Correspondence includes letters to Greenberg and scattered copies of Greenberg's replies. The bulk of the letters are from artists, authors and other art critics, art collectors, galleries, museums, and publishers, with some scattered personal correspondence. Many of the correspondents wrote substantive and detailed letters to Greenberg which provide documentation of the evolving careers, artistic development, opinions, and personal and professional relationships of the correspondents. Greenberg's replies, though few in number, are often similarly substantive and illuminating. The relationships revealed in the letters are indicative of the influence wielded by Greenberg's opinions, support, and criticism.
There are multiple substantive letters from American artists discussing their work, personal lives, and careers, including Darby Bannard, Jack Bush, Richard Diebenkorn, Oscar Edwards, Helen Frankenthaler, Paul Jenkins, Buffie Johnson, Kenneth Noland, Jules Olitski, Ludwig Sander, David Smith, Kimber Smith, Clyfford Still, Anne Truitt, and many others. Also found are letters from art collectors, curators, critics, and art dealers seeking and exchanging opinions, including Dominque Fourcade, Mark Krupnik, Lawrence Rubin, Karen Wilkin, and Virginia Wright; correspondence from galleries and museums in the United States and abroad, college and university art departments often related to speaking engagements, and publishers such as Art International and Beacon Press, who published Greenberg's work.
Greenberg also corresponded extensively with Canadian artists including Terry Fenton, British artists, Irish writer Nuala O'Faolain, gallery owners, dealers, and critics including Anthony Caro, Andrew Hudson, Tim Scott, and Leslie Waddington, as well as many others in the United States and elsewhere.
Restrictions:
Correspondence between Peter Fuller, Andre Emmerich, and Clement Greenberg; correspondence with Nuala O'Faolain; Greenberg family letters; and additional individual letters from a variety of correspondents are access restricted. Written permission is required. Contact Reference Services for more information.
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:
The Clement Greenberg papers, 1937-1983. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Sponsor:
Funding for the processing of this collection was provided by the Terra Foundation for American Art. Funding for the digitization of the papers was provided in part by The Walton Family Foundation.
The exhibition records of the Contemporary Study Wing of the Finch College Museum of Art measure 20.9 linear feet and date from 1943 to 1975, with the bulk of records dating from the period its galleries were in operation, from 1964 to 1975. Over two-thirds of the collection consists of exhibition files, which contain a wide range of documentation including artist files, checklists, correspondence, writings, photographs, interviews, numerous films and videos, artist statements, printed materials, and other records. Also found within the collection are administrative records of the museum, artist files, and papers of the Contemporary Wing's director and curator, Elayne Varian, which were produced outside of her work at Finch College.
Scope and Contents:
The exhibition records of the Contemporary Study Wing of the Finch College Museum of Art measure 20.9 linear feet and date from 1943 to 1975, with the bulk of records dating from the period its galleries were in operation, from 1964 to 1975. Over two-thirds of the collection consists of exhibition files, which contain a wide range of documentation including artist files, checklists, correspondence, writings, photographs, interviews, numerous films and videos, artist statements, printed materials, and other records. Also found within the collection are administrative records of the museum, artist files, and papers of the Contemporary Wing's director and curator, Elayne Varian, which were produced outside of her work at Finch College.
Administrative records include records relating to the general operation of the Contemporary Wing concerning fundraising, professional associations, budget, contact information for artists, donors, and lenders to exhibitions. Also found are records of the permanent collection of artworks acquired by the museum between 1964 and 1975 from contemporary artists and collectors of contemporary art.
Artist files contain basic biographical information on over 150 contemporary artists, with scattered correspondence, photographs, technical information about artworks, artist statements, and other writings. Artist files also include an incomplete run of artist questionnaires gathered by the New York Arts Calendar Annual for 1964.
Elayne Varian's personal papers include curatorial records, a course schedule and syllabus related to her teaching activities, and various writings. Curatorial projects documented in Varian's papers include three programs produced outside of Finch College, including a juried show at the New York State Fair in 1967, a film series at Everson Museum of Syracuse University, and an exhibition at Guild Hall in East Hampton in 1973. Several of Varian's writing projects involved interviews, which are also found in this series in the form of sound recordings and transcripts. Interview-based writing projects include individual profiles on Brian O'Doherty and Babette Newberger, and interviews conducted for an article on the artist-dealer relationship published in Art in America (January 1970). Dealers interviewed for the latter project include Leo Castelli, Virginia Dwan, John Gibson, Richard Feigen, Arnold Glimcher, Fred Mueller, Martha Jackson, Sidney Janis, Betty Parsons, Seth Siegelaub, and Howard Wise. Artists interviewed include Roy Lichtenstein, Adolph Gottlieb, and Charles Ross.
Exhibition files, comprising the bulk of the collection, document exhibitions held in the Contemporary Wing during its existence from 1964 to 1975. Types of records found in the series include exhibition catalogs, correspondence, loan agreements, lists, contact information, insurance valuations of artworks, photographs, biographical information on artists, clippings, posters, press releases, and other publicity materials. In addition to the rich textual and photographic records found for exhibitions, numerous audiovisual recordings are also found, some of which were made in preparation for an exhibition, some document mounted exhibitions, and others are artworks themselves or components of artworks exhibited in the galleries. Interviews with artists, dealers, and others involved in exhibitions include Alan Sonfist, Mel Bochner, Hans Richter, Ruth Richards, James Brooks and Janet Katz, Margaret Benyon, Irwin Hollander (transcript only), David Anderson, Doris Chase, Will Insley, Michael Kirby, Les Levine, Ursula Meyer, Brian O'Doherty, Charles Ross, Tony Smith, Douglas Davis, Jane Davis, Russ Connor, Les Levine, Michael Mazur, Paul Gedeohn, and physicists Lloyd G. Cross, Allyn Z. Lite, and Gerald Thomas Bern Pethick. Video artworks, recordings of performances, or components of multimedia artworks are found by artists Vito Acconci, Kathy Dillon, Douglas Davis, Dan Graham, Les Levine, Bruce Nauman, Michael Netter, Eric Siegel, and Robert Whitman. A film of the Art in Process: The Visual Development of a Structure (1966) exhibition is found, and video recordings of artists Lynda Benglis, Michael Singer, and Sam Wiener form as part of the documentation for the Projected Art: Artists at Work (1971) exhibition.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged as 4 series.
Missing Title
Series 1: Administrative Records, 1950-1975 (2 linear feet; Boxes 1-2, 22, OV 23)
Series 2: Artist Files, 1958-1975 (2.4 linear feet; Boxes 3-4, 22, OV 23, FC 27-28)
Series 3: Elayne Varian Personal Papers, 1965-1970 (1.3 linear feet; Boxes 5-6)
Series 4: Exhibition Files, 1943-1975 (14.9 linear feet; Boxes 6-22, OV 24-25, FC 26)
Biographical / Historical:
The Contemporary Study Wing of the Finch College Museum of Art, later called simply the "Contemporary Wing," was established in 1964 by the president of Finch College, Roland De Marco, as an extension the Finch College Museum of Art in New York City.
Its mission was to educate art history students at the Manhattan women's college who were interested in working with contemporary art. DeMarco, himself an art collector, hired Elayne Varian as director and curator of the contemporary wing. DeMarco met Varian in the New York office of the prominent international art dealership Duveen Brothers, where she had worked since the mid-1940s, most recently as an art dealer. Varian received her art education in Chicago, where she studied art history and education at the University of Chicago, and took classes in film at the Bauhaus and in fine art the Art Institute of Chicago. Sensitive to emerging art movements in galleries and studios around the city of New York, as the contemporary wing's curator, Varian quickly established a reputation for thoughtfully conceived, cutting-edge exhibitions which were consistently well-received by the press.
Under Varian, the Contemporary Wing carried out a dual mission of showing work of living artists and educating students and the public about the artwork and museum work in general. Varian used the galleries to provide practical training to students interested in a gallery or museum career throughout its existence. For several years, she also maintained an assistantship position for post-graduate museum professionals to gain experience in the field, many of whom went on to careers in museums across New York State.
The Contemporary Wing's best-known exhibitions formed a series of six shows called Art in Process, held between 1965 and 1972. Each of the Art in Process shows took a different medium, including painting, sculpture, collage, conceptual art, installation art, and serial art, and brought the process of art-making into the gallery with the artworks in various ways. For example, for Art in Process V (1972), the show about installation art, the galleries were open to the public for the entire process of its installation, allowing visitors to watch the works take shape. Another show entitled Documentation (1968) exhibited artworks with documentation such as artist's notes, sales records, and conservation records, bringing to light the value of record-keeping in the visual arts. Two exhibitions entitled Projected Art were also innovative, with the first (1966-1967) bringing experimental films from the cinema to the galleries, and the second (1971) showing artists' processes via footage and slides of artists working. Another show, Artists' Videotape Performances (1971), involved both screening of and creation of works in the gallery using a range of experiments with recent video technology. The museum also participated in an experimental broadcast of an artwork entitled Talk Out! by Douglas Davis, in which a telephone in the gallery allowed visitors to participate in its creation while it was broadcast live from Syracuse, NY. Other exhibitions that showcased experimentation in art included N-Dimensional Space (1970), on holography in art, Destruction Art(1968), on destructive actions being incorporated into contemporary art-making, and Schemata 7 (1967), a show about the use of environments in contemporary art, whose working title was "Walk-in Sculpture."
Other popular exhibitions at the Contemporary Wing included shows on Art Deco (1970) and Art Nouveau (1969). Several shows mined the private collections of prominent contemporary art collectors including Martha Jackson, Betty Parsons, George Rickey, Paul Magriel, Jacques Kaplan, Josephine and Philip Bruno, and Carlo F. Bilotti. A number of exhibitions featured contemporary art from overseas including Art from Belgium (1965), Art from Finland (1973), Seven Swedish Painters (1965), and Art in Jewelry (1966), which featured mainly international jewelry artists. Retrospective exhibitions of Hans Richter, Hugo Weber, and James Brooks were also held.
Hundreds of contemporary artists were shown at the Contemporary Wing in the eleven years of its existence, including many who came to be leading figures in contemporary art, and some who already were, including Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, Mel Bochner, Eva Hesse, Lynda Benglis, Bruce Nauman, Robert Morris, Lawrence Weiner, Robert Smithson, Sol Le Witt, Dan Flavin, Philip Pearlstein, and Yayoi Kusama, to name just a few.
The Contemporary Wing and the entire Finch College Museum of Art shut its doors in 1975, when Finch College closed due to lack of funds. The permanent collection was sold at that time, and the proceeds were used to pay Finch College employee salaries. Elayne Varian went on to the position of curator of contemporary art at the John and Mabel Ringling Museum in Sarasota, Florida. She died in 1987.
Related Materials:
Also found in the Archives of American Art is an oral history interview with curator Elayne Varian conducted by Paul Cummings, May 2, 1975.
Provenance:
The Archives of American Art acquired these records from the Finch College Museum of Art after it closed permanently in June 1975.
Restrictions:
Use of original papers requires an appointment. 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:
Video artists -- New York (State) -- New York Search this
Museum administrators -- New York (State) -- New York Search this
Museum curators -- New York (State) -- New York Search this
Topic:
Art dealers -- New York (State) -- New York Search this
Painters -- New York (State) -- New York Search this
Exhibition records of the Contemporary Study Wing of the Finch College Museum of Art, 1943-1975. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Sponsor:
Funding for the processing of this collection was provided by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, administered through the Council on Library and Information Resources' Hidden Collections grant program. Funding for the digitization of two motion picture films was provided by the Smithsonian Women's Committee, and for the remaining sound and video recordings from the Smithsonian's Collection Care Pool Fund. Funding for the digitization of the collection, not including audiovisual materials, was provided by The Walton Family Foundation and the Terra Foundation for American Art.
Series consists of records related to curatorial, teaching, and writing projects of Elayne Varian that were not undertaken in her role at Finch College.
Curatorial projects include the exhibition Art Today (1967), a juried show at the New York State Fair; a series of art film screenings held at the Everson Museum of Art of Syracuse University, and an exhibition at Guild Hall in East Hampton featuring local artists over the age of 60.
A single file of teaching materials consists of a syllabus and course schedule.
The bulk of writings in the series consist of recorded interviews, with corresponding transcripts, of art dealers and artists, which were conducted for a 1970 article Varian wrote for Art in America called "New Dealing," on the subject of artist-dealer relationships. Interviews, listed individually in the folder list, are on 11 sound tape reels and are typically around 40 minutes in duration. Photographs related to that project are also found depicting Virginia Dwan, Martha Jackson, and Leo Castelli with Andy Warhol. Other writing projects include published interviews with artists Brian O'Doherty and Babette Newburger, a manual on museum security, and an article on patented art. The original interview with Newburger is found on one sound tape reel with an edited transcript.
Collection Restrictions:
Use of original papers requires an appointment. Use of archival audiovisual recordings with no duplicate access copy 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:
Exhibition records of the Contemporary Study Wing of the Finch College Museum of Art, 1943-1975. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Sponsor:
Funding for the processing of this collection was provided by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, administered through the Council on Library and Information Resources' Hidden Collections grant program. Funding for the digitization of two motion picture films was provided by the Smithsonian Women's Committee, and for the remaining sound and video recordings from the Smithsonian's Collection Care Pool Fund. Funding for the digitization of the collection, not including audiovisual materials, was provided by The Walton Family Foundation and the Terra Foundation for American Art.
The Emily A. Francis papers, circa 1910s-1969, measure 10 linear feet and include organizational records of Contemporary Arts and affiliated member organization, Collectors of American Art, Inc., founded and directed by Emily A. Francis in 1929 and 1937, respectively. The collection consists of biographical material, foundation and board materials, correspondence, artist files, gallery files, exhibition files, membership materials, business and financial material, printed material, scrapbooks, artwork, and photographs.
Scope and Contents:
The Emily A. Francis papers, circa 1910s-1969, measure 10 linear feet and include organizational records of Contemporary Arts and affiliated member organization, Collectors of American Art, Inc., founded and directed by Emily A. Francis in 1929 and 1937, respectively. The collection consists of biographical material, foundation and board materials, correspondence, artist files, gallery files, exhibition files, membership materials, business and financial material, printed material, scrapbooks, artwork, and photographs.
Biographical materials include personal financial material and documents relating to Francis' emigration from New Zealand in 1916. Foundation and board materials document the founding and continuing business of Contemporary Arts and Collectors of American Art, Inc. through board books, meetings minutes, by-laws, and articles of incorporation. Correspondence is with New York and international artists, as well as members, institutions, galleries, and board members; and artist files consist of correspondence, scattered photographs, exhibition materials, and consignment and loan agreements. Among the artists featured extensively in correspondence and artist files are Edward Betts, Virginia Cuthbert, Charles Logasa, and Sam Middleton.
Contemporary Arts gallery files document gallery activities through consignment and loan files to institutions and galleries, inventory records, sign-in registers, and event files. Exhibition files include loan agreements, exhibition price lists, and exhibition catalog mock-ups, as well as scattered correspondence. The files also include membership registers, member bulletin mock-ups, and other membership files, as well as financial ledgers with sales and artist accounts, leases and legal documents, receipts and invoices, and other business and financial material. Exhibition announcements and catalogs, member bulletins and annual reports, "The Bulletin of the Collectors of American Art, Inc.," and other printed material, are also included. Fifteen scrapbooks contain clippings, exhibition announcements and catalogs relating to Contemporary Arts and Collectors of American Art, Inc. Extensive artwork consists of a charcoal sketch, paintings and paint sketches, and original prints, including woodcuts and serigraphs. Photographs are of Emily A. Francis and others, gallery installation views, events, and artwork.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged as 12 series.
Series 1: Biographical Material, 1921-1966 (0.1 linear feet; Box 1)
Series 2: Foundation and Board Materials, 1928-1969 (0.6 linear feet; Box 1)
Series 3: Correspondence, 1924-1964 (1.9 linear feet; Boxes 1-3)
Series 4: Artist Files, 1933-1964 (0.3 linear feet; Box 3)
Series 5: Contemporary Arts Gallery Files, 1930-1966, undated (1.1 linear feet; Boxes 3-4)
Series 6: Exhibition Files, 1931-1965 (0.8 linear feet; Box 5)
Series 7: Membership Materials, 1935-1966, undated (0.4 linear feet; Boxes 5-6)
Series 8: Business and Financial Material, 1928-1966 (1.3 linear feet; Boxes 6-7)
Series 9: Printed Material, 1931-1966, undated (Boxes 7-8)
Series 10: Scrapbooks, 1931-1962 (1.2 linear feet; Box 8-9, 13-14)
Series 11: Artwork, 1940-1962, undated (0.9 linear feet; Boxes 10-12)
Series 12: Photographs, circa 1910s - circa 1960s (0.1 linear feet; Boxes 10, 12)
Biographical / Historical:
Emily A. Francis (1879-1966) (also known as Emily Jacobs) was the director of the Contemporary Arts gallery (also known as Contemporary Arts, Inc.) in New York, which she founded in 1929 and incorporated into a membership organization in 1931.
Inspired by the American Art-Union (1839-1851), she organized the Collectors of American Art, Inc. in 1937, which was associated with the gallery and initially called the Painting of the Month Club. Contemporary Arts held group shows and selected original artist prints and paintings to distribute annually to Collectors of American Art, Inc. paying members, which began at $5.00 per year. The stated mission of Collectors of American Art, Inc. was "to encourage production and distribution of Fine Art in America." Contemporary Arts sponsored painters and sculptors and exhibited their works in annual traveling exhibitions to universities and art centers across the country, as well as internationally; held regular Monday evening open house receptions for artists to exhibit their paintings and sculptures and chat with the public; and held monthly "Meet the Artist" parties for high schoolers to talk with the artists. Francis was born in Christchurch, New Zealand, and first visited the United States in 1913, emigrating in 1916. She remained director of Contemporary Arts and Collectors of American Art, Inc. until her death in New York City in 1966, at the age of 87.
Provenance:
Donated in 1965 by Emily A. Francis and in 2023 by Peter Van Doren, a client of Francis.
Restrictions:
This collection is open for research. Access to original papers requires an
appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C. Research Center.
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:
Gallery directors -- New York (State) -- New York Search this
Quotes and excerpts must be cited as follows: Oral history interview with Virginia M. Zabriskie, 1975 May 28-June 6. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Quotes and excerpts must be cited as follows: Oral history interview with C. Jane and Jeffrey Camp, 1987 December 2-1988 January 15. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Topic:
Art -- Collectors and collecting -- Virginia -- Richmond -- Interviews Search this
Quotes and excerpts must be cited as follows: Oral history interview with Betty M. Asher, 1980 June 30 and 1980 July 7. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Quotes and excerpts must be cited as follows: Oral history interview with Virginia Dwan, 1984 March 21-June 7. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Quotes and excerpts must be cited as follows: Oral history interview with Rosamund Felsen, 2004 Oct. 10-11. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Wesleyan University (Middletown, Conn.) Search this
Type:
Sound recordings
Interviews
Citation:
Quotes and excerpts must be cited as follows: Oral history interview with Jeffrey Deitch, 2006 May 15. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Elizabeth Murray Oral History of Women in the Visual Arts Project Search this
Type:
Sound recordings
Interviews
Citation:
Quotes and excerpts must be cited as follows: Oral history interview with Virginia Dwan, 2010 July 14-2011 March 21. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Quotes and excerpts must be cited as follows: Oral history interview with Rena Bransten, 2014 May 29-2015 July 10. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Topic:
Art dealers -- California -- San Francisco -- Interviews Search this
The records of the Catherine Viviano Gallery measure 11.6 linear feet and date from 1930-1990, with the bulk of the materials dating from 1949-1978. Established in New York City in 1949, the gallery specialized in contemporary painting and sculpture primarily by American and European artists. The collection consists of artists' files; correspondence with artists, collectors, dealers, museum directors, curators, and publishers; business records; printed material; and photographs of artwork and artists. Also included are records relating to Catherine Viviano's activities as a private dealer and consultant after she closed the gallery in 1970.
Scope and Contents note:
The records of the Catherine Viviano Gallery measure 11.6 linear feet and date from 1930-1990, with the bulk of the materials dating from 1949-1978. Established in New York City in 1949, the gallery specialized in contemporary painting and sculpture primarily by American and European artists. The collection consists of artists' files; correspondence with artists, collectors, dealers, museum directors, curators, and publishers; business records; printed material; and photographs of artwork and artists. Also included are records relating to Catherine Viviano's activities as a private dealer and consultant after she closed the gallery in 1970.
Artists' files include biographical material; artists' statements; correspondence; sales and expense reports; lists and notes; guest lists; writings by others; receipts, invoices, and statements; printed material, including press releases, exhibition announcements, brochures, catalogues, clippings; and photographs of artwork and artists. Included are extensive files on Afro Basaldella, Renato Birolli, Robert Broderson, Anselmo Franesconi, Joseph Glasco, Manabu Mabe, César Manrique, Luciano Minguzzi, Ennio Morlotti, Bernard Perlin, Daniel Rice, and Bernard Rosenthal. There are also files on Jan Cox, Kay Sage, and Kazuo Wakabayashi.
Correspondence comprises the largest series in the collection and consists of general correspondence; correspondence with museums, galleries, and art-related institutions in the United States; and correspondence with museums, galleries, and art-related institutions abroad. Letters focus on routine business matters, e.g., appraisals and sales, acquisitions, and organizing exhibitions at the Catherine Viviano Gallery and other venues.
General correspondence includes letters between Catherine Viviano and artists and their family members. Among the correspondents are: Mary Callery, Bernard Chaet, Piero and Virginia Dorazio, Jean Dubuffet, Dallas Ernst, Karl Fortress, Alberto Giacometti, Henry Sage Goodwin, Morris Graves, José Guerrero, Earle Ludgin, Joan Miro, Alfonso Ossorio, Dorothea Tanning, Stuyvesant Van Veen, Adja Yunkers and his wife, Dore Ashton, among others. Also found is Viviano's correspondence with clients, many of whom were prominent collectors, e.g., Richard Brown Baker, Carl and Joan Fisher, Lawrence and Barbara Fleischman, Joseph Hirschhorn, Marc Moyens, Vincent Price, Joseph Pulitzer, Jr., Nelson Rockefeller, Stanley Seeger, and Frederick and Dorothy Zimmerman. Of interest, are letters from Elizabeth Bishop inquiring about the purchase of a work of art from the gallery. Included are letters from art historians, museum directors, curators, representatives at other art-related institutions, and publishers including Walter Bareiss, Walter Barker, Dominque De Menil, Valentine Dudensing, William Eisendrath, S. Lane Faison, Emily Genauer, Bertram Goodhue, Erhard and Barbara Göpel, James Laughlin, Porter McCray, Abram Lerner, Doris Meltzer, Stephen Robson Miller, John Bernard Myers, Perry Rathbone, Belle Krasne Ribicoff, Meyer Shapiro, George Stout, and Curt Valentin.
Correspondence with museums, galleries, and art-related institutions in the United States contains letters between Viviano and museum directors, curators, dealers, artists, and collectors pertaining to loans, shipping and delivery of artwork, appraisals and sales, and acquisitions. Files include substantive correspondence with the American Academy of Arts and Letters, American Federation of the Arts, Art Institute of Chicago, Arts Club of Chicago, the Barnes Foundation, Bristol Art Museum, Brooklyn Museum, Bundy Art Gallery, Carnegie Institute, City Art Museum of St. Louis, Cleveland Museum of Art, Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center, Dallas Museum of Fine Arts, Denver Art Museum, Des Moines Art Center, Detroit Institute of Arts, Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University, Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Institute of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles County Art Museum, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Museum of Fine Arts of Houston, Museum of Modern Art, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia Art Alliance, Santa Barbara Museum of Art, University of Nebraska Art Galleries, University of Virginia, Mary Washington College, Wadsworth Atheneum, Walker Art Center, William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art, Atkins Museum of the Fine Arts, World House Gallery, and Yale University Art Library.
Correspondence with museums, galleries, and art-related institutions abroad primarily concerns the lending of artwork for exhibitions, acquisition and sales; also included are letters requesting biographical information on artists. Letters between Catherine Viviano and representatives of Max Beckmann Gesellschaft Archiv and Galerie Gunther Franke contain provenance-related information on Beckmann's work.
Business records document the routine business operations of the gallery. Printed material includes an incomplete run of Catherine Viviano Gallery exhibition catalogues; invitations and announcements from other galleries and institutions; and miscellaneous printed material.
Photographs include three images of miscellaneous artwork used for art reference.
Arrangement note:
Records are generally arranged by material type and in chronological order thereafter. Artists' files and correspondence files are arranged in alphabetical order and materials within the folders are arranged chronologically
The collection is arranged as 5 series:
Missing Title
Series 1: Artists' Files, 1945-1986 (Boxes 1-3; 3.5 linear feet)
Series 2: Correspondence, 1939-1985 (Boxes 3-6; 5.5 linear feet)
Series 3: Business Records, 1949-1972 (Boxes 10-11; 1.0 linear feet)
Series 4: Printed Material, 1930-1990 (Boxes 11-13; 1.6 linear feet)
Series 5: Photographs (1948-1954), undated (Box 14; 1 folder)
Biographical/Historical note:
Catherine Viviano (1889-1992) opened her gallery in 1949 on 42 East 57th Street in New York City. Specializing in contemporary American paintings and sculpture, the gallery featured younger American and European artists, e.g., Robert Broderson, Carlyle Brown, Jan Cox, Joseph Glasco, Peter Lanyon, Manabu Mabe, César Manrique, Bernard Perlin, Joseph Rollo, Bernard Rosenthal, and Kay Sage, among others. The gallery was also notable for introducing the work of Italian artists, who had been cut off from the American art scene during World War II, including Afro Basaldella and his brother Mirko Basaldella, Renato Birolli, Leonardo Cremonini, and Luciano Minguzzi.
Born in Italy in 1899 and raised in Chicago, Catherine Viviano came to New York in the early 1930's to work at the Pierre Matisse Gallery, where she remained for sixteen years before founding the Catherine Viviano Gallery.
In 1970, Catherine Viviano closed the gallery, though she continued to work from her home as an art dealer and consultant. She died of a stroke at the age of ninety-two in 1992.
Related Archival Materials note:
Among the other resources relating to Catherine Viviano Gallery in the Archives of American Art are the Kay Sage papers, 1925-circa 1985, bulk 1950-1965.
Provenance:
The Catherine Viviano Gallery records were donated in 2003 on behalf of Margaret Viviano, Catherine Viviano's sister, by her grandnephew, Peter C. Salerno, who had Power of Attorney for Margaret Viviano.
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.
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:
Leo Castelli Gallery records, circa 1880-2000, bulk 1957-1999. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Sponsor:
Funding for the partial digitization of this collection was provided by the Roy Lichtenstein Foundation.
