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Oral history interview with Leroy Davis and Cecily Langdale, 2007 June 26-August 7

Interviewee:
Davis, Leroy, 1922-  Search this
Interviewer:
Berman, Avis, 1949-  Search this
Subject:
Langdale, Cecily  Search this
Shikler, Aaron  Search this
Barnes, Albert C. (Albert Coombs)  Search this
Bly, Boris  Search this
De Mazia, Violette  Search this
Davis, Terry Ritter  Search this
Bouché, Louis  Search this
Levine, David  Search this
Penn, Arthur  Search this
Hirschl & Adler Galleries  Search this
Tyler School of Art  Search this
Barnes Foundation  Search this
Type:
Sound recordings
Interviews
Citation:
Quotes and excerpts must be cited as follows: Oral history interview with Leroy Davis and Cecily Langdale, 2007 June 26-August 7. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Topic:
Art dealers -- New York (State) -- New York -- Interviews  Search this
Gallery owners -- New York (State) -- New York -- Interviews  Search this
Art dealers -- New York (State) -- New York -- Interviews  Search this
Gallery owners -- New York (State) -- New York -- Interviews  Search this
Record number:
(DSI-AAA_CollID)13624
(DSI-AAA_SIRISBib)271983
AAA_collcode_davis07
Data Source:
Archives of American Art
EDAN-URL:
edanmdm:AAADCD_oh_271983
Online Media:

Oral History interview with Hope Makler, 1989 November 28

Interviewee:
Makler, Hope Welsh, 1924-2013  Search this
Interviewer:
Pacini, Marina  Search this
Subject:
Barnes Foundation  Search this
Makler Gallery  Search this
Type:
Sound recordings
Interviews
Citation:
Quotes and excerpts must be cited as follows: Oral History interview with Hope Makler, 1989 November 28. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Topic:
Art, American  Search this
Theme:
Women  Search this
Record number:
(DSI-AAA_CollID)13329
(DSI-AAA_SIRISBib)213405
AAA_collcode_makler89
Theme:
Women
Data Source:
Archives of American Art
EDAN-URL:
edanmdm:AAADCD_oh_213405

Oral history interview with Leroy Davis and Cecily Langdale

Interviewee:
Davis, Leroy  Search this
Langdale, Cecily  Search this
Interviewer:
Berman, Avis  Search this
Names:
Barnes Foundation -- Students  Search this
Hirschl & Adler Galleries  Search this
Tyler School of Art -- Students  Search this
Barnes, Albert C. (Albert Coombs), 1872-1951  Search this
Bly, Boris  Search this
Bouché, Louis, 1896-1969  Search this
Davis, Terry Ritter  Search this
De Mazia, Violette, 1899-  Search this
Levine, David, 1926-2009  Search this
Penn, Arthur, 1922-  Search this
Shikler, Aaron, 1922-  Search this
Extent:
119 Pages (Transcript)
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Pages
Sound recordings
Interviews
Date:
2007 June 26-August 7
Scope and Contents:
An interview of Leroy Davis and Cecily Langdale conducted 2007 June 26-August 7, by Avis Berman, for the Archives of American Art, in New York, New York.
Davis speaks of losing his parents at a young age; attending music school in Philadelphia; studying at Tyler School of Fine Arts and the Barnes Foundation; usage of the word "art" in terms of music and painting; being drafted into the Air Force during World War II; opening a gallery in New York City; working as a framer on the side; working on the White House Fine Arts Commission; selling English watercolors. Langdale speaks of focusing on history, literature, and art history in college; working on shows at Hirschl & Adler gallery; opening a gallery with Davis; writing a book on monotypes. Davis also recalls Aaron Shikler, Boris Bly, Arthur Penn, Violette de Mazia, Albert C. Barnes, Louis Bouché, Terry Ritter Davis, David Levine, Herman Gundersheimer, Arthur Penn, Minnie Cushing, Paul Mellon, Jackie Kennedy, Jock Whitney, and others. Langdale also recalls Robert Walker, Richard Cowdery, Meredith Long, Seymour Remenick, Dr. Thomas Conroy, and others.
Biographical / Historical:
Leroy Davis (1922- ) is an art dealer from New York, New York. Cecily Langdale is an art dealer from New York, New York and Avis Berman is a writer and art historian from New York, New York.
General:
Originally recorded on 1 sound cassette, 3 sound discs, and 3 data compact discs. Reformatted in 2010 as 4 digital wav files. Duration is 4 hr., 50 min.
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.
Restrictions:
The transcript and recording are open for research. Contact Reference Services for more information.
Topic:
Art dealers -- New York (State) -- New York -- Interviews  Search this
Gallery owners -- New York (State) -- New York -- Interviews  Search this
Art dealers -- New York (State) -- New York -- Interviews  Search this
Gallery owners -- New York (State) -- New York -- Interviews  Search this
Genre/Form:
Sound recordings
Interviews
Identifier:
AAA.davis07
Archival Repository:
Archives of American Art
GUID:
https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw995c26909-9f3c-463b-b2c7-6950120ad525
EDAN-URL:
ead_collection:sova-aaa-davis07
Online Media:

Jackson Pollock and Lee Krasner papers

Creator:
Pollock, Jackson, 1912-1956  Search this
Krasner, Lee, 1908-1984  Search this
Names:
Betty Parsons Gallery  Search this
Martha Jackson Gallery  Search this
Benton, Thomas Hart, 1889-1975  Search this
Brooks, James, 1906-1992  Search this
Burkhardt, Rudy  Search this
Cavaliere, Barbara  Search this
Davis, Bill  Search this
De Kooning, Willem, 1904-1997  Search this
Dehner, Dorothy, 1901-1994  Search this
Eames, Ray  Search this
Forge, Andrew  Search this
Friedman, B. H. (Bernard Harper), 1926-  Search this
Glaser, Jane R.  Search this
Gray, Cleve  Search this
Greenberg, Clement, 1909-1994  Search this
Gruen, John  Search this
Holmes, Doloris  Search this
Isaacs, Reginald R., 1911-  Search this
Janis, Sidney, 1896-1989  Search this
Johnson, Philip, 1906-2005  Search this
Kadish, Reuben, 1913-1992  Search this
Maddox, Charles  Search this
Matter, Mercedes  Search this
McCoy, Sanford, Mrs.  Search this
Miller, Daniel  Search this
Miller, Robert, 1932 Apr. 17-  Search this
Motherwell, Robert  Search this
Namuth, Hans  Search this
Ossorio, Alfonso, 1916-1990  Search this
Pollock, Charles C.  Search this
Pollock, Jackson, 1912-1956 -- Photographs  Search this
Rose, Barbara  Search this
Rouche, Burton  Search this
Smith, Tony, 1912-  Search this
Still, Clyfford, 1904-  Search this
Valliere, James  Search this
Wasserman, Tamara E.  Search this
Wright, William  Search this
Zogbaum, Wilfrid, 1915-1965  Search this
Extent:
16.1 Linear feet
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Motion pictures (visual works)
Video recordings
Photographs
Interviews
Sound recordings
Scrapbooks
Sketchbooks
Transcripts
Date:
circa 1914-1984
bulk 1942-1984
Summary:
The papers of abstract expressionist painters Jackson Pollock and wife Lee Krasner measure 16.1 linear feet and date from circa 1914 to 1984, with the bulk of the material dating from 1942 to 1984. The collection documents their personal and professional lives, as well as the legacy of Jackson Pollock's work after his death. Found are biographical material, correspondence, writings by Krasner and others, research material, business and financial records, printed material, scrapbooks, artwork by others, photographs, interview transcripts, audio and video recordings, and motion picture film.
Scope and Content Note:
The papers of abstract expressionist painters Jackson Pollock and wife Lee Krasner measure 16.1 linear feet and date from circa 1914 to 1984, with the bulk of the material dating from 1942 to 1984. The collection documents their personal and professional lives, as well as the legacy of Jackson Pollock's work after his death. Found are biographical material, correspondence, writings by Krasner and others, research material, business and financial records, printed material, scrapbooks, artwork by others, photographs, interview transcripts, audio and video recordings, and motion picture film.

The collection is divided into two series, the first of which focuses on Pollock and includes his scattered papers dating from circa 1914 to his death in 1956, as well as Krasner's papers dating from his death to 1984 about managing Pollock's legacy. This series includes biographical materials, including transcripts and audio recordings of an interview with William Wright in 1949; Pollock's and Krasner's correspondence with Thomas Hart Benton, Betty Parsons Gallery, Bill Davis, B. H. Friedman, Reginald Isaacs, Sidney Janis, Violet De Lazlo, Martha Jackson Gallery, Alfonso Ossorio, Tony Smith, and Clyfford Still, and with one another; Krasner's correspondence concerning Pollock's estate and artwork after his death; numerous writings about Pollock, including an original draft of Bryan Robertson's biography and an essay by Clement Greenberg.

James Valliere extensive research files on Pollock for a never-published biography were given to Krasner and filed in Series 1. These include scattered correspondence with Lee Krasner, and Pollock's family and friends, including Charles Pollock, Thomas Hart Benton, and Robert Motherwell. There are also transcripts of interviews Valliere conducted with Pollock's friends and colleagues, including James Brooks, Dorothy Dehner, Clement Greenberg, Reuben Kadish, Lee Krasner, Charles Maddox, Mrs. Sanford McCoy, Daniel T. Miller, Robert Miller, and Tony Smith. The original audio reels and duplicates exist for many and are filed here. Additional interviews were conducted with Willem de Kooning, Alfonso Ossorio, and Burton Rouche, but not transcribed - these are filed in Series 1.10, Audio Recordings and Motion Picture Film.

Also found in Series 1 are scattered business records documenting Krasner's handling of Pollock's estate and legacy; printed materials relating to Pollock, including published biographies, exhibition catalogs, and clippings; two scrapbooks; and a sketchbook by an unidentified artist. Numerous photographs of Pollock include childhood and family photographs, photographs of Pollock in his studio by Hans Namuth, Rudy Burckhardt, and Herbert Matter, photographs of Pollock with Lee Krasner, and exhibition photographs. Audio recordings and motion film in Series 1 include a 1964 16mm film about Pollock (VHS copies are available) and reel-to-reel recordings of untranscribed interviews of Pollock's friends and colleagues by James Valliere, including interviews with Willem de Kooning and Alfonso Ossorio. Additional transcribed interviews are filed in subseries 1.4.

Lee Krasner's papers documenting her own career are arranged in Series 2 and date from 1927-1984. Biographical materials include resumes and awards, school documents, family documentation, and exhibition lists. Her correspondence with artist friends and art colleagues is extensive and includes many letters from artists such as Philip Johnson, Ray Eames, Cleve Gray, and Hans Namuth. She also maintained correspondence with many art historians and critics, curators, gallery owners, collectors, arts-related and social organizations, admirers, and family members.

There are thirteen transcripts of interviews with Krasner by Bruce Glaser, Barbara Cavaliere, Andrew Forge, Emily Wasserman, Barbara Rose, and others. The original audio recordings for these transcripts are filed in series 2.10, along with other audio recordings for which there are no transcripts, including interviews by John Gruen, Delores Holmes, Mercedes Matter, the Martha Dean Radio Show, NBC Today Show, and WQXR radio. There are also audio recordings of Krasner's lectures in series 2.10.

Krasner's papers also include writings and reminiscences by Krasner; writings about Krasner; printed materials such as exhibition catalogs and clippings; and one scrapbook containing clippings and photographs. Numerous photographs are of Krasner, including portrait photographs taken by Hans Namuth; of Krasner with Jackson Pollock and family and friends, and of her exhibitions and artwork.

Users should note that Pollock's and Krasner's papers contain similar types of material that often overlap in subject matter, especially among the correspondence and photographs.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged into 2 series:

Missing Title

Series 1: Jackson Pollock papers and Lee Krasner papers about Jackson Pollock, circa 1914-1984 (Box 1-7, 16, OV 18, FC 19-22; 7.4 linear feet)

Series 2: Lee Krasner papers, circa 1927-1984 (Box 7-15, 17; 8.6 linear feet)
Biographical Note:
Jackson Pollock was born in 1912, in Cody, Wyoming, the youngest of five sons. His family moved several times during his childhood, finally settling in Los Angeles. In 1930 he joined his older brother, Charles, in New York City, and studied with Regionalist painter Thomas Hart Benton at the Art Students League of New York. Pollock worked during the 1930s for the Works Progress Administration's Federal Art Project. During 1936 he worked in artist David Alfaro Siqueiros's Experimental Workshop. In 1938 he began psychiatric treatment for alcoholism, and his artwork was greatly influenced by Jungian analysis and the exploration of unconscious symbolism.

In 1943 Pollock had his first one-man exhibition at Peggy Guggenheim's New York gallery, Art of this Century, and continued to exhibit there over the next several years. A major turning point in Pollock's life and art was in 1945 when he married fellow artist Lee Krasner and moved to East Hampton, Long Island. There he developed his mature painting style, and became famous for his abstract pouring technique on large canvases. The height of his creativity spanned from 1947 to 1952, and his work was promoted by art critic Clement Greenberg. Along with other abstract expressionists including Hans Hofmann, Alfonso Ossorio, and Barnett Newman, he joined the Betty Parsons Gallery in 1947. He had his most successful one-man show in 1950 which was widely publicized and praised. This exhibition, combined with a 1949 feature article in LIFE magazine, made Pollock an American celebrity.

In 1952 Pollock moved his work to Sidney Janis Gallery and returned to earlier motifs in a search for new breakthroughs. The last few years of his life he suffered from mental and physical health problems, and in August, 1956 he died in a car accident. His wife, Lee Krasner, oversaw his estate and worked with many museums, including the Museum of Modern Art, on Pollock retrospective exhibitions.

Lee Krasner was born Lenore Krassner in 1908 in Brooklyn, New York to Russian immigrant parents. In 1926 she was admitted to the Women's Art School of The Cooper Union, and in 1928 she attended the Art Students League. After graduating from The Cooper Union in 1929, she attended the National Academy of Design until 1932. After briefly attending City College and Greenwich House, she worked for the Public Works of Art Project and the Temporary Emergency Relief Administration, and finally became an assistant in 1935 on the WPA Federal Art Project, Mural Division. From 1937 to 1940 she studied at the Hans Hofmann School of Fine Arts and began exhibiting with the American Abstract Artists group.

In 1942 Krasner met Pollock as they were both preparing to exhibit work in the same show. Although they married and she became immersed in his career, she continued to exhibit her own work with other abstract artists and from 1946 to 1949 worked on the Little Image painting series. In 1953 she began working on collages, a medium she would come back to again later in her career. After Pollock's death her work was greatly influence by her sadness and anger, creating a visible evolution of her style.

For the rest of her career, Krasner consistently exhibited her work in both group and solo exhibitions. She had her first retrospective at Whitechapel Gallery, London, in 1965, and in 1966, she joined Marlborough Gallery, New York which represented Pollock's work as well. In the 1970s and early 1980s Krasner won many awards for her achievement in the visual arts, including the Augustus St. Gaudens Medal and the Chevalier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. She returned to the medium of collage, and in 1976 joined the Pace Gallery, New York. In 1981 she joined the Robert Miller Gallery, New York. Lee Krasner continued creating art until her death in 1984.
Related Material:
Found in the Archives of American Art are the Charles Pollock Papers, 1902-1990, which includes correspondence, photographs, and other files relating to his brother, Jackson Pollock. Other resources in the Archives are oral history interviews with Lee Krasner, including a series of interviews conducted by Dorothy Seckler between 1964 and 1968, and interviews conducted by Barbara Rose in 1966 and Doloris Holmes in 1972.
Provenance:
The papers of Jackson Pollock were donated in 1983 by Lee Krasner through Eugene V. Thaw shortly before her death. Additional material about Pollock and the papers of Lee Krasner were donated in 1985 by Eugene V. Thaw, executor of Lee Krasner's estate.
Restrictions:
The collection has been digitized and is available online via AAA's website.
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:
Painters -- New York (State)  Search this
Topic:
Art -- Economic aspects  Search this
Abstract expressionism  Search this
Women artists  Search this
Women painters  Search this
Genre/Form:
Motion pictures (visual works)
Video recordings
Photographs
Interviews
Sound recordings
Scrapbooks
Sketchbooks
Transcripts
Citation:
Jackson Pollock and Lee Krasner papers, circa 1914-1984. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Identifier:
AAA.polljack
See more items in:
Jackson Pollock and Lee Krasner papers
Archival Repository:
Archives of American Art
GUID:
https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw9ac60d2fa-adb8-4919-9ebb-ddef5dfaa3f8
EDAN-URL:
ead_collection:sova-aaa-polljack
Online Media:

Exhibition records of the Contemporary Study Wing of the Finch College Museum of Art

Creator:
Finch College. Museum of Art  Search this
Varian, Elayne H.  Search this
Names:
Acconci, Vito, 1940-  Search this
Anderson, David K., 1935-  Search this
Benglis, Lynda, 1941-  Search this
Benyon, Margaret, 1940-  Search this
Bochner, Mel, 1940-  Search this
Brooks, James, 1906-1992  Search this
Castelli, Leo  Search this
Chase, Doris, 1923-  Search this
Cross, Lloyd G.  Search this
Davis, Douglas  Search this
Dwan, Virginia  Search this
Feigen, Richard L., 1930-  Search this
Glimcher, Arnold B.  Search this
Gottlieb, Adolph, 1903-1974  Search this
Graham, Dan, 1942-  Search this
Hollander, Irwin  Search this
Insley, Will, 1929-2011  Search this
Jackson, Martha Kellogg  Search this
Janis, Sidney, 1896-1989  Search this
Kirby, Michael  Search this
Levine, Les, 1935-  Search this
Lichtenstein, Roy, 1923-1997  Search this
Mazur, Michael, 1935-2009  Search this
Meyer, Ursula, 1915-  Search this
Nauman, Bruce, 1941-  Search this
O'Doherty, Brian  Search this
Parsons, Betty  Search this
Richter, Hans, 1888-1976  Search this
Siegelaub, Seth, 1941-  Search this
Smith, Tony, 1912-1980  Search this
Sonfist, Alan  Search this
Weiner, Sam  Search this
Wise, Howard  Search this
Extent:
20.9 Linear feet
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Transcripts
Interviews
Photographs
Sound recordings
Video recordings
Museum records
Date:
1943-1975
bulk 1964-1975
Summary:
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
Gallery directors  Search this
Gallery owners  Search this
Genre/Form:
Transcripts
Interviews
Photographs
Sound recordings
Video recordings
Museum records
Citation:
Exhibition records of the Contemporary Study Wing of the Finch College Museum of Art, 1943-1975. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Identifier:
AAA.finccoll
See more items in:
Exhibition records of the Contemporary Study Wing of the Finch College Museum of Art
Archival Repository:
Archives of American Art
GUID:
https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw9ed5f13a2-eeb3-452a-8735-204ff25576b5
EDAN-URL:
ead_collection:sova-aaa-finccoll
Online Media:

Interviews

Collection Creator:
Turner, John F.  Search this
Extent:
1.5 Linear feet (Boxes 1-2)
Type:
Archival materials
Date:
1977-circa 1989
Scope and Contents:
There are 47 sound cassettes and one partial transcript of interviews with and about Howard Finster, most conducted by John Turner. Interviewees include family members, such as Pauline and Beverly Finster, as well as artists, curators, collectors, gallery owners, and dealers, such as Jeffrey Camp, Eleanor Dickinson, Allen Ginsberg, Lynda Hartigan, Herbert Waide Hemphill, Alan Jabbour, Phyllis Kind, Art and Margo Rosenbaum, and others.
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.

Use of archival visual recordings with no duplicate access copy requires advance notice.
Collection Rights:
U-matic videocassette recording Howard Finster exhibition opening: Authorization to quote or reproduce for the purposes of publication requires written permission from John Turner. Contact Reference Services for more 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:
John F. Turner research material on Howard Finster, circa 1928-2015, bulk dates 1978-1990. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Identifier:
AAA.turnjohn, Series 2
See more items in:
John F. Turner research material on Howard Finster
Archival Repository:
Archives of American Art
GUID:
https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw9ea9ee5e5-a014-4a90-bd6d-f59339e3f02e
EDAN-URL:
ead_component:sova-aaa-turnjohn-ref26

Oral history interview wih Clara Diament Sujo

Interviewee:
Diament Sujo, Clara  Search this
Interviewer:
Berman, Avis  Search this
Creator:
Elizabeth Murray Oral History of Women in the Visual Arts Project  Search this
Names:
Elizabeth Murray Oral History of Women in the Visual Arts Project  Search this
Barr, Alfred H., Jr., 1902-1981  Search this
Córdova, Arturo de, 1908-1973  Search this
D'Harnoncourt, Rene, 1901-1968  Search this
De Kooning, Willem, 1904-1997  Search this
Duchamp, Marcel, 1887-1968  Search this
Hughes, Langston, 1902-1967  Search this
Johns, Jasper, 1930-  Search this
Kuh, Katharine  Search this
Lam, Wifredo  Search this
Marisol, 1930-2016  Search this
Messer, Thomas M.  Search this
Miller, Dorothy Canning, 1904-2003  Search this
Otero Rodríguez, Alejandro  Search this
Perón, Juan Domingo, 1895-1974  Search this
Pollock, Jackson, 1912-1956  Search this
Rauschenberg, Robert, 1925-2008  Search this
Reverón, Armando, 1889-1954  Search this
Romero Brest, Jorge  Search this
Soto, Jesús Rafael, 1923-2005  Search this
Sterne, Hedda, 1910-2011  Search this
Valera, Víctor, 1927-  Search this
Extent:
98 Pages (Transcript)
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Pages
Interviews
Sound recordings
Date:
2010 June 8-16
Scope and Contents:
An interview of Clara Diament Sujo conducted 2010 June 8-16, by Avis Berman, for the Archives of American Art's Elizabeth Murray Oral History of Women in the Visual Arts project, at Sujo's home, in New York, New York.
Diament speaks of her childhood in Argentina; her father's early influence; working with Abbott Industries; her travels with her father as a child to Punta del Este in Urguay, and Mar del Plata; her experiences in the United States; life under Juan Perón and how political events helped shape her education; teaching in Venezuela; collecting art for the Venezuelan science museum; her views on art; the artists that she has worked with and represented; the opening of her first gallery in Venezuela; her gallery in New York City; the influence of Jorge Romero Brest; and her work with the museum network to represent Latin American artists. She recalls Katharine Kuh, Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning, Richard Wright, Langston Hughes, Jesus Rafael Soto, Arturo de Cordova, Alejandro Otero, Victor Valera, Armando Reverón, Mercedes Pardo, Wilfredo Lam, Alfred Barr, Rene d'Harnoncourt, Dorothy Miller, Thomas Messer, Marcel Duchamp, Hedda Sterne, Robert Rauschenberg, Jasper Johns, Marisol Escobar, and others.
Biographical / Historical:
Clara Diament Sujo (1921-) is an Argentinian born owner and director of CDS Gallery in New York, New York. Avis Berman (1949-) is a scholar in New York, New York.
General:
Originally recorded on 1 compact disc. Reformatted in 2010 as 3 digital wav files. Duration is 5 hr., 10 min.
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:
Gallery owners -- New York (State) -- New York  Search this
Gallery directors -- New York (State) -- New York  Search this
Art dealers -- New York (State) -- New York  Search this
Collectors -- New York (State) -- New York  Search this
Topic:
Art -- Collectors and collecting  Search this
Latino and Latin American artists  Search this
Women art dealers  Search this
Genre/Form:
Interviews
Sound recordings
Identifier:
AAA.diamen10
Archival Repository:
Archives of American Art
GUID:
https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw96d7f23a5-df3f-460a-9e75-6c53a343b5e5
EDAN-URL:
ead_collection:sova-aaa-diamen10
Online Media:

Photographs of Other Individuals

Collection Creator:
Namuth, Hans  Search this
Type:
Archival materials
Date:
circa 1950-1983
Scope and Contents:
Photographs of other individuals depict architects, gallery owners, art critics, musicans, and writers at their place of work or home. Individuals include Marcel Breuer, John Cage, Leo Castelli, Buckminster Fuller, and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, among many others. Most photographs are black and white, but a few color prints are included.
Arrangement:
Photographs are organized alphabetically by artist last name in two sets: 8x10 prints followed by oversized prints. Photographs of multiple people are placed at the end of the series.
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:
All Photographs by Hans Namuth: All requests for image reproductions are to be sent to: Assistant Registrar for Rights & Reproductions; Center for Creative Photography. Contact Reference Services for more 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:
Hans Namuth photographs and papers, 1945-1985. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Identifier:
AAA.namuhans, Subseries 3.2
See more items in:
Hans Namuth photographs and papers
Hans Namuth photographs and papers / Series 3: Photographs
Archival Repository:
Archives of American Art
GUID:
https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw9f2506855-aa02-4887-a452-748aaa2c09b4
EDAN-URL:
ead_component:sova-aaa-namuhans-ref190

Betty Parsons Gallery records and personal papers

Creator:
Parsons, Betty  Search this
Names:
Betty Parsons Gallery  Search this
Bess, Forrest, 1911-1977  Search this
Congdon, William, 1912-1998  Search this
Pollock, Jackson, 1912-1956  Search this
Reinhardt, Ad, 1913-1967  Search this
Rothko, Mark, 1903-1970  Search this
Extent:
61.1 Linear feet
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Sketchbooks
Interviews
Video recordings
Drawings
Date:
1916-1991
bulk 1946-1983
Summary:
The Betty Parsons Gallery records and personal papers measure 61.1 linear feet and date from 1916 to 1991, with the bulk of the material dating from 1946-1983. Records provide extensive documentation of the gallery's operations from its inception in 1946 to its closing in 1983 and of the activities of Betty Parsons as one the leading art dealers of contemporary American Art in the latter half of the twentieth century, particularly the work of the Abstract Expressionists. Over one third of the of the collection is comprised of artists files containing correspondence, price lists, and printed materials. Additional correspondence is with galleries, dealers, art institutions, private collectors, and the media. Also found are exhibition files, exhibition catalogs and announcements, sales records, stock inventories, personal financial records, and photographs. Betty Parsons's personal papers consist of early curatorial files, pocket diaries, personal correspondence, and evidence of her own artwork, including sketchbooks, and files documenting her personal art collection.
Scope and Content Note:
The Betty Parsons Gallery records and personal papers measure 61.1 linear feet and date from 1916 to 1991, with the bulk of the material dating from 1946-1983. Records provide extensive documentation of the gallery's operations from its inception in 1946 to its closing in 1983 and of the activities of Betty Parsons as one the leading art dealers of contemporary American Art in the latter half of the twentieth century, particularly the work of the Abstract Expressionists. Over one third of the of the collection is comprised of artists files containing correspondence, price lists, and printed materials. Additional correspondence is with galleries, dealers, art institutions, private collectors, and the media. Also found are exhibition files, exhibition catalogs and announcements, sales records, stock inventories, personal financial records, and photographs. Betty Parsons's personal papers consist of early curatorial files, pocket diaries, personal correspondence, and evidence of her own artwork, including sketchbooks, and files documenting her personal art collection. Personal papers also include personal photographs.

Artists files, the largest and most extensive series, consist of a wide variety of documents, including biographical materials, correspondence with or related to the artist, exhibition catalogs and announcements, sales and expense invoices, clippings, price lists, and photographs of the artist, exhibitions, and artwork. The files reflect Parsons's close personal relationships with certain artists, particularly Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko, Clyfford Still, and Barnett Newman. Extensive documentation is also found for Forrest Bess, William Congdon, Paul Feeley, Thomas George, Alexander Liberman, Seymour Lipton, Richard Pousette-Dart, Jesse Reichek, and Jack Youngerman. Historians and researchers will find these files to be an invaluable resource both in tracing Betty Parsons's role in promoting Abstract Expressionism and researching individual artists.

Exhibition files primarily document the gallery's infrequent group or themed exhibitions. Of particular note are the files on The Ideographic Picture, which was organized by Barnett Newman and included his work, as well as that of Pietro Lazzari, Boris Margo, Ad Reinhardt, Mark Rothko, Theodoros Stamos, and Clyfford Still. Price lists, artist biographies and exhibition schedules are housed in the general exhibition files. Loan exhibition files provide documentation of artwork borrowed by other galleries or institutions for exhibitions, as well as shows outside of the gallery that were organized by Betty Parsons. Also found are gallery exhibition guest books, and announcements and catalogs.

Gallery correspondence is primarily with galleries and dealers, museums, arts organizations, and collectors. Scattered letters from artists are also found, although the bulk of the artists' correspondence is filed in the Artists Files. Also found here are memoranda and letters between Betty Parsons and her staff that contain detailed information concerning Parsons's schedule and gallery activities. Similar correspondence is found amongst the correspondence files within the series Betty Parsons papers.

Appraisal and conservation files include correspondence, appraisal invoices, forms, and appraisal requests and other information from the Art Dealers Association of America, and conservation invoices and reports. The majority of the appraisal records contain information about the specific works of art, including artist, title, date, current owner and the estimated value at the time of the request. Conservation records document conservation treatments undertaken by outside conservators to gallery stock.

Sales, purchases, stock and inventory are well documented in the sales and inventory records. The records provide detailed information about individual sales, prices of individual pieces of artwork, consignments, and loans. Most sales records also include detailed information about the buyer and are a valuable resource for provenance research. Files documenting the general administration, routine business operations, and financial transactions (not individual sales) of the gallery are housed in the general business and financial records. These records include ledgers, receipts, tax records, and banking records. There is some limited information about works of art scattered amongst the receipts and in the "in/out slips" files. Legal records house general legal documents and those concerning specific lawsuits. Of particular note is the file detailing the lawsuit between Betty Parsons and Sidney Janis over the fifth floor of 24 West 57th Street.

The remainder of the collection consists of Betty Parsons's personal papers which document her career prior to opening her own gallery, her work as an artist, and her personal art collection.

Some information about Parsons's work prior to opening her own gallery is found in the early curatorial files she retained from her curatorial and administrative work at the Wakefield Gallery and the Mortimer Brandt Gallery. Clippings, correspondence, announcements, exhibition lists and exhibition files are found. For both positions, she kept only the exhibition files for a small group of exhibitions organized around a specific theme, the most notable being the exhibition of Pre-Columbian Sculpture at the Wakefield Gallery.

Biographical materials include copies of her biography, family genealogies, photographs of Parsons, interviews with Colette Roberts and WYNC radio, memberships, photographs, and ephemera, including a collection of programs and invitations from events that she attended. Throughout her life Parsons gave generously of her time to various cultural and charitable institutions and was awarded for her contributions. There are also a number of files that document her speaking engagements, her participation as a juror in numerous juried exhibitions, charitable work, and awards that she received.

Parsons's personal correspondence files reflect how deeply Parsons's life was intertwined with the gallery. There are letters from museum directors, dealers, artists seeking representation, and personal letters from artists with whom she had close personal relationships, most notably Larry Bigelow, Alexander Calder, William Condon, and Ad Reinhardt. There are also letters from the English artist Adge Baker, with whom Parsons was romantically involved. Correspondence also includes several files of postcards and Christmas cards.

Pocket diaries and engagement calendars, spanning from 1933-1981, record social engagements, meetings, vacations, and telephone numbers. Also found are circa two linear feet of notebooks and sketchbooks, many of which are annotated with addresses, poetry, journal entries, and other observations of people, places, and travels. Writings by others include writings about Betty Parsons or the Betty Parsons Gallery, such as Lawrence Alloway's unpublished typescript titled "An American Gallery" and other topics.

Printed material consists of exhibition announcements and catalogs, art magazines, and newspaper and magazine clippings about Betty Parsons, her family and acquaintances, artists, and other art related topics, coupled with a miscellaneous selection of clippings, and a video recording, on topics that presumably captured Parsons's attention.

Personal art work records document Betty Parsons's career as an artist through inventories, group and solo exhibitions files, price lists, appraisals, sales and consignment invoices. Photographs are primarily reproductions of her works of art, although there are scattered photographs of exhibition installations.

Betty Parsons's private art collection files document her extensive personal collection of art that included works by Jackson Pollock, Agnes Martin, Romare Bearden, Barnett Newman, and Mark Rothko, in addition to Amlash sculpture from ancient Persia and primitive sculpture from New Hebrides. These files include inventories, lists, exhibition records, sales and purchase invoices, and photographs. There are also files for donations and loans from Parsons's personal collection to museums and fund raising auctions for several non-profit institutions.

Finally, the personal financial records provide information about the Parsons's family finances and her personal financial success as an art dealer. In addition to her own investments, Parsons inherited shares in family investments through the estates of her parents, J. Fred Pierson, Jr. and Suzanne Miles Pierson, and younger sister, Emily Rayner. Real estate files include correspondence, utility bills, receipts, area maps, and land plots for houses in Sheepscot, Maine and St. Maartens, Netherlands Antilles. Tax returns, ledger worksheets, receipts, banking statements, deposit slips, and cancelled checks are among the other financial records.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged as seven series. Many of the series are further divided into subseries.

Missing Title

Series 1: Artists Files, 1935-1983 (19.4 linear feet; Boxes 1-18, 51, 55-56, OVs 53, 65)

Series 2: Exhibition Files, 1941-1983 (2.9 linear feet; Boxes 18-21, 51, 55, OVs 54, 66)

Series 3: Correspondence Files, 1941-1983 (3.9 linear feet; Boxes 21-24, 52, 56)

Series 4: Appraisal Files, 1954-1983 (0.7 linear feet; Box 24)

Series 5: Sales and Inventory Records, 1946-1983 (3.9 linear feet; Boxes 25-28, 51)

Series 6: General Business and Financial Records, 1946-1983 (9.3 linear feet; Boxes 28-38, 51, 56)

Series 7: Betty Parsons Personal Papers, 1916-1991 (21 linear feet; Boxes 38-51, 55-64, OVs 65-67)
Historical Note:
Betty Parsons (1900-1982) was one of the leading art dealers in New York City specializing in modern art, particularly the work of the Abstract Expressionists, and an abstract painter and sculptor in her own right. She opened Betty Parsons Gallery in 1946 at 15 E. 57th St., later moving to 24 W. 57th St.

The history of the Betty Parsons Gallery is inextricably bound to the life and experiences of its founder. Betty Parsons was born Betty Bierne Pierson on January 31, 1900 in New York City. She enjoyed a privileged childhood, which included vacation homes in Newport and Palm Beach. Her only formal education was a five-year stint at the prestigious Chapin School from 1910-1915, where she met many of the women who would become life-long friends and supporters. In the spring of 1920, she married Schuyler Livingston Parsons from one of New York's oldest families. The marriage ended after only three years and the couple traveled to Paris where they could obtain a divorce on the grounds of incompatibility. She retained her married surname and purchased a house on the rue Boulard in Paris, where she remained for ten years, pursuing studies in painting and sculpture.

Financial constraints forced Parsons to return to the United States in 1933. She first traveled west to California, but it was her return to New York in 1935 that marked the start of her career as an art dealer. Her first opportunity to connect with the New York art world came after a successful exhibition of her watercolors at the Midtown Galleries where the owner, Alan Gruskin, noted Parson's faithful and wealthy group of supporters and offered her work installing exhibitions and selling paintings on commission. Her work for the Midtown Galleries led to a second position in the Park Avenue gallery of Mary Sullivan, one of the founders of the Museum of Modern Art. Here, Parsons learned the business of running a gallery. By 1940 Parsons was ready to take on more independent responsibility and agreed to manage a gallery within the Wakefield Bookshop. In this job, she exercised full curatorial control by selecting artists and organizing exhibitions. She championed then unknown contemporary American artists and the gallery's roster soon included Saul Steinberg, Hedda Sterne, Alfonso Ossorio, Joseph Cornell, Walter Murch, and Theodore Stamos. Although the majority of the exhibitions were solo shows, there were a few group shows and themed exhibitions, such as Love in Art (1941) and Ballet in Art (1942). Under Parson's direction, the gallery hosted an important exhibition of Pre-Columbian sculpture, curated by Barnett Newman.

When the owners of the Wakefield Bookshop decided to close the gallery late in 1944, Mortimer Brandt, a dealer who specialized in Old Master paintings and drawings, offered her a position as head of the newly created contemporary section of his gallery. Many of the artists who had shown with Parsons at the Wakefield Gallery followed her to her new gallery, where they were joined by Ad Reinhardt, Boris Mango, and Hans Hofmann. While the exhibitions garnered attention from the press and the interest of contemporary artists, the contemporary section was not a financial success and Brandt opted to close his gallery in 1946.

Using $1000 of her own money and an additional borrowed $4000, Parsons sublet the space that previously housed Mortimer Brandt's contemporary section, on the fifth floor of 15 East 57th Street, and opened the Betty Parsons Gallery.

In many respects the early years of the Betty Parsons Gallery were the most vital, as it was during the period of 1947-1951 that the gallery became linked with the Abstract Expressionists and the history of post-WWII American Art. In an unpublished history of the gallery, noted art critic Lawrence Alloway stated that the significance of the gallery's early exhibitions ranks with Durand-Ruel's Impressionists exhibitions or Kahnweiler's shows of the Cubists. Betty Parsons Gallery quickly became one of the most prestigious galleries in New York City associated with new American Art of all styles. Her close friend Barnett Newman organized the gallery's inaugural exhibition of Northwest Coast Indian Art and he soon began to exhibit his own work at the gallery. When Peggy Guggenheim's Art of This Century Gallery closed, Jackson Pollock, Clyfford Still, and Mark Rothko joined Parsons' growing stable of artists. Although Parsons continued to promote and exhibit many of the artists whom she had previously discovered, these four artists dominated this period. Newman, Pollock, Still, and Rothko worked closely together, holding themselves apart from the other artists somewhat. They were actively involved in the curatorial process and often hung their own shows. For these artists, the exhibition itself was an artistic act of creation.

Parsons provided a supportive environment and allowed her artists enormous freedom in planning and designing their exhibitions. She was not, however, an aggressive salesperson. During this early period the gallery ledgers document sales to an impressive array of museums including the Museum of Modern Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, and the Art Institute of Chicago, as well as important collectors such as Edward Root and Duncan Phillips. Nevertheless, the art that the gallery promoted was not yet widely accepted. Sales were few, prices were low and the business would not turn a profit for several years. Meanwhile, there was mounting pressure from Pollock, Newman, Still, and Rothko to drop some of the other artists from Parsons' stable and focus all resources on them. They wanted to be promoted to a larger audience and have their work sold at higher prices, but Parsons enjoyed discovering new artists and did not want to be restricted in this endeavor. The year 1951 marks the last time that Pollock's drip paintings or the monumental works of Newman, Rothko or Still were shown at the Betty Parsons Gallery.

In the following years the Betty Parsons Gallery continued to attract a diverse group of talented artists. Ellsworth Kelly, Richard Tuttle, Robert Rauschenberg, and Jack Youngerman had their first New York exhibitions at the Betty Parsons Gallery. Parsons opened Section Eleven in 1958, a short-lived annex to the main gallery, so that she could promote younger, less well-known artists. It closed in 1960 due to the administrative difficulties in running two essentially separate galleries.

In 1962, Sidney Janis, another prominent art dealer, started proceedings to evict Parsons from the floor that they shared on 15 East 57th Street. The Betty Parsons Gallery moved to 24 West 57th Street in 1963, where it remained until it closed in 1983, following Parsons' death the preceding year. Throughout the gallery's history, Parsons continued to promote faithful artists such as Hedda Sterne and Saul Steinberg, who had been with her from the beginning and to seek out new talent, both for her main gallery and for other venues, such as the short-lived Parsons-Truman Gallery, which she opened in 1974 with former Parsons Gallery director Jock Truman to show works on paper by emerging artists.

In addition to being an art dealer, Betty Parsons was a respected artist and collector. With her connoisseur's eye and connections, Parsons amassed an impressive private collection of art. She bought her first piece while an art student in Paris in the 1920s, a small gouache by Zadkine, but did not begin acquiring works in earnest until she was established as an art dealer. Partial inventories of her personal collection show that the majority of her collection contained works by artists associated with the gallery. Mark Rothko, Hans Hofmann, Ad Reinhardt, Agnes Martin, and Kenzo Okada were among the artists represented. Many were gifts from the artists, such as an ink drawing by Jackson Pollock, inscribed "For Betty." Selections from her collection appeared in small museums across the United States, including a traveling exhibition organized by Fitch College, New York, in 1968. In her role as a promoter of contemporary American art, Parsons lent generously from her collection, particularly to the federal Art in the Embassies Program. Throughout her life she also donated works to a variety of museums, most notably, the Whitney Museum of American Art, Museum of Modern Art, New York, and the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Denmark.

Parsons frequently claimed that her desire to pursue a career as an artist stemmed from a visit to the Armory Show when she was thirteen. In her late teens, after pressuring her father for art lessons, she studied with the sculptor Gutzon Burglum of Mount Rushmore fame. In Paris, she continued her studies first with Antoine Bourdelle, whose sculptures she had admired at the Armory Show, and later with Ossip Zadkine. The first exhibition of her work, figurative watercolors and sculptures, took place in Paris in 1927. As she matured as an artist, her art became more abstract. Her late works were painted wood sculptures that she pieced together from wood that she found near her studio in Long Island. Parsons's work was exhibited in more than thirty solo exhibitions, including, Betty Parsons; Paintings, Gouaches and Sculpture, 1955-1968, at the Whitechapel Gallery in London. During her lifetime, she would not allow her works to be shown in her own gallery. Shortly after she died of a stroke in 1982, In Memoriam, Betty Parsons: Late Sculptures, opened at the Betty Parsons Gallery.
Related Material:
Also found in the Archives of American Art are oral history interviews with Betty Parsons, June 4-9, 1969, by Paul Cummings, and June 11, 1981 by Gerald Silk.
Separated Material:
Some of the material originally loaned for microfilming in 1968 and 1969 was not included in later donations and can be viewed on microfilm reels N68/62-N68/74 and N69/105-N69/106. Loaned materials are not described in the container listing in this finding aid.
Provenance:
The gallery donated some records in 1974, many of which had been loaned earlier for microfilming. The bulk of the collection was donated in 1984 and 1986 by William Rayner and Christopher Schwabacher, executors of the Estate of Betty Parsons. Additional material was donated by William Rayner in 1998 and Christopher Schwabacher in 2017. Additional material was donated in 2018 by the Lee Hall estate via Carolyn Crozier and Deborah Jacobson, co-executors. Hall was Parsons's biographer and had the material in her possession at the time of Parsons's death. An additional photograph of Parons and Marie Carr Taylor by Henri Cartier-Bresson was donated in 2021 by Mary Carpenter, who inherited the photograph from her mother, Nan Thorton Jones, who received it as a gift from Taylor.
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.

Researchers interested in accessing audiovisual recordings in this collection must use access copies. Contact References 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.
Occupation:
Gallery owners -- New York (State) -- New York  Search this
Art dealers -- New York (State) -- New York  Search this
Painters -- New York (State) -- New York  Search this
Sculptors -- New York (State) -- New York  Search this
Topic:
Women art dealers  Search this
Women artists  Search this
Abstract expressionist  Search this
Genre/Form:
Sketchbooks
Interviews
Video recordings
Drawings
Citation:
Betty Parsons Gallery records and personal papers, 1916-1991. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Identifier:
AAA.parsbett
See more items in:
Betty Parsons Gallery records and personal papers
Archival Repository:
Archives of American Art
GUID:
https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw956c1036f-b673-4dc1-8c1b-cde0bd641c60
EDAN-URL:
ead_collection:sova-aaa-parsbett
Online Media:

Hermine Benhaim Freed papers relating to Howard Putzel

Creator:
Freed, Hermine  Search this
Names:
Putzel, Howard, 1898-1945  Search this
Extent:
0.01 Linear feet
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Date:
1945-1966
Summary:
The papers of Hermine Benhaim Freed measure 0.01 linear feet (7 items) and date from 1945 to 1966. The collection mostly consists of material Freed gathered about New York gallery owner Howard Putzel, such as Benhaim's paper on Howard Putzel, "Howard Putzel and the Beginnings of Abstract Expressionism," written for a Modern Art Seminar at New York University. Also included are letters to Freed, 1966, about Putzel from Joseph Allen, Peggy Guggenheim, Kenneth MacPherson and Gordon Onslow-Ford; and a typescript and a clipping of reviews of the exhibition "A Problem for Critics," 1945, organized by Putzel.
Scope and Contents:
The papers of Hermine Benhaim Freed measure 0.01 linear feet (1 folder) and consists of 7 items and date from 1945 to 1966. The collection mostly consists of material gathered about New York gallery owner Howard Putzel, such as Freed's paper on Howard Putzel, "Howard Putzel and the Beginnings of Abstract Expressionism," written for a Modern Art Seminar at New York University. Also included are letters to Freed, 1966, about Putzel from Joseph Allen, Peggy Guggenheim, Kenneth MacPherson and Gordon Onslow-Ford; and a typescript and a clipping of reviews of the exhibition "A Problem for Critics," 1945, organized by Putzel.
Arrangement:
Due to the small size of this collection, the papers are arranged as one series.

Series 1: Hermine Benhaim Freed papers relating to Howard Putzel, 1945-1966 (Folder 1; 7 items)
Biographical / Historical:
Hermine Benhaim Freed (1940-1998) was a painter and video artist in New York City. Freed studied painting at Cornell University and New York University, where she taught starting from the late 1960s.
Provenance:
The papers were donated to the Archives of American Art in 1972 by Hermine Benhaim Freed.
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 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:
Painters -- New York (State) -- New York  Search this
Video artists -- New York (State) -- New York  Search this
Educators -- New York (State) -- New York  Search this
Topic:
Art -- Collectors and collecting  Search this
Abstract expressionism  Search this
Women artists  Search this
Women painters  Search this
Women educators  Search this
Citation:
Hermine Benhaim Freed papers relating to Howard Putzel, 1945-1966. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Identifier:
AAA.benhherm
See more items in:
Hermine Benhaim Freed papers relating to Howard Putzel
Archival Repository:
Archives of American Art
GUID:
https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw94bf840e1-82ca-4e2f-9abb-8b6b7b21dba8
EDAN-URL:
ead_collection:sova-aaa-benhherm
Online Media:

Hermine Benhaim Freed papers relating to Howard Putzel

Collection Creator:
Freed, Hermine  Search this
Extent:
7 Items ((Folder 1))
Type:
Archival materials
Date:
1945-1966
Scope and Contents:
The collection mostly consists of material Freed gathered about New York gallery owner Howard Putzel, such as Freed's paper on Howard Putzel, "Howard Putzel and the Beginnings of Abstract Expressionism," written for a Modern Art Seminar at New York University. Also included are letters to Freed, 1966, about Putzel from Joseph Allen, Peggy Guggenheim, Kenneth MacPherson and Gordon Onslow-Ford; and a typescript and a clipping of reviews of the exhibition "A Problem for Critics," 1945, organized by Putzel.
Collection 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.
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 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:
Hermine Benhaim Freed papers relating to Howard Putzel, 1945-1966. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Identifier:
AAA.benhherm, Series 1
See more items in:
Hermine Benhaim Freed papers relating to Howard Putzel
Archival Repository:
Archives of American Art
GUID:
https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw91a50f2c6-8902-44aa-902d-edf12926c5ac
EDAN-URL:
ead_component:sova-aaa-benhherm-ref4

Gross McCleaf Gallery selected artists' files

Creator:
Gross McCleaf Gallery  Search this
Names:
Broderson, Morris, 1928-2011  Search this
Carles, Arthur B., 1882-1952  Search this
Day, Larry, 1921-  Search this
Emerson, Edith, 1888-1981  Search this
Gross, Estelle Shane, 1929-1992  Search this
Howard, Humbert, 1905-1990  Search this
Lueders, Jimmy C., 1927-1994  Search this
McCleaf, Marlin  Search this
Oakley, Violet, 1874-1961  Search this
Piper, Jane, 1916-1991  Search this
Pittman, Hobson Lafayette, 1899 or 1900-1972  Search this
Porter, Fairfield  Search this
Tyson, Carroll Sargent, 1878-1956  Search this
Weidner, Roswell, 1911-1999  Search this
Welliver, Neil  Search this
Extent:
0.8 Linear feet
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Date:
1947-1986
Summary:
The Gross McCleaf Gallery selected artists' files measure 0.8 linear feet and date from 1947 to 1986. The files consist of price lists, printed material, correspondence, exhibition catalogs and announcements, biographical summaries, newspaper clippings, and some photographs. Artists include Neil Welliver, Hobson Pittman, Edith Emerson, Humbert Howard, Jane Piper, and Fairfield Porter among others.
Scope and Contents:
The Gross McCleaf Gallery selected artists' files measure 0.8 linear feet and date from 1947 to 1986. The files consist of price lists, printed material, correspondence, exhibition catalogs and announcements, biographical summaries, and clippings. Some of the files include photos of the artist, works of art, and exhibition installations. Artists represented in the collection are Arthur B. Carles, Larry Day, Edith Emerson, Humbert Howard, Jimmy Lueders, Violet Oakley, Jane Piper, Hobson Pittman, Fairfield Porter, Carroll S. Tyson, Roswell Weidner, Neil Welliver, and Harold Weston.
Arrangement:
Due to the small size of this collection the papers are arranged as one series.
Biographical / Historical:
The Gross McCleaf Gallery was founded in 1969 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania by Marlin McCleaf and Estelle Shane Gross. The gallery was originally named the Marlin McCleaf Gallery. After McCleaf's departure from the gallery in the early 1970s, Gross became the sole owner and changed the gallery's name to Gross McCleaf Gallery. Early artists exhibited at the gallery include Fairfield Porter, Neil Welliver, Rackstraw Downes, Red Grooms and his wife Mimi Gross, Jane Piper, and Larry Day. After Estelle Gross' death in 1992, Sharon Ewing became the gallery owner and director. Ewing retired in 2020 and Rebecca Segall took over as the gallery's owner and director.
Provenance:
The collection was donated by Estelle and Jay Gross in 1988.
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.
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.
Topic:
Women art dealers  Search this
Function:
Art galleries, Commercial -- Pennsylvania
Citation:
Gross McCleaf Gallery selected artists' files, 1947-1986. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Identifier:
AAA.grosmccl
See more items in:
Gross McCleaf Gallery selected artists' files
Archival Repository:
Archives of American Art
GUID:
https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw9052b0be7-bd8e-4cc3-9fca-5f366e523a11
EDAN-URL:
ead_collection:sova-aaa-grosmccl
Online Media:

Oral history interview with Buffie Johnson

Interviewee:
Johnson, Buffie  Search this
Interviewer:
Cummings, Paul  Search this
Names:
Hayter, Stanley William, 1901-1988  Search this
Hofmann, Hans, 1880-1966  Search this
Pollock, Jackson, 1912-1956  Search this
Putzel, Howard, 1898-1945  Search this
Rothko, Mark, 1903-1970  Search this
Smith, Tony, 1912-1980  Search this
Extent:
2 Sound tape reels (Sound recording, 5 in.)
140 Pages (Transcript)
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Sound tape reels
Pages
Sound recordings
Interviews
Date:
1977 Nov. 22-1978 Jan. 23
Scope and Contents:
An interview of Buffie Johnson conducted 1977 Nov. 22-1978 Jan. 23, by Paul Cummings, for the Archives of American Art.
Johnson speaks of her childhood in New York City and Ducksbury, Mass.; her early encouragement in art; life in Paris and the European scene before World War II. She discusses gettting established as a painter, selling her early work, the change in her painting toward abstraction, her friendship with gallery owner Howard Putzel, painting a mural for a movie theater, her inspirations for painting and her interest in the women's movement. She recalls Tony Smith, Hans Hofmann, Stanley William Hayter, Mark Rothko, and Jackson Pollock.
Biographical / Historical:
Buffie Johnson (1912-2006) was a painter and muralist from New York, N.Y.
Provenance:
These interviews are 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.
Restrictions:
Transcript: Use requires an appointment.
Occupation:
Painters -- New York (State) -- New York  Search this
Muralists -- New York (State) -- New York  Search this
Topic:
Painting, Abstract -- New York (State) -- New York  Search this
Mural painting and decoration -- New York (State) -- New York  Search this
Women artists  Search this
Women painters  Search this
Women muralists  Search this
Genre/Form:
Sound recordings
Interviews
Identifier:
AAA.johnso77
Archival Repository:
Archives of American Art
GUID:
https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw939e09048-eb0d-453d-8407-d295b4ef7c7e
EDAN-URL:
ead_collection:sova-aaa-johnso77
Online Media:

Macbeth Gallery records

Creator:
Macbeth Gallery  Search this
Names:
Hartley, Marsden, 1877-1943  Search this
Homer, Winslow, 1836-1910  Search this
Macbeth, Robert W. (Robert Walker), 1884-1940  Search this
Macbeth, William, 1851-1917  Search this
McIntyre, Robert G. (Robert George), b. 1885  Search this
Stuart, Gilbert, 1755-1828  Search this
Weir, Robert Walter, 1803-1889  Search this
Extent:
131.6 Linear feet
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Daguerreotypes
Photographs
Scrapbooks
Date:
1947-1948
1838-1968
bulk 1892-1953
Summary:
The Macbeth Gallery records provide almost complete coverage of the gallery's operations from its inception in 1892 to its closing in 1953. Through extensive correspondence files, financial and inventory records, printed material, scrapbooks, reference and research material, and photographs of artists and works of art, the records document all aspects of the gallery's activities, charting William Macbeth's initial intention to lease his store "for the permanent exhibition and sale of American pictures" through over sixty years of success as a major New York firm devoted to American art. The collection measures 131.6 linear feet and dates from 1838 to 1968 with the bulk of the material dating from 1892 to 1953.
Scope and Content Note:
The Macbeth Gallery records provide almost complete coverage of the gallery's operations from its inception in 1892 to its closing in 1953. The records document all aspects of the gallery's activities, charting William Macbeth's initial intention to lease his store "for the permanent exhibition and sale of American pictures" through over sixty years of success as a major New York firm devoted to American art. The collection measures 131.6 linear feet and dates from 1838 to 1968 with the bulk of the material dating from 1892 to 1953.

The gallery's correspondence files form the core of the collection and illuminate most aspects of American art history: the creation and sale of works of art, the development of reputations, the rise of museums and art societies, change and resistance to change in the art market, and the evolution of taste. Ninety-five feet of correspondence house substantial and informative letters from dozens of important American painters and sculptors, including older artists and younger contemporaries of the gallery in its later years. There are also letters from collectors, curators, other galleries, and critics.

The financial files found in the collection offer insight into the changing economic climate in which the gallery operated. They include information ranging from the details of individual sales and the market for individual artists, to consignment activities and artist commissions, to overviews of annual sales. This information is augmented by the firm's inventory records and the photographs of artwork with their accompanying records of paintings sold. The inventory records provide details of all works of art handled by the gallery, both sold and unsold, and the buyers who purchased them; the photographs of artwork include images of artwork sold with accompanying sales information.

The highlight of the gallery's printed material is the publication Art Notes. Although published only until 1930, Art Notes provides an excellent and detailed view of the gallery's exhibition schedule and the relationship of the gallery owners with many of the artists whose work they handled. It was a house organ that also provided a running commentary on events in the art world. The gallery's 19 fragile scrapbooks, maintained throughout the firm's history, provide further coverage of activities through exhibition catalogs and related news clippings. Printed material from other sources provides a frame of reference for activities in the art world from the mid-19th to the mid-20th-centuries and includes an almost complete run of the rare and important pre-Civil War art publication The Crayon.

Reference files record the interest which the gallery owners took in the work of early portrait painters and in later artists such as George Inness and Winslow Homer. Together with the immense volume of correspondence with buyers and sellers of paintings by the great portraitists and the Hudson River School found in the gallery's correspondence files, these records are still useful sources of information today and underscore the deep interest that the Macbeths and Robert McIntyre took in 18th and 19th-century American art.

The photographs of artists found here are a treasure trove of images of some of the major figures of the 19th and 20th-centuries. There are photographs of artists such as Chester Beach, Emil Carlsen, Charles Melville Dewey, Frederick Carl Frieseke, Childe Hassam, Winslow Homer, George Inness, Maurice Prendergast, and Julian Alden Weir, many of them original prints and the majority of them autographed.

With the exception of the "The Eight" and a few of their contemporaries, an important aspect of art history, the modernist movement, is generally represented in the Macbeth Gallery records only in a negative form as the three successive proprietors of the gallery showed very little interest in this area. Nevertheless, the collection is a highly significant source of information on many of the major and minor figures in American art in the period after 1890.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged into eight series:

Missing Title

Series 1: Correspondence, 1838-1968 (Box 1-95, 163-164, OV 165; 96.2 linear feet)

Series 2: Financial and Shipping Records, 1892-1956 (Box 96-110; 11.8 linear feet)

Series 3: Inventory Records, 1892-circa 1957 (Box 111-113; 3.0 linear feet)

Series 4: Printed Material, 1838-1963 (Box 114-119, 162; 5.0 linear feet)

Series 5: Scrapbooks, 1892-1952 (Box 120-130; 3.3 linear feet)

Series 6: Reference Files, 1839-1959 (Box 131-132; 0.6 linear feet)

Series 7: Miscellaneous Files, 1912-1956 (Box 133-134; 0.8 linear feet)

Series 8: Photographs, circa 1880-circa 1968 (Box 135-161; 12.1 linear feet)
Historical Note:
The Macbeth Gallery was established in 1892 by William Macbeth, a Scotch-Irish immigrant who had spent ten years with the print dealer Frederick Keppel before he opened his doors to the art-buying public at 237 Fifth Avenue in New York. Despite the prevailing interest in foreign art at that time, particularly in that of the Barbizon and Dutch schools, Macbeth was determined to dedicate his gallery to "the permanent exhibition and sale of American pictures, both in oil and water colors."

Although some of the gallery's earliest exhibitions were of work by European artists, the business soon became the only gallery in continuous operation that kept American art permanently on display. In the January 1917 issue of Art Notes, Macbeth recounts those early days remembering that "The opening of my gallery......was a rash venture under the existing conditions, and disaster was freely predicted." Nevertheless, he struggled through the financial crisis of 1893 and persisted with his devotion to American art; slowly the market for his pictures grew more amenable.

Macbeth moved to more spacious quarters at 450 Fifth Avenue in 1906 and two years later undertook what was to become the major event in the gallery's early history: the 1908 exhibition of "The Eight," featuring work by Arthur B. Davies, Willam J. Glackens, Robert Henri, Ernest Lawson, George Luks, Maurice Prendergast, Everett Shinn, and John Sloan. "The Eight" were an unlikely combination of social realists, visionaries and impressionists eager to challenge the dominating influence of the National Academy. The exhibition received an immense amount of publicity and instantly entered into art history as a successful assault on tradition.

Despite the splash that the exhibition made and its implications for the future of American art, nothing that the gallery did subsequently indicated that Macbeth intended to capitalize on its significance. It is true that Macbeth supported many artists later considered leaders in American art when the public would pay no attention to them because of their modernist tendencies; Arthur B. Davies, Paul Dougherty, Maurice Prendergast, Theodore Robinson, and F. Ballard Williams all held their first exhibitions at his gallery. Nevertheless, neither Macbeth nor the gallery's two successive proprietors, Robert G. McIntyre (William's nephew) and Robert Macbeth (William's son), who joined the gallery in 1903 and 1906 respectively, ever developed a true interest in modern art. The November 1930 issue of Art Notes summarizes their collective disdain for modernism, stating: "We believe that, by and large, modern art is amusing. We are heretical enough to believe that much of it was started for the amusement of its creators and that no one was more surprised than they when it was taken seriously by a certain audience to whom the bizarre and the unintelligible always makes an appeal." So while the Macbeths and McIntyre cetainly championed American artists and insisted they deserved as much recognition as the Europeans, their deepest and most abiding interest was undoubtedly the established artists of the 18th and 19th-centuries and those of the early 20th-century who continued in a more conservative style. Artists such as Emil Carlsen, Charles Harold Davis, Frederick C. Frieseke, Robert Henri, Winslow Homer, Chauncey F. Ryder, Abbot Handerson Thayer, J. Francis Murphy, A. H. Wyant were the gallery's bread and butter.

When William Macbeth died in 1917 Robert Macbeth took up the reins with the assistance of Robert G. McIntyre . Although they incorporated the business as William Macbeth, Inc., in 1918 the gallery continued to be known, as it always would be, simply as Macbeth Gallery. Macbeth and McIntyre continued to show work in the same vein as the elder Macbeth. They concentrated primarily on oil paintings at this time, having found by the 1920s that "oils are all that our gallery owners will buy," though they also exhibited an occasional group of watercolors and pastels in addition to bronzes and other sculpture by contemporary American artists such as Chester Beach and Janet Scudder.

Of the early American painters the Macbeths and McIntyre were particularly interested in colonial portraits and miniatures, especially those painted by prominent artists in the latter part of the eighteenth century such as John Singleton Copley, Gilbert Stuart, Thomas Sully and John Trumbull. In its early years the gallery also handled the work of a few prominent American etchers including Frank W. Benson, Emil Fuchs, Daniel Garber, Childe Hassam and Chauncey F. Ryder. The print department was generally discontinued, however, in the late 1930s although the gallery continued to show prints by contemporaries such as Stow Wengenroth.

In 1924 relative prosperity allowed the gallery to move uptown to 15 East Fifty-seventh Street. When the 1930s brought new financial hardship for the gallery Macbeth and McIntyre took a variety of approaches to boosting sales. In 1930 they decided to hold only group exhibitions throughout the season to the exclusion of one-man shows, and also held some special exhibitions of paintings priced at a hundred dollars each in the hope that they could tempt those "willing to take advantage of a rare chance to secure representative examples of good art at a most attractive price." A move to smaller quarters at 15 East Fifty-seventh Street in 1935 was made with the intention of concentrating their efforts on the work of fewer contemporary artists, while continuing to handle the work of the older Americans they had long supported.

When Macbeth died suddenly and unexpectedly in August 1940 following an operation for appendicitis, McIntyre continued to run the gallery with the assistance of Hazel Lewis. During the 1940s McIntyre and Lewis showed primarily contemporary art in a wide range of media including oil, watercolor, pastel, drawing and sculpture, while continuing, as always, to show the occasional group of 19th-century Americans. The great success of the gallery's later years was undeniably Andrew Wyeth whose first exhibition, held at Macbeth Gallery in 1937, resulted in the sale of all twenty-two paintings cataloged.

Although subsequent Wyeth exhibitions were also successful, McIntyre struggled financially throughout the 1940s and periodically considered liquidating the company. Although "vitally interested" in contemporary art by people such as Robert Brackman, Jay Connaway, Carl Gaertner, James Lechay, Herbert Meyer and Ogden M. Pleissner he found that, for the most part, it did not pay. McIntyre continued operations until 1953 when he decided that doing so for profit was not only a financial burden but also ran contrary to his desire to spend more time devoted to his first love, early American art. When the lease expired on 11 East Fifty-seventh Street in April 1953 McIntyre did not renew it. After closing the gallery's doors he sold art from his New York apartment and from his home in Dorset, Vermont. He officially dissolved William Macbeth, Inc., in 1957.

The history of the Macbeth Gallery is a long and distinguished one with each successive proprietor making a significant contribution to art in America. William Macbeth helped establish an audience and a market for American art when few were willing to give it serious consideration. Robert Macbeth continued to cement the gallery's reputation as one of the leading firms in New York and was instrumental in organizing the American Art Dealers Association. Robert G. McIntyre claimed in a letter to Lloyd Goodrich, dated 22 June 1945, that the thing of which he was most proud was "the share I have had in the formation of the collection of the Addison Gallery of American Art, at Andover, Massacusetts." McIntyre was widely respected in the art community as a dealer, as an adviser to curators, and as a scholar whose research and book on Martin Johnson Heade helped "rediscover" an important American artist. One of his most significant and lasting contributions to the history of art in America, however, was undoubtedly his gift of the gallery's historical records to the Archives of American Art.
Related Material:
Among the holdings of the Archives of American are a small collection of scattered Robert McIntyre's papers and 9 items of William Macbeth's papers. Macbeth Gallery exhibition catalogs are also available in the American Art Exhibition Catalog collection and the Brooklyn Museum Records, both loaned and microfilmed collections.

An extensive collection of Macbeth Gallery exhibition catalogs are also held by the Frick Art Reference Library and the Watson Library of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Provenance:
The bulk of the Macbeth Gallery records were donated and microfilmed in several installments between 1955 and 1966 by Robert G. McIntyre and Estate. Additional Macbeth Gallery printed material was donated by Phoebe C. and William Macbeth II, grandchildren of William Macbeth, in 1974.
Restrictions:
Use of 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.
Topic:
Eight (Group of American artists)  Search this
Artists -- United States  Search this
Art -- Collectors and collecting  Search this
Art, American  Search this
Function:
Art galleries, Commercial -- New York (State)
Genre/Form:
Daguerreotypes
Photographs
Scrapbooks
Citation:
Macbeth Gallery records, 1838-1968, bulk 1892 to 1953. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Identifier:
AAA.macbgall
See more items in:
Macbeth Gallery records
Archival Repository:
Archives of American Art
GUID:
https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw9755cec30-3318-4f15-a7b7-031c448a7a46
EDAN-URL:
ead_collection:sova-aaa-macbgall
Online Media:

Ferargil Galleries records

Creator:
Ferargil Galleries  Search this
Names:
Arkell, Bartlett  Search this
Benton, Thomas Hart, 1889-1975  Search this
Bliss, Lizzie P. (Lizzie Plummer), 1864-1931  Search this
Carlsen, Emil, 1853-1932  Search this
Dabo, Leon, 1868-1960  Search this
Davey, Randall, 1887-1964  Search this
Davies, Arthur B. (Arthur Bowen), 1862-1928  Search this
Diedrich, Hunt  Search this
Lawson, Ernest, 1873-1939  Search this
Lowrie, Agnes Potter  Search this
Lucioni, Luigi, 1900-1988  Search this
Miller, Barse, 1904-1973  Search this
Parrish, Maxfield, 1870-1966  Search this
Parsons, Lloyd  Search this
Pike, John, 1911-1979  Search this
Platt, Dan Fellows, 1873-1938  Search this
Price, F. Newlin (Frederic Newlin)  Search this
Sample, Paul, 1896-1974  Search this
Sawyer, Wells, 1863-1960  Search this
Van Soelen, Theodore  Search this
Van Vleck, Natalie, 1901-1974  Search this
Willams, Lois  Search this
Photographer:
Käsebier, Gertrude, 1852-1934  Search this
Extent:
18.7 Linear feet
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Photographs
Prints
Drafts (documents)
Gallery records
Scrapbooks
Sketches
Date:
circa 1900-1963
Summary:
The Ferargil Galleries records date from circa 1900-1963 and document the activities of this New York gallery that dealt primarily in American contemporary art from shortly after its 1915 founding by Frederic Newlin Price (1884-1963) to it's closure in 1955. 18.7 linear feet of records include incoming and outgoing correspondence with artists, dealers, schools and colleges, and museums and other art institutions; artist files; estate and legal records including papers relating to the Arthur B. Davies estate; gallery business and financial records; printed material; scrapbooks; scattered personal papers of Price; artwork; and photographs of artists, exhibitions and artwork.
Scope and Content Note:
The Ferargil Galleries records date from circa 1900-1963 and document the activities of this New York gallery that dealt primarily in American contemporary art from shortly after its 1915 founding by Frederic Newlin Price (1884-1963) to it's closure in 1955. 18.7 linear feet of records include incoming and outgoing correspondence with artists, dealers, schools and colleges, and museums and other art institutions; artist files; estate and legal records including papers relating to the Arthur B. Davies estate; gallery business and financial records; printed material; scrapbooks; scattered personal papers of Price; artwork; and photographs of artists, exhibitions and artwork.

Correspondence is both incoming and outgoing and documents the day-to-day activities of the galleries, primarily from the 1920s to the 1950s. Significant correspondence with, or relating to, many of the artists represented by Ferargil Galleries can be found here including correspondence with Bartlett Arkell, Thomas Hart Benton, Randall Davey, Hunt Diedrich, Ernest Lawson, Agnes Potter Lowrie, Luigi Lucioni, Barse Miller, Maxfield Parrish, John Pike, Paul Sample, Wells M. Sawyer, Theodore van Soelen and many others.

Artist files consist primarily of material compiled about artists represented by Ferargil Galleries, including biographical information, press releases for exhibitions, and scattered price lists and information about individual works of art.

Estate and legal records include estate inventories for the estates of Lizzie P. Bliss, Arthur B. Davies, and Dan Fellows Platt, and document several legal actions involving Ferargil Galleries. Of particular significance are the records documenting Price's involvement with the estate of Arthur B. Davies, including correspondence with Davies's wife, Virginia, and sales and inventory records for Davies's artwork at Ferargil Galleries and elsewhere.

Business and financial records date primarily from the 1920s and document inventories, sales, insurance, shipping, and taxes for the bulk of the gallery's operating years.

Printed material contains Ferargail Galleries exhibition catalogs and announcements from 1918 to the 1950s in addition to scattered printed material from other galleries and one folder relating to Arthur B. Davies.

Scrapbooks provide a more comprehensive and detailed history of the gallery's exhibitions, through multiple news clippings of press coverage, in addition to catalogs, announcements, and photographs. Of particular note is a circa 1908 photograph of Arthur B. Davies taken by Gertrude Kasëbier.

Scattered personal records of Frederic Newlin Price document Price's work with the Benjamin West Society at Swarthmore College and further reveal Price's interests through an inventory of his art collection and drafts and copies of his writings on artists such as Arthur B. Davies, and on changing trends and tastes in the art world.

A small series of artwork includes 6 pencil sketches, a print, 3 plans, and an Arthur B. Davies exhibition catalog mock-up with pencil sketches, all by unidentified artists.

Gallery photograph files include some photos of artists such as Emil Carlsen, Leon Dabo, Lloyd Parsons, Natalie Van Vleck and Lois Williams, in addition to 13 folders of photos relating to collections and exhibitions, and photographs of artwork.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged as 9 series:

Missing Title

Series 1: Correspondence, 1920s-1963 (Boxes 1-15; 6.0 linear ft.)

Series 2: Artist Files, circa 1920s-1950s (Boxes 16-17; 0.7 linear ft.)

Series 3: Estate and Legal Records, circa 1925-circa 1939 (Boxes 17-18; 0.3 linear ft.)

Series 4: Business and Financial Records, 1919-1956 (Boxes 18-21; 1.2 linear ft.)

Series 5: Printed Material, circa 1900-1956 (Boxes 21-22; 0.7 linear ft.)

Series 6: Scrapbooks, circa 1920s-1950s (Boxes 23-34, 40, OV 41; 5.4 linear ft.)

Series 7: Frederic Newlin Price Records, 1920s-1950s (Box 34; 6 folders)

Series 8: Artwork, circa 1920s-circa 1950s (Box 34, OV 41; 2 folders)

Series 9: Photographs, circa 1920-1950s (Boxes 35-39, OV 40; 4.4. linear ft.)
Historical Note:
Frederic Newlin Price (1884-1963) opened Ferargil Galleries in 1915 at 24 East 49th Street and 607 Fifth Avenue in New York City. Art critic W. Frank Purdy (1865-1943)was the President of the Art Alliance of America in 1918 and director of the School of American Sculpture worked at the galleries as director of sculpture.

Named from a combination of "fer" (ferrous-iron) and "argil" (clay), Ferargil Galleries dealt in wrought iron, sculpture, paintings and prints, and focused on exhibitions of work by American artists such as George Bellows, Thomas Hart Benton, Emil Carlsen, John Steuart Curry, Arthur B. Davies, W. Hunt Diederich, Thomas Eakins, Edward Hicks, Ernest Lawson, Albert P. Ryder and Grant Wood. Ferargil was also known for its representation of a group of contemporary watercolorists including Charles Dickinson, Phil Dike, Hardie Gramatky, Barse Miller, and Paul Sample.

In 1927 the business moved to 37 East 57th Street (later 63 East 57th Street) and housed a print room, a sculpture gallery with a fountain, and the main painting galleries.

In 1931 Price became the Director of the newly-formed Benjamin West Society at his alma mater, Swarthmore College. There, he promoted the arts at Swarthmore through annual lectures and exhibitions by contemporary artists and also acquired artwork for the college, primarily by Benjamin West. Price served as President of the American Art Dealers Association in the early 1930s and published a number of books and articles on artists including Arthur B. Davies, Walter Griffin, Eric Hudson, Ernest Lawson, Arthur P. Ryder and Horatio Walker.

Price closed Ferargil Galleries in 1955.
Separated Material:
The Archives of American Art also holds microfilm of material lent for microfilming (reels D321-D322, and N68-14-N68-15) including personal and business correspondence with artists and other records. Lent materials were returned to the lender and are not described in the collection container inventory.
Provenance:
In 1958, Frederic Newlin Price donated circa 70 letters to the Archives of American Art and loaned material for microfilming on reels D321-D322. The remaining records were donated anonymously in 1968.
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.
Topic:
Art, American -- New York (State) -- New York  Search this
Art -- Collectors and collecting  Search this
Gallery owners  Search this
Function:
Art galleries, Commercial -- New York (State)
Genre/Form:
Photographs
Prints
Drafts (documents)
Gallery records
Scrapbooks
Sketches
Citation:
Ferargil Galleries records, 1900-1963. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Identifier:
AAA.feragall
See more items in:
Ferargil Galleries records
Archival Repository:
Archives of American Art
GUID:
https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw93168e3a9-3aa5-43c5-8811-da96c9975228
EDAN-URL:
ead_collection:sova-aaa-feragall
Online Media:

Milch Gallery records, 1911-1995

Creator:
Milch Gallery  Search this
Subject:
Barmore, Charles  Search this
Barr, Charles H.  Search this
Ballin, Hugo  Search this
Barlow, Myron  Search this
Baer, Martin  Search this
Ascher, Mary G. (Mary Goldman)  Search this
Azzaretti, Faust  Search this
Biddle, George  Search this
Blackburn, Morris  Search this
Bellows, George  Search this
Benson, Frank Weston  Search this
Baumann, Gustave  Search this
Barr, Norman  Search this
Barrymore, Lionel  Search this
Acheson, Alice  Search this
Aiken, Charles Avery  Search this
Albee, Grace  Search this
Twachtman, John Henry  Search this
Tryon, Dwight William  Search this
Trebilcock, Paul  Search this
Thayer, Abbott Handerson  Search this
Anderson, Karl  Search this
Warneke, Heinz (Heinrich)  Search this
Varian, Dorothy  Search this
Ufer, Walter  Search this
Weir, Julian Alden  Search this
Weir, John F. (John Ferguson)  Search this
Watkins, Franklin Chenault  Search this
Wiles, Irving Ramsay  Search this
Laufman, Sidney  Search this
Wiggins, Carleton  Search this
Appel, Marianne  Search this
Wickey, Harry  Search this
White, Henry Cooke  Search this
Zucker, Jacques  Search this
Woodward, Robert Strong  Search this
Waugh, Frederick Judd  Search this
Gonzalez, Xavier  Search this
Bacon, Peggy  Search this
Arms, John Taylor  Search this
Moffett, Ross  Search this
Milch, Edward  Search this
Moran, Thomas  Search this
Mora, F. Luis (Francis Luis)  Search this
Meyerowitz, William  Search this
Milch, Albert  Search this
Manship, Paul  Search this
Archipenko, Alexander  Search this
MacRae, Emma Fordyce  Search this
Beal, Reynolds  Search this
Metcalf, Willard Leroy  Search this
Melchers, Gari  Search this
Low, Will Hicok  Search this
Linde, Ossip L.  Search this
Lutz, Dan  Search this
Lucioni, Luigi  Search this
Woodward, Stanley Wingate  Search this
Lawson, Ernest  Search this
Lever, Hayley  Search this
Lie, Jonas  Search this
Kingman, Dong  Search this
Kroll, Leon  Search this
Kronberg, Louis  Search this
Wyeth, Andrew  Search this
Kupferman, Lawrence Edward  Search this
Ireland, Leroy  Search this
Judson, Alice  Search this
Kalish, Max  Search this
Katz, A. Raymond (Alexander Raymond)  Search this
Sheets, Millard  Search this
Heinz, Charles  Search this
Hennings, E. Martin  Search this
Henri, Robert  Search this
Hopkinson, Charles  Search this
Tanner, Henry Ossawa  Search this
Sterner, Albert  Search this
Sterne, Maurice  Search this
Speight, Francis  Search this
Speicher, Eugene Edward  Search this
Shuster, Will  Search this
Sharp, Joseph Henry  Search this
Shapiro, David  Search this
Schofield, Walter Elmer  Search this
Sawyer, Wells  Search this
Sample, Paul  Search this
Ryerson, Margery  Search this
Ryder, Chauncey F.  Search this
Rungius, Carl  Search this
Romano, Umberto  Search this
Redfield, Edward Willis  Search this
Ritschel, William  Search this
Pousette-Dart, Nathaniel  Search this
Pugh, Mabel  Search this
Pleissner, Ogden M.  Search this
Pollet, Joseph C.  Search this
Perrine, Van Dearing  Search this
Pittman, Hobson Lafayette  Search this
Parshall, DeWitt  Search this
Pearson, Ralph M.  Search this
Oberteuffer, Karl A. (Karl Amiard)  Search this
Ochtman, Leonard  Search this
Myers, Jerome  Search this
Adams, Charles L.  Search this
Nagler, Edith Kroger  Search this
Adams, Wayman  Search this
Murphy, Hermann Dudley  Search this
Murphy, John Francis  Search this
Curran, Charles C. (Charles Courtney)  Search this
Crane, Bruce  Search this
Davey, Randall  Search this
Daingerfield, Elliott  Search this
DeCamp, Joseph  Search this
De Groot, Adelaide Milton  Search this
Dessar, Louis Paul  Search this
Dehn, Adolf  Search this
Calder, Alexander Stirling  Search this
Butler, Howard Russell  Search this
Chamberlain, Samuel  Search this
Carroll, John  Search this
Christy, Howard Chandler  Search this
Cheffetz, Asa  Search this
Congdon, William  Search this
Cole, Alphaeus Philemon  Search this
Breckenridge, Hugh H. (Hugh Henry)  Search this
Bridgman, Frederick Arthur  Search this
Browne, George Elmer  Search this
Bruce, Edward  Search this
Brush, George de Forest  Search this
Buck, Claude  Search this
Burlin, Paul  Search this
Burr, George Elbert  Search this
Blakelock, Ralph Albert  Search this
Blanch, Arnold  Search this
Blanch, Lucile  Search this
Bluemner, Oscar  Search this
Pène Du Bois, Guy  Search this
Blumenschein, Ernest Leonard  Search this
Bohm, Max  Search this
Bohrod, Aaron  Search this
Bosa, Louis  Search this
Hart, George Overbury  Search this
Halpert, Samuel  Search this
Grosz, George  Search this
Gregory, Waylande  Search this
Heerman, Norbert Leo  Search this
Hassam, Childe  Search this
Haskell, Ernest  Search this
Hartmann, Sadakichi  Search this
Gaspard, Leon  Search this
Ganso, Emil  Search this
Gallagher, Sears  Search this
Fuchs, Emil  Search this
Gregory, John  Search this
Greenwood, Marion  Search this
Genth, Lillian Mathilde  Search this
Feshin, Nikolaĭ Ivanovich  Search this
Fenton, Beatrice  Search this
Etnier, Stephen  Search this
Farnsworth, Jerry  Search this
Fredenthal, David  Search this
French, Daniel Chester  Search this
FitzGerald, James  Search this
Flagg, James Montgomery  Search this
Dike, Phil  Search this
Donoho, Gaines Ruger  Search this
Dewing, Thomas Wilmer  Search this
Diederich, William Hunt  Search this
Eakins, Susan Macdowell  Search this
Duncan, Charles  Search this
Vonnoh, Robert William, 1858-1933  Search this
Milch Galleries  Search this
E. & A. Milch, Inc.  Search this
Type:
Gallery records
Photographs
Citation:
Milch Gallery records, 1911-1995. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Topic:
Gallery owners  Search this
Art -- Collectors and collecting  Search this
Art, American  Search this
Theme:
Art Gallery Records  Search this
Art Market  Search this
Record number:
(DSI-AAA_CollID)8207
(DSI-AAA_SIRISBib)210378
AAA_collcode_milcgall
Theme:
Art Gallery Records
Art Market
Data Source:
Archives of American Art
EDAN-URL:
edanmdm:AAADCD_coll_210378
Online Media:

Eileen Cowin papers

Creator:
Cowin, Eileen  Search this
Names:
California State University, Fullerton -- Faculty  Search this
Franconia College -- Faculty  Search this
Chiarenza, Carl  Search this
Curran, Darryl, 1935-  Search this
Gonzalez, Maria  Search this
Heinecken, Robert, 1931-  Search this
Korsower, Ellen  Search this
Larson, William  Search this
Siskind, Aaron  Search this
Extent:
20.1 Linear feet
29.56 Gigabytes
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Gigabytes
Sketchbooks
Video recordings
Sound recordings
Interviews
Drawings
Date:
circa 1900-2020
Summary:
The papers of Los Angeles photo and video artist Eileen Cowin measure 20.1 linear feet and 29.56 GB and date from circa 1900 to 2020. The papers include biographical materials consisting of school records, identification cards, an interview transcript, and other personal files; personal and professional correspondence; writings for essays, video art pieces, panels, and lectures; teaching files; project files containing grant and fellowship records, files for Cowin's Los Angeles Metro Public Art Project, and other commission files; exhibition files documenting Cowin's group and solo exhibitions including Still (and all): Eileen Cowin, 1971-1998, a retrospective of Cowin's work; printed material; video artwork including laserdiscs of ...and Their Daughter Married a Prince, "Speaking Woman," and "Scarcely Had They Uttered," as well as sketches and and etching of family; photographic material of Cowin, family, friends and colleagues, proofs and prints of works; and personal business records consisting of artwork donation records, business records with galleries, and insurance and inventory lists.
Scope and Contents:
The papers of Los Angeles photo and video artist Eileen Cowin measure 20.1 linear feet and 29.56 GB and date from circa 1900 to 2020. The papers include biographical materials, correspondence, writings, teaching files, project files, exhibition files, printed and digital material, artwork and sketchbooks, sound and video recordings, and photographic material.

Biographical material consists of diplomas, passports, rolodexes, faculty identification cards, legal papers, interview transcripts, and miscellaneous documents in hard copy and digital formats.

Personal and professional correspondence is with family, friends, artists, collectors, gallery owners, museums, and universities. Notable correspondents include Carl Chiarenza, Darryl Curran, Maria Gonzalez, Robert Heinecken, Ellen Korsower, William Larson, and Aaron Siskind.

Writings include notebooks, annotated appointment calendars and wall calendars, lectures, essays, drafts and notes, artists statements, guest registers, and some writings by others. A few lectures and one essay are on sound and digital video recordings.

Teaching files are mostly related to material from California State University, Fullerton. There are a few documents from Franconia College and other universities where Eileen Cowin taught workshops or had faculty appointments. The files include student evaluations, promotion notifications, and limited correspondence.

Project files include professional files, such as grant applications, artist residencies, and symposiums. Also found are art project proposals, publication agreements for art projects, and commissions,. Files contain correspondence, printed and digital material, application forms, research notes, and photographic material.

Exhibition files include announcements, catalogs, reviews, correspondence, price lists of artwork, and assorted material for Eileen Cowin's group and solo shows.

Printed material consists primarily of clippings, exhibition catalogs, announcements, books, periodicals, and clippings.

Artwork includes 26 videocassettes of Cowin's artwork, 1 sketchbook, drawings, 4 digital audio recordings, and a few college art projects.

Photographic material includes press prints, digital photographs, proofs, contact sheets, slides, negatives, transparencies, and test shots. There are photographs of installations and artwork as well as images for exhibition mock-ups. There are also batches of "research photographs" which were used for reference. Also included are portraits and snapshots of Cowin, photographs of Cowin with friends and colleagues, and photographs of family.

Personal business records consisting of equipment lists for insurance, gallery files, addresses and contacts, and artwork donation files.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged as 10 series.

Missing Title

Series 1: Biographical Material, 1927-2015 (0.8 linear feet; Boxes 1, 24, ER01; 0.016 GB)

Series 2: Correspondence, 1969-2018 (3.9 linear feet; Boxes 1-4, 24, 28, ER02-ER03; 0.199 GB)

Series 3: Writings, 1963-2014 (2.4 linear feet; Boxes 4-6, 24-25, ER04-ER06; 11.88 GB)

Series 4: Teaching Files, 1974-2008 (0.3 linear feet, Boxes 6, 25, ER07; 0.171 GB)

Series 5: Project Files, 1979-2019 (1.5 linear feet; Boxes 6-7, 25-26, OV 30, ER08; 9.35 GB)

Series 6: Exhibition Files, 1979-2012 (1.5 linear feet; Boxes 7-8, 26, ER09; 0.001 GB)

Series 7: Printed Material, 1966-2014 (2.6 linear feet; Boxes 8-10, 17, 26, OV 20, ER10; 0.011 GB)

Series 8: Artwork and Sketchbooks, 1964-2014 (3.2 linear feet; Boxes 10-13, 17, 26, 28, ER11; 0.076 GB)

Series 9: Photographic Material, circa 1900-2020 (3.2 linear feet; Boxes 13-16, 18-19, 26-28, OVs 21, 31-32, ER12-ER13; 7.86 GB)

Series 10: Personal Business Records, 1972-2017 (0.6 linear feet; Boxes 27-28)
Biographical / Historical:
Eileen Cowin (1947-) is a photographer and video artist who lives in Los Angeles, California.

Eileen Cowin was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1947. She graduated from the State University of New York, New Paltz in 1968 and received her master's degree in photography from the Institute of Design at Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT) in Chicago in 1970. At IIT, she studied with Aaron Siskind and Arthur Siegel.

Cowin was involved in the L.A. experimental photography scene that began in the mid-1970s led by Robert Heinecken and Darryl Curran. In the early 1980s, Cowin gained initial prominence with staged photographs of family and friends in various roles, work in keeping with The Pictures Generation emerging at the same time on the East Coast.

From 1971-1975, Cowin taught photography at Franconia College in New Hampshire, and later became a professor at California State University, Fullerton, where she continued to teach until retiring in 2008.

Cowin's artwork has been featured in over 40 solo exhibitions and over 165 group exhibitions in the United States and abroad. She has received numerous awards for her art and worked on many public art projects.
Provenance:
The Eileen Cowin papers were donated to the Archives of American Art by Eileen Cowin in 2015 and 2021.
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. Use of archival audiovisual recordings with no duplicate access copy requires advance notice.

One box of correspondence with Michael Dorris and Louise Erdrich and one box of correspondence with Robert Fichter are ACCESS RESTRICTED; use requires written permission.
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 -- California  Search this
Photographers -- California  Search this
Topic:
Women artists  Search this
Art -- Study and teaching  Search this
Genre/Form:
Sketchbooks
Video recordings
Sound recordings
Interviews
Drawings
Citation:
Eileen Cowin papers, circa 1900-2020. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Identifier:
AAA.cowieile
See more items in:
Eileen Cowin papers
Archival Repository:
Archives of American Art
GUID:
https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw94268d668-090e-4f26-9621-4e5d875f9d26
EDAN-URL:
ead_collection:sova-aaa-cowieile

Correspondence

Collection Creator:
Cowin, Eileen  Search this
Extent:
3.9 Linear feet (Boxes 1-4, 22-24, 29)
0.199 Gigabytes (ER02-ER03)
Type:
Archival materials
Gigabytes
Date:
1969-2018
Scope and Contents:
Personal and professional correspondence is with family, friends, colleagues, artists, art collectors, gallery owners, museums, and universities. Notable correspondents include Carl Chiarenza, Darryl Curran, Maria Gonzalez, Robert Heinecken, Ellen Korsower, William Larson, Min Gallery, Roy Boyd Gallery, and Aaron Siskind.
Arrangement:
Family correspondence is at the beginning of the series, followed by alphabetical correspondence, then chronological correspondence. Folder titles in quotation marks indicate that the original folder heading and arrangement of contents were retained. Correspondence in digital format is arranged in two folders: family and friends, and letters of recommendation.
Restrictions:
Correspondence with Michael Dorris and Louise Erdrich, and correspondence with Robert Fichter are access restricted; written permission is required. Contact Reference Services for more information. Access to original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C. Research Center.
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:
Eileen Cowin papers, circa 1900-2020. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Identifier:
AAA.cowieile, Series 2
See more items in:
Eileen Cowin papers
Archival Repository:
Archives of American Art
GUID:
https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw9850fed69-8d10-4e26-be26-bfae6a5342d5
EDAN-URL:
ead_component:sova-aaa-cowieile-ref32

Beatrice Wood papers, 1894-1998, bulk 1930-1990

Creator:
Wood, Beatrice, 1893-1998  Search this
Subject:
Nin, Anaïs  Search this
Rosencrantz, Esther  Search this
Roché, Henri Pierre  Search this
Arensberg, Walter  Search this
Arensberg, Louise S. (Louise Stevenson)  Search this
Duchamp, Marcel  Search this
Hoag, Stephen Asa  Search this
Hapgood, Elizabeth Reynolds  Search this
John Waller, Fine Ceramics (Firm : Los Angeles, Calif.)  Search this
Zachary Waller Gallery (Los Angeles, Calif.)  Search this
Garth Clark Gallery (New York, N.Y.)  Search this
Type:
Interviews
Diaries
Drawings
Sketchbooks
Drawings
Citation:
Beatrice Wood papers, 1894-1998, bulk 1930-1990. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Topic:
Glazes -- Formulae  Search this
Women artists  Search this
Women ceramicists  Search this
Scrapbooks  Search this
Women painters  Search this
Women authors  Search this
Theme:
Diaries  Search this
Women  Search this
Lives of artists  Search this
Record number:
(DSI-AAA_CollID)9363
(DSI-AAA_SIRISBib)211559
AAA_collcode_woodbeat
Theme:
Diaries
Women
Lives of artists
Data Source:
Archives of American Art
EDAN-URL:
edanmdm:AAADCD_coll_211559
Online Media:

Andre Emmerich

Photographer:
Mick, Christopher  Search this
Subject:
Emmerich, Andre  Search this
Type:
Photographs
Date:
1992
Citation:
Christopher Mick. Andre Emmerich, 1992. André Emmerich Gallery Records and André Emmerich Papers, circa 1929-2009. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Topic:
Gallery directors  Search this
Portraits  Search this
Record number:
(DSI-AAA)9230
See more items in:
André Emmerich Gallery Records and André Emmerich Papers, circa 1929-2009
Data Source:
Archives of American Art
EDAN-URL:
edanmdm:AAADCD_item_9230
Online Media:

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