Biographical material, professional and personal correspondence, subject files, financial records, artwork, printed material and an audio cassette.
Biographical information includes a résumé and award. Business correspondence, 1964-1984, regards the opening of The Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden and Block's teaching position at California State University, Northridge, and personal correspondence includes 5 illustrated letters by Block to his wife and two printed cards from Fritz Faiss. Subject files regard the WPA, 1938-1983, film animation, 1957-1976, and book illustration, 1978-1984. Financial records relate to Block's association with the Ankrum Gallery, 1936-1981. Photographs are of Block, his friends, family and works of art.
Artwork includes 2 sketches, 1962, and approximately 60 pencil figurative drawings and studies done during weekly life drawing sessions established by Block and Hans Burkhardt at the Studio Club on the MGM lot from the 1950s to mid-1970s (among them is a pastel by Burkhardt of Block drawing the nude model); and 16 drawings and one print and one poster, most of which were executed by Irving Block for Santa Susana Press, California State University, Northridge's 1986 broadside of John Updike's poem, A Pear Like a Potato. Printed material, 1941-1982, includes exhibition catalogs and clippings. An audio cassette contains Block's reminiscences of his friendship with Burkhardt and a recording of Block delivering a lecture to a senior seminar class on Walt Whitman.
Biographical / Historical:
Irving Block (1910-1986) was a painter and educator in Los Angeles, California. Block was born in New York City. He was involved in the Works Projects Administration's Federal Art Project in the 1930s, and worked as a matte shot artist at 20th Century Fox during the 1940s and 50s. He taught for many years at California State University, Northridge (1963-1980). Block co-authored with Alan Adler the original story for the science fiction film Forbidden Planet, for which he designed Robbie the Robot.
Provenance:
Donated 1984 by Block and in 1996 by Jill Block, the widow of Irving Block. Additional drawings, print and poster donated 2015 by Virginia Elwood-Akers, a former librarian at California State University, Northbridge who received the drawings from colleague Dean Norman Tanis, head of the Santa Susana Press.
Restrictions:
Use of original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C., Research Center.
Occupation:
Art teachers -- California -- Los Angeles Search this
The papers of African American painter, printmaker, and educator Marvin Harden measure 2.2 linear feet and date from circa 1936 to 2005. Found within the papers are biographical materials, correspondence, teaching files, exhibition files, printed material, artwork, and photographs. Correspondents include Joyce Tremain, Judy Chicago, Marion Lerner Levine, Jud Fine, Houston Conwill, Sandy Ballatore-Nelson, Nancy Lee Riegelmen, Eugene Anderson, Connor Everts, Pleter Plagens, Jan Stussy, Caroll Toon, William Wilson, and others. Artwork includes a book of etchings Natural Selections (1991).
Scope and Contents:
The papers of African American painter, printmaker, and educator Marvin Harden measure 2.2 linear feet and date from circa 1936 to 2005. Found within the papers are biographical materials, correspondence, teaching files, exhibition files, printed material, artwork, and photographs. Artwork includes a book of etchings Natural Selections (1991).
Biographical material includes papers pertaining to Harden's education and family history, including an essay written by his sister Lura Harden Miller.
Correspondence is with artists, colleagues, and organizations, including Eugene Anderson, Sandy Ballatore-Nelson, William Brice, Judy Chicago, Houston Conwill, Connor Everts, Jud Fine, Marion Lerner Levine, Pleter Plagens, Nancy Lee Riegelmen, Jan Stussy, Caroll Toon, William Wilson, Dobrick Gallery, Eugenia Butler Gallery, Gloria Cortella, Inc., Hank Baum Gallery, Jan Turner Gallery, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, and the Museum of Modern Art, among others.
Teaching files primarily document Harden's career as an art educator at California State University, Northridge. Materials include teaching awards, assignments, course outlines, notes, and miscellaneous writings by Harden about his teaching philosophy. The files also contain correspondence and photographs with students, a student exhibition guest register, committee notes, memorandums, and evidence pertaining to an employment-related grievance with the university.
Exhibition files include announcements, correspondence, exhibition catalogs, floor plans, insurance documents, loan agreements, photographs, press releases, and price lists.
Printed material consists of announcements and invitations, exhibition catalogs, and a loose clippings scrapbook with articles and reviews about Harden's artwork and exhibitions. Also found is a copy of the first volume of the Journal published by the Los Angeles Institute of Contemporary Art, which includes a photograph of Harden and references to his involvement in developing the organization.
Artwork includes two sketches and an artists' book entitled natural selections which contains 12 aquatint etchings by Marvin Harden.
Among the black and white and color photographs are portraits and snapshots of Marvin Harden, family members, and colleagues, as well as Harden's home, studio, and land at Inwardness Ranch located near Cambria, California.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged as 7 series.
Missing Title
Series 1: Biographical Material, 1950-1991 (Box 1; 5 folders)
Series 2: Correspondence, 1964-2005 (Box 1; 0.6 linear feet)
Series 3: Teaching Files, circa 1964-2003 (Box 1; 0.4 linear feet)
Series 4: Exhibition Files, 1966-2004 (Boxes 1-2; 0.6 linear feet)
Series 5: Printed Material, circa 1964-2003 (Box 2; 0.6 linear feet)
Series 6: Artwork, 1989-2000 (Box 2; 2 folders)
Series 7: Photographs, circa 1936-2001 (Box 2; 7 folders)
Biographical / Historical:
Marvin Harden (1935- ) is an African American painter, printmaker, and educator living and working in California.
Harden received a Master of Fine Arts from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) in 1963. While there, Harden studied under John Paul Jones, Jan Stussy, and William Brice. He also became friends with UCLA classmate and feminist artist, Judy Chicago.
Harden's first solo exhibition was in 1964 at Ceeje Galleries in Los Angeles, California. His drawings, paintings, and prints have been exhibited widely in museums, galleries, and universities in southern California, and also in New Mexico, New York, and Texas, among other locations. Harden has also been the recipient of artists' fellowships awarded by the National Endowment for the Arts, John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, and Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art.
Harden became a Professor of Art at California State University, Northridge (CSUN) in 1968, and in 1984 he received a Distinguished Teaching Award and Exceptional Merit Service Award. During his career at CSUN, Harden established the art department's graduate teaching assistant program.
Provenance:
The Marvin Harden papers were donated to the Archives of American Art by Marvin Harden in 2005.
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.
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.
(Includes reproductions of Marvin Harden's artwork)
Collection 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.
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:
Marvin Harden papers, circa 1936-2005. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
This collection is open for research. Access to original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C. Research Center.
Researchers interested in accessing born-digital records or audiovisual recordings in this collection must use access copies. Contact References 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:
Senga Nengudi papers, 1947, circa 1962-2017. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Sponsor:
Funding for the processing of this collection was provided by the Henry Luce Foundation.
