Quotes and excerpts must be cited as follows: Oral history interview with Don Baum, 1986 January 31-May 13. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Files on artwork by Baum, exhibition and loan files, photographs of artwork by others, personal correspondence, and an audio recording.
Files on Baum's artwork, organized chronologically, include photographs and slides of works, as well as titles, dates, locations if known, and occasional printed material and correspondence regarding loans or purchases. Exhibition and loan files are organized chronologically and include printed material and correspondence with the Betsy Rosenfeld Gallery, the Art Institute of Chicago and various Chicago Imagist group shows, among others. Other files include photographs and slides of artwork by other artists.
Personal correspondence includes letters and postcards from Baum's children, and his friends, most of them Chicago artists, including Miriam Brofsky, Glen Davies, Gabrielle Edgecomb, Hans Gallas, Phil Hanson, Miyoko Ito, Jin Soo Kim, June Leaf, Jim Nutt, Barbara Rossi, Darthea Speyer, Sue Taylor, Ken Warneke, Karl Wirsum and others. Many of the letters are illustrated or contain objects. Also included is a radio program about Baum's assemblage houses produced by Wisconsin Public Radio, 1988.
Biographical / Historical:
Don Baum (1922-2008) was a sculptor, assemblage artist, and curator in Chicago, Ill. Baum was considered part of the Chigao group of artists, Monster Roster, and was Hyde Park Art Center's exhibitions director.
Provenance:
Donated 1995 by Don Baum and in 2009 by Maria Baum, Don Baum's daughter.
Restrictions:
Use of original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C., Research Center. Contact Reference Services for more information.
An interview of Don Baum conducted 1986 January 31 and May 13, by Sue Ann Kendall, for the Archives of American Art, in Chicago, Illinois.
Baum speaks about his childhood in Michigan; interests during his college years at Michigan State; classes at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago; friendship with artists such as Miyoko Ito and Ethel Spears; the Institute of Design and Laszlo Moholy-Nagy; faculty and classes at the University of Chicago; jam sessions at Gertrude Abercrombie's home; teaching at Roosevelt University; the influence of travel; June Leaf; Leon Golub; psychoanalysis and its influence on his work; collage; The Hyde Park Art Center; objects with a magical aura; writing and writers; dolls; the relationship of self to art; outsider art; transformation; Joseph Cornell; the Hairy Who artists; collectors; the Museum of Contemporary Art; the Illinois Arts Council; Chicago art and artists; and travel in Indonesia.
Biographical / Historical:
Don Baum (1922-2008) was a sculptor, assemblage artist, curator, and educator from Chicago, Illinois.
General:
Originally recorded on 2 sound cassettes. Reformatted in 2010 as 12 digital wav files. Duration is 5 hr., 23 min.
Provenance:
This interview is part of the Archives' 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 others.
Restrictions:
Patrons must use transcript.
Transcript available on the Archives of American Art website.
An interview of Miyoko Ito conducted 1978 July 20, by Dennis Barrie, for the Archives of American Art.
Ito discusses her family background; being in Japan at an early age, attending school and learning calligraphy; returning to California in 1928; excelling in drawing and painting; attending Berkeley High School; studying watercolor at Berkeley School of Water Color; studying under Erle Loran, Worth Ryder, John Haley; the influence of Hans Hofmann; being in internment camp (Camp Rann); attending Smith College, Northampton to study painting under instructor George Cohen; attending the Art Institue of Chicago and meeting Francis Chapin and Joan Mitchell; being influenced by Bonnard; moving into lithography at Oxbow; studying under Max Kahn; doing printmaking and etching; and participating in the Momentum Shows. Ito mentions Ynez Johnston, Leonard Edmondson, Lionel Venturi, Ellen Lanyon, Don Baum, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, and Vera Berdich.
Biographical / Historical:
Miyoko Ito (1918-1983) was a Japanese American painter based in Chicago, Illinois.
General:
Originally recorded on 1 tape reel (5 in.).
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 others.
Sue Taylor letters from sculptor, assemblage artist, and curator Don Baum (1922-2008) measure 0.2 linear feet and date from circa 1990-2001. Included are approximately 40 letters and postcards from Baum to Taylor and printed material regarding Baum.
Biographical / Historical:
Sue Taylor is an art history professor at Portland State University, Portland, Oregon and was friends with Baum and studied his work.
Related Materials:
The Archives of American Art also holds the papers of Don Baum.
Provenance:
Donated 2017 by Sue Taylor.
Restrictions:
Use of original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C., Research Center.
Occupation:
Assemblage artists -- Illinois -- Chicago Search this
An interview with Dennis Adrian conducted 2015 October 8-9, by Lanny Silverman, for the Archives of American Art's Chicago Art and Artists: Oral History Project, at Adrian's home in Seaside, Oregon.
Adrian speaks of growing up in Astoria; traveling to Chicago and New York; Cannon Beach; aging and getting older; his origins; curators and curating; visual sensibilities; the Portland Public Library; opera; his parents, grandparents, and family; Finnish sensibility and humor; Portland Art Museum and classes for children; curator as voyeur; credit and accomplishments; hands on experiences; Artforum; art history; attending University of Chicago; homosexuality and coming out; looted European masterworks; Botticelli; exposure to real art; connoisseurship; collectors and collecting; a Robert Louis Stevenson letter; violin making; growing into yourself; Chicago; war; New York University; Frumkin Gallery; New York; the art world; Madison Art Center; Akron Art Museum; friendship and role models; Art Institute of Chicago; meeting Mies van der Rohe; meeting idols; education; Oscar Wilde and Dorothy Parker; Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; Monster Roster; traveling; Chicago art politics; writing and critics; Eurocentric curators; Chicago as an undervalued city; Dog Day Afternoon; discovering art; New York sightings; and experiences running into artists. Adrian also recalls Roger Brown, Ruth Horwich, Gilda Buchbinder, Don Baum, Sherman Lee, Victor Carlson, Peter Voulkos, Lawrence Alloway, Rhona Hoffman, Allan Frumkin, June Leaf, Leon Golub, Jeremy Anderson, Robert Barnes, Tom Garver, Bruce Conner, Natasha Nicholson, H. C. Westermann, Franz Schulze, Bertha Harris Wiles, Muriel Newman, Aaron James Spire, Lillian Florsheim, John Maxon, Greg Knight, P.B. Maryan, Philip Pearlstein, Sylvia Sleigh, Nancy Spero, Irving Petlin, John Coplans, Alan Artner, Alice Shaddle, Phyllis Kind, Andy Warhol, Joseph Cornell, Tilda Swinton, Leo Castelli, Philip Guston, Dubuffet, Pussy Pepke, Bumpy Rogers, Barbara Rossi, Christina Ramberg, Philip Hanson, Miyoko Ito, Mark Jackson, Rolf Achilles, and Vito Acconci.
Biographical / Historical:
Dennis Adrian (1937- ) is an art critic, educator, and curator in Chicago, Illinois. Lanny Silverman (1947- ) is a curator at the Chicago Cultural Center in Chicago, Illinois.
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.
Occupation:
Art critics -- Illinois -- Chicago -- Interviews Search this
A collection of 5 interviews conducted by Sidney Lawrence used in research for the Roger Brown exhibition held at the Hirshhorn Museum in 1986. Interviewees include Roger Brown, Phyllis Kind, Dennis Adrian, Roy Yoshida, and Don Baum.
Biographical / Historical:
Sidney Lawrence was a curator; Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, D.C. Roger Brown is a Chicago painter.
Provenance:
Donated 1986 by the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden.
Don Baum. Don and Alice Baum Christmas card to Katharine Kuh, 19-- Dec. 22. Katharine Kuh papers, 1875-1994. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Don Baum. Don Baum Christmas card to Kathleen Blackshear, 19--. Kathleen Blackshear and Ethel Spears papers, 1920-1991. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Don Baum and Anne Strainchamps. Radio program about Don Baum's assemblage houses, 1988 October 12. Don Baum papers, circa 1940-2004. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Don Baum. Don Baum holiday card to Kathleen Blackshear and Ethel Spears, between 1922 and 1990. Kathleen Blackshear and Ethel Spears papers, 1920-1991. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
University of North Carolina at Greensboro Weatherspoon Art Gallery Spring Garden & Tate Street Greensboro North Carolina 27412 Accession Number: 1986.3831