The microfilmed Charles Biederman papers contain correspondence, journals, writings, printed material, and published materials. Microfilmed on Reels 1446-1450 are personal and business correspondence regarding Biederman's art and books Art as Evolution of Visual Knowledge and The New Cézanne. Among the correspondents are John and Joan Barnes, David Barr, David Bohm, Ian Finley, Peggy Guggenheim, S.I. Hayakawa, Marjorie Mercer Kendig, Ron Kostyniuk, and Eugene Pauls. Also included are two copybooks with letters from Biederman to John and Eugenie Anderson. Microfilmed on Reels 1662-1679 are correspondence with Alfred H. Barr, Jr., Eric Bell, Naum Gabo, Kathleen Lonsdale, Dorothy Miller, Victor Pasmore, and poet Jonathan Williams and others; notes and typed manuscripts of Biederman's articles and books about art; an audio script of a film; exhibition catalogs and announcements; clippings; and a biographical sketch.
Biographical / Historical:
Charles Biederman (1906-2004) was a painter and sculptor from Red Wing, Minnesota. Biederman was born in Cleveland, Ohio and studied art at the Cleveland Art Institute, and later at the School of the Art Institute in Chicago. He worked and lived in Chicago, New York, and Paris before settling in Red Wing, Minnesota in 1942. Biederman was the author of numerous books on art theory, and best known for his three-dimensional painted aluminum constructions, created from the early 1950s to the late 1990s.
Related Materials:
The Archives of American Art also holds the Neil Juhl Larsen research material on Charles Biederman, circa 1927-2011 and the microfilmed David Barr papers relating to Charles Biederman, 1963-1976.
Provenance:
Lent for microfilming 1978-1979 by Charles Biederman.
Restrictions:
The Archives of American art does not own the original papers. Use is limited to the microfilm copy.
Indians of North America -- Southwest, New Search this
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Portfolios
Songs
Date:
1927-1939
Scope and Contents:
Material includes manuscript "Winnebago Music," 362 typed pages, 50 illustrations (filed separately in original prints file, Bureau of American Ethnology File, Number 3261 part), transcriptions of 205 Winnebago songs, and 2 flute melodies (ca. 116 pages) marked "ready for publication" and submitted November 28, 1939; and original copies of 205 Winnebago songs received from the Densmore estate, ca. 1962. This manuscript was compiled from various Winnebago manuscripts submitted by the author to the Bureau of American Ethnology at intervals, 1927-1940.
Contents:
"Winnebago Music." Contains material from 14 Winnebago manuscripts formerly submitted. Revised in final form for publication November, 1940 by Miss Densmore. 362 pages numbered 1 through 318 with some pages having several sub-letters. The manuscript contains an 83 page section on "The Peyote Cult". "Winnebago Music." Carbon copy of unpublished manuscript, pages 220-240. This manuscript is a brief resume of F. Densmore's work with Winnebago songs and dances. No date appears on the manuscript but it could not have been written before 1940. Tabulated analyses from the various Winnebago manuscripts in the following list were sent to F. Densmore, returned by F. Densmore, July 19, 1939, and not refiled with the manuscript to which they belong. Now filed together in 1st envelope.
Old Manuscript Number 2974, "14 Winnebago songs used in the treatment of the sick." 10 page manuscript, 7 page descriptive analysis of songs. Material was collected at Galesville, Wisconsin, November 23, 1927.
Old Manuscript Number 2986, "22 Winnebago songs of the Winter Feast." 22 page manuscript. Submitted April 21, 1928.
Old Manuscript Number 3029, "28 Winnebago war songs." 34 page manuscript including descriptive analysis of songs. Material collected in Trempeleau and near Galesville, Wisconsin, October 1927. Submitted November 26, 1928.
Old Manuscript Number 3106, "Origin-song of the dice game and other Winnebago songs." 11 page manuscript, 7 page descriptive analysis. Submitted December 15, 1928.
Old Manuscript Number 3107, "13 Winnebago songs connected to the recent war, and 17 tables showing a comparison between songs of the Pawnee and songs of the Chippewa, Sioux and other tribes." 11 page manuscript, 9 page descriptive analysis. Submitted January 26, 1929.
Old Manuscript Number 3115, "19 Winnebago songs connected with legends, games and dances." 14 page manuscript, 11 page descriptive analysis. Material collected near Black Falls, Wisconsin, September 1928 and submitted to the Bureau of American Ethnology March 2, 1929. Also "data concerning two Winnebago drumsticks and a pair of Menominee "striking sticks." 1 page, 1 illustration. 3/5/1929
Old Manuscript Number 3156, "12 Winnebago songs of games and dances." 17 page manuscript including descriptive analyses of 12 songs. Material collected Tomah, Wisconsin and near Wisconsin Rapids, June 26, 1930.
Old Manuscript Number 3178 "Songs for a spirit of the dead, and other Winnebago songs." (36 pages analysis, 9 sheets transcriptions, 4 small photos, recorded on the old catalog card are not present. Material collected at Dallas on Wisconsin River, October 31, 1930.
Old Manuscript Number 3179 "Winnebago songs of the Water-spirit and Night-spirit bundles." 21 page manuscript including descriptive analysis. (24 pages tabulated analysis, 9 sheets transcriptions, 2 photos of John Smoke, recorded on old catalog card are not present) Submitted September 20, 1930.
Old Manuscript Number 3198 "Winnebago songs of the Medicine Lodge: Buffalo Feast and Fish Dance." 28 page manuscript including descriptive analysis. (Tabulated analysis, transcriptions and 2 illustrations recorded on the old catalog card are not present) Material collected at Red Wing, Minnesota, September 1930. Submitted June 27, 1931.
Old Manuscript Number 3201 "(14) Pueblo (Hopi, Zuni), Navaho and Winnebago Songs." 21 page manuscript including descriptive analysis. (Transcription, tabulated analysis and illustrations recorded on old catalog card are not present.) Submitted October 16, 1931.
Old Manuscript Number 3205 "The Peyote Cult and Treatment of the Sick among the Winnebago Indians." 44 page typed manuscript including descriptive analysis of 17 songs, 1 original diagram of Peyote lodge, drawn by Yellowbank, and 8" X 10" photo of musical instruments, and 4 photo illustrations (Bureau of American Ethnology # 3261-b,27,28,29,30). (Transcriptions and tabulated analysis recorded on old catalog card are not present.) Submitted October 16, 1931.
Old Manuscript Number 3229 (pt) "Winnebago, Iroquois, Pueblo (Zuni and Cochiti), and British Columbia (Nitinat, Fraser and Thompson River) songs, with catalog numbers of 143 songs." Catalog numbers of song numbers 1981-2123 is the only remaining part of this manuscript. (60 page manuscript, recorded on old catalog card, was separated at intervals. The Iroquois section was pulled August 1955 and is now filed Bureau of American Ethnology Manuscript # 3378. The Pueblo section was pulled August 1955 and now filed Bureau of American Ethnology Manuscript # 4482 (old number 3229 part). The British Columbia Section was pulled August 1955 and is now filed Bureau of American Ethnology Manuscript # 3371 (old number 3229 part). All this material accounts for pages 35-60 of the 60 page manuscript. The first 25 pages must have refered to the Winnebago and perhaps a comparative analysis of the songs of these different tribes, but these 25 pages have not been located.
Old Manuscript Number 3261-a "(9) Winnebago Songs of the Peyote Ceremony." 17 page typed manuscript including descriptive analysis, 1 diagram, 3 portraits of singers now in illustration file # 3261-b:31, 33, 34). (18 page tabulated analysis and 6 page transcriptions, recorded on old catalog card, are not present, 1965) Submitted June 21, 1932.
Local Numbers:
NAA MS 3261
Provenance:
Submitted by the author to the Bureau of American Ethnology at intervals, and some manuscripts received from the Densmore estate, ca. 1962.
