood, Olive Rush, and Will Shuster; a work journal and commentary on various artists and their projects; and commentary on the physical situation, psychological climate and supervisory problems associated with the projects.
Biographical / Historical:
The Public Works of Art Project (PWAP), the first of the New Deal art programs, was established under the Department of the Treasury in December 1933 to assist unemployed artists by enabling them to work on the decoration of non-federal public buildings. Although it lasted only until the following summer, it engaged nearly 4,000 artists in all parts of the country and served as an important precedent for subsequent federal art programs, such as the Federal Art Project of the Works Progress Administration.
Provenance:
Lent for microfilming 1964 by Gustave Baumann.
Restrictions:
The Archives of American art does not own the original papers. Use is limited to the microfilm copy.
United States. Dept. of the Treasury. Section of Fine Arts Search this
Extent:
6.3 Linear feet
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Sketches
Diaries
Photographs
Date:
1879-1967
Summary:
The papers of Olive Rush measure 6.3 linear feet and date from 1879 to 1967. They contain correspondence, artwork, photographs, writings, and other personal papers documenting Rush's education and career as an illustrator, portraitist, muralist, painter, teacher, and promoter of Native American art.
Scope and Contents note:
The records of Olive Rush measure 6.3 linear feet and date from 1879 to 1967. They contain correspondence, artwork, photographs, writings, and other records that document her education and career as an illustrator, portraitist, muralist, painter, and promoter of Native American art.
Biographical materials include several narratives written by Rush and others, as well as a few items related to Delaware artist Ethel Pennewill Brown Leach, Rush's close friend and colleague. Correspondence spans Rush's education and career, and documents her early career in illustration, purchases and exhibitions of her work, her efforts to secure exhibitions for Native American artists, and her dealings with administrators of Federal Art Projects of the 1930s.
Writings include diaries from Rush's early years, including an especially detailed diary from her Santa Fe Indian School mural project in 1932. Also found are lectures, talks, essays, notebooks with technical experiments and aesthetic ideas, and loose notes for her FAP project at the New Mexico College of Agricultural and Mechanical Arts.
Records of Rush's artwork include two record books, receipts for supplies and shipments, price lists, inventories, records of submissions, and a small number of similar records of artwork by Native American artists. Sketchbooks, loose sketches, and drawings by Rush span her entire career and include many studies and proposed designs for murals and frescoes.
Printed Materials consist of exhibition catalogs, clippings, and reproductions of artwork, especially illustration work from Rush's early career. Photographs include a class photograph from the Corcoran School of Art circa 1890 and many of Rush and her fellow artists in Wilmington, Delaware from around 1904 to 1910. Photographs of works of art document Rush's murals and frescoes in private homes, businesses, and public buildings.
Arrangement note:
The collection is arranged into seven series:
Series 1: Biographical Material, 1886-1966 (Box 1; 7 folders)
Series 2: Correspondence, 1889-1964 (Boxes 1-2, 8; 1.4 linear feet)
Series 3: Writings, 1886-1962 (Box 2; 0.6 linear feet)
Series 4: Records of Artwork, 1904-1956 (Box 3; 8 folders)
Series 5: Artwork, 1896-1957 (Boxes 3-4, 7, OV 8-12; 1 linear foot)
Series 6: Printed Materials, 1879-1967 (Boxes 4-5, 7, OV 13; 1.6 linear feet)
Series 7: Photographs, circa 1890-1966 (Box 6; 0.4 linear feet)
Biographical/Historical note:
Olive Rush was born in Fairmount, Indiana in 1875 to a Quaker farm family of six children, and attended nearby Earlham College, a Quaker school with a studio art program. Encouraged by her teacher, Rush enrolled in the Corcoran School of Art in Washington, D.C. in 1890, where she stayed for two years and achieved early recognition for her work. In 1893, Rush joined the Indiana delegation of artists to the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago.
In 1894, she moved to New York City and continued her studies at the Art Students League with Henry Siddons Mowbray, John Twachtman, and Augustus St. Gaudens. She secured her first job as an illustrator with Harper and Brothers and quickly started doing additional illustration work for Good Housekeeping, Scribner's, The Delineator, Woman's Home Companion, Sunday Magazine and St. Nicholas Magazine. Rush also became a staff artist at the New York Tribune and illustrated several books.
In 1904, Rush sent an inquiry with samples of her work to master illustrator Howard Pyle, who had established what was then the only school of illustration in the country in Wilmington, Delaware. There he provided free instruction to a small number hand-picked artists culled from hundreds of applicants. Although Pyle did not admit women to his studio, he encouranged her to come and join the class for lectures and criticisms. Rush moved to Delaware later that year, joining a growing number of female illustrators there including Ethel Pennewill Brown (later Leach), Blanche Chloe Grant, Sarah Katherine Smith, and Harriet Roosevelt Richards, among others. Rush and her female colleagues lived together in a boarding house known as Tusculum, which became well-known as a gathering place for women artists.
Rush traveled to Europe in 1910, embarking on a period of intense study and travel which would mark a steady transition from illustration to painting. She studied at Newlyn in Cornwall, England and then in France with the American impressionist Richard E. Miller. She returned to Wilmington in 1911, where she moved into Pyle's studio with Ethel Pennewill Brown. Rush bounced to New York, Boston, and back to France, where she lived for a time with fellow artists Alice Schille, Ethel Pennewill Brown, and Orville Houghton Peets. Her reputation grew, and she began to exhibit regularly in major national and regional juried exhibitions including the Carnegie, Pennsylvania Academy, and Corcoran annual exhibitions, as well as the Hoosier Salon.
In 1914, Rush made her first trip to Arizona and New Mexico. Passing through Santa Fe on her return trip, Rush made contact with the artists community at the Museum of New Mexico, where she secured an impromptu solo exhibition after showing her new work, inspired by the landscape of the Southwest. She made Santa Fe her permanent home in 1920 in an adobe cottage on Canyon Road, which became a main thoroughfare of the Santa Fe artists' community.
Rush began to experiment with fresco painting, and developed her own techniques suitable to the local climate. She became a sought-after muralist and was asked to create frescoes for many private homes and businesses. In her painting, she often depicted the Native American dances and ceremonies she attended. She exhibited these paintings around the country, including with the Society of Independent Artists in New York, and in the Corcoran Annual Juried exhibition, where Mrs. Herbert Hoover and Duncan Phillips both purchased her work.
In 1932, Rush was hired to teach at the Santa Fe Indian School. Rush's enthusiastic work in the 1930s with the young pueblo artists is credited with helping to bring about a flourishing of Native American visual art in New Mexico. Rush continued to work with native artists throughout her life, and many of her associates went on to gain national reputations, including Harrison Begay, Awa-Tsireh, Pop Chalee, Pablita Valerde, and Ha-So-De (Narciso Abeyta).
From 1934 to 1939, Rush executed murals for the Public Works of Art Project (PWAP) and the Federal Art Project (FAP) of the Works Progress Administration (WPA). Rush's federal art projects included murals for the Santa Fe Public Library (1934), the Biology Building of the New Mexico Agricultural College (1935), the Pawhuska, Oklahoma Post Office (1938), and the Florence, Colorado Post Office (1939). Rush was also asked to join the Advisory Committee on Indian Art created by the PWAP in 1934, to help administer a segment of the program aimed at employing Native American artists.
In her later years, Rush's artwork became increasingly experimental, incorporating the ideas of Chinese painting, Native American art, and her contemporaries, the modernists, especially Wassily Kandinsky. She continued painting and exhibiting until 1964, when illness prohibited her from working. She died in 1966, leaving her home and studio to the Santa Fe Society of Friends.
Sources consulted for this biography include Olive Rush: A Hoosier Artist in New Mexico (1992) by Stanley L. Cuba, and Almost Forgotten: Delaware Women Artists and Arts Patrons 1900-1950 (2002) by Janice Haynes Gilmore.
Related Archival Materials note:
The Archives of American Art holds a brief oral history interview with Olive Rush concerning her involvement with Federal Art Projects.
Separated Materials note:
The Archives of American Art also holds material lent for microfilming (reel SW4) including scrapbooks, photographs, clippings, and exhibition catalogs. Most of this material was later donated, but some items remain with the lender and are not described in the collection container inventory.
Provenance:
Olive Rush donated the bulk of her papers to the Archives of American Art in 1963 and 1964. Additional exhibition catalogs and photographs were added to the collection upon her death in 1966. An anonymous donation of diaries, sketchbooks, and a photograph was received by the Archives in 1970. Also in 1970, the Olive Rush Memorial Studio lent papers for microfilming. Many, but not all, of the loaned materials were later donated.
Restrictions:
The bulk of the collection has been digitized and is available online via AAA's website. Use of material not digitized requires an appointment.
Rights:
The Olive Rush papers are owned by the Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution. Literary rights as possessed by the donor have been dedicated to public use for research, study, and scholarship. The collection is subject to all copyright laws.
Topic:
Women painters -- New Mexico -- Santa Fe Search this
Reels 3028-3030: Biographical data; correspondence with Ernest Blumenschein, Adolf Dehn, Loren Mozley, Georgia O'Keeffe and others; a transcript of an interview with Hunter's widow, Virginia Hunter Ewing, Janaury 7, 1964, regarding Hunter's tenure as State Director for the Federal Art Program of WPA in New Mexico; illustrated typescripts of Hunter's manuscripts; price lists and appraisals of his work; 4 undated sketchbooks of figure studies; annotated drawings of furniture, interior designs and mural studies; a scrapbook, 1925-1960, of newspaper clippings and other printed material; exhibition catalogs; magazine clippings; photos of Hunter, his paintings and murals, and his interior design for the Officer's Club, Army Air Base, Clovis, New Mexico.
Reel NDA 1: Press clippings and a memorial bulletin from the Roswell Museum in New Mexico where he was an administrator.
Biographical / Historical:
Painter, administrator and designer; Sante Fe, New Mexico. State director of the Federal Art Project of the Work Projects Administration, a federally aided project to provide employment to artists during the Depression.
Provenance:
The lender, Mrs. Ewing, is the widow of Hunter. Material on reel NDA 1 lent by Mrs. Ewing.
Restrictions:
The Archives of American art does not own the original papers. Use is limited to the microfilm copy.
