The records of the American Academy in Rome measure 65.9 linear feet and date from 1855 to 2012. The collection documents the history of the institution from its inception in 1894 as the American School of Architecture in Rome, through the end of World War II, and chronicles the contributions the academy has made to America's cultural and intellectual development. Nearly one-half of the collection consists of an unprocessed addition received in 2014 containing records that mostly post-date World War II and include correspondence and subject files of officers and executives based in the New York office of American Academy in Rome.
Scope and Content Note:
The records of the American Academy in Rome measure 65.9 linear feet and date from 1855 to 2012. The collection documents the history of the institution from its inception in 1894 as the American School of Architecture in Rome, through the end of World War II, and chronicles the contributions the academy has made to America's cultural and intellectual development. Nearly one-half of the collection consists of an unprocessed addition received in 2014 containing records that mostly post-date World War II and include correspondence and subject files of officers and executives based in the New York office of American Academy in Rome.
Items predating the 1894 founding of the American School of Architecture in Rome are personal papers and memorabilia of individuals associated with the institution.
Series 1: Predecessor Institutions, is composed of the records of the American School of Architecture in Rome, 1894-1898, and the American School of Classical Studies in Rome, 1895-1913. Records of the American School of Architecture in Rome include records of its Managing Committee, correspondence, financial records, and printed matter. Among the Managing Committee's records are notes and correspondence relative to the founding of the institution, minute books and reports; also, legal documents including records concerning its dissolution prior to being reorganized as the American Academy in Rome. Correspondence is mostly that of Vice President Charles F. McKim who handled administrative matters. Financial records include capital stock certificates, invoices and receipts. Printed matter consists of scholarship competition announcements.
Records of the American School of Classical Studies in Rome include records of its Managing Committee, Committee on Fellowships, publications, printed matter, and treasurers' records. The Managing Committee's records consist of the proposed resolution concerning its merger with the American Academy in Rome. Committee on Fellowship records are comprised of correspondence, reports, and fellowship applications. Publications records include correspondence and invoices. Printed matter includes general information, annual reports of the Managing Committee and Director, annual reports of the Committee on Medieval and Renaissance Studies, fellowship applications and examination questions, and the proposed consolidation agreement. Treasurers' records include the files of Alex. Bell and Willard V. King. Bell's sparse records consist of a budget, receipts for salary payments, an invoice, canceled checks, and correspondence. King's files, while more substantial than those that survive from Bell's tenure, are quite incomplete. They include correspondence, banking records, budgets and financial statements, investment records, invoices, and receipts for salaries and expenses.
Series 2: Board of Trustees Records, is comprised of legal documents, minutes, and reports; records of Trustee committees; records of officers; and records of individual Trustees. Legal documents, 1897-1926 and undated, consist of by-laws and amendments, certificate of incorporation, and constitution and amendments. Minutes and reports of the Board of Trustees, 1897-1947 and 1957, including those of its annual meetings, are carbon copies rather than the official minute books, and are incomplete. Reports of officers are incomplete, as well. Also included are reports of Officers'/Trustees' visits to Rome, and reports of the Director and Secretary in Rome submitted to the Board of Trustees.
Records of Trustee committees, 1905-1946 and undated, consist of reports and/or minutes arranged alphabetically by committee; these, too are incomplete, with many committees represented by a single report. Committees represented are: Building Committee, Carter Memorial Committee, Endowment Committee, Executive Committee, Finance Committee, Library Committee, McKim Memorial Committee, Nominating Committee, Committee on Publications. Committee on the School of Classical Studies records consist of its own minutes and reports, reports of its Advisory Council and the Jury on Classical Fellowships. Committee on the School of Classical Studies also include reports of officers and staff of the School of Classical Studies to the Committee on the School of Classical Studies as follows: Director, Professor in Charge, Annual Professor, Director of the Summer Session, Professor of Archaeology, Curator of the Museum, Editor, Librarian, and Committee on the Welfare of Women Students. Committee on the School of Fine Arts records consist of its own minutes and reports, reports of its Special Committee on the Plan and Expense of a Department of Music in the School of Fine Arts, and report of Fine Arts Program, Triptych Project with the Citizens Committee for the Army and Navy, Inc.; also, reports of officers and staff of the School of Fine Arts to the Committee on the School of Fine Arts as follows: Director, Professor in Charge, Associate in Charge, Annual Professor, Professor in Charge of the Department of Musical Composition. In addition, there are minutes and/or reports of the Committee of Twelve and Subcommittee of Five and the Special Committee on Villa Aurelia.
Records of Officers. 1898-1957 and undated, consist mainly of correspondence files and reports, with large numbers of transcriptions and carbon copies. Included are records of: Presidents Charles F. McKim, William R. Mead, Charles A. Platt, John Russell Pope, and James Kellum Smith; Vice Presidents Theodore N. Ely, George B. McClellan, and Henry James; Secretaries H. Siddons Mowbray (Secretary/Treasurer), Frank D. Millet, C. Grant La Farge, William B. Dinsmoor, and H. Richardson Pratt; and Treasurers William R. Mead, William A. Boring, Leon Fraser, and Lindsay Bradford Office files of President Mead, Secretaries Millet and La Farge, and Treasurer Boring are the most complete; files of other individuals, the Vice Presidents in particular, are often quite sparse.
Records of individual Trustees, 1902-1946 and undated, consist of material relating to official Academy business that was created or maintained by each in his capacity as trustee. (Note: many of these individuals also served as officers or staff of the Academy, and their records documenting those functions will be found in the appropriate series.) Included in this subseries are the records of: Chester H. Aldrich, Gilmore D. Clarke, James C. Egbert, Barry Faulkner, Allan C. Johnson, William M. Kendall, C. Grant La Farge, Edward P. Mellon, Charles Dyer Norton, Charles A. Platt, John Russell Pope, Edward K. Rand, John C. Rolfe, James Kellum Smith, S. Breck Trowbridge, Ferruccio Vitale, John Quincy Adams Ward, Andrew F. West, and William L. Westerman. These records tend to be sparse; files maintained by James C. Egbert, Barry Faulkner, Allan C. Johnson, and Ferruccio Vitale are notable exceptions.
Series 3: New York Office Records, consists of records of staff, rosters, printed matter, photographs, personal papers, Association of Alumni of the American Academy in Rome, and miscellaneous records.
Records of staff, 1919-1950 and undated, include the office files of Executive Secretaries Roscoe Guersney, Meriwether Stuart, and Mary T. Williams; Librarian George K. Boyce; and Endowment Fund Campaign Secretaries Phillilps B. Robinson and Edgar I. Williams.
The rosters, 1895-1939 and undated, are printed forms completed by fellows and students, with occasional attachments (usually correspondence or photographs). Included are the rosters of the School of Fine Arts, School of Classical Studies, and School of Classical Studies Summer Sessions.
Printed matter, 1905-[1981?] and undated, has been classified as Academy produced and produced by others. Items produced by the Academy, 1905-[1981?], include general information including act of incorporation and by-laws, fundraising brochure, constitution, Directory of Fellows and Residents, histories of the institution, newsletter of the Director, and printed items relating to special events. Printed matter specifically relating to the School of Classical Studies includes annual announcements, the consolidation agreement, a directory, fellowship announcements and applications, lecture announcements, newsletters, and brochures about summer sessions. School of Fine Arts printed matter includes annual announcements, concert programs, exhibition checklists and catalogs, fellowship announcements and application forms, history, and newsletters.
Printed matter produced by others, 1905-1940 and undated, consists of three scrapbooks of news clippings and photographs compiled by the American Academy in Rome, extensive clipping files, and articles from miscellaneous publications. All of these items are about the American Academy in Rome, or by or about individuals associated with the institution. Also included is a poster for Leave Courses offered at the Academy for U. S. servicemen.
Photographs, 1891-1941 and undated, are organized into the categories of works of art, people, buildings, places, events, and miscellaneous. Works of art are by visiting students and fellows, Frank D. Millet, collaborative problems, Rome Prize Competitions in Architecture, Rome Prize Competitions in Landscape Architecture, and Prix de Rome Competition exhibitions. Photographs of people are both of individuals and groups; among the groups are summer school students and fellowship winners.
Buildings depicted are American Academy properties. Among them are the "New Building," including interior and exterior construction views; studios; and Villas Aurelia, Mirafiore, and Richardson. Also included is a group of photographs of Academy architecture students measuring buildings in Rome and Florence. Places pictured are views of the Academy property and surrounding areas.
Photographs of events include cricket games, Thanksgiving and Fourth of July dinners, Architectural League exhibition, and inauguration of the Manship Fountain. Miscellaneous photographs are of an architectural drawing for a proposed building.
Personal Papers, Memorabilia, and Ephemera, 1855-1923 an undated, were donated to the American Academy in Rome or otherwise left on its premises. None are official records generated by the institution. Included are: Ernest Lewis' photograph album/scrapbook; Allan Marquand's papers; Charles F. McKim's memorabilia, photographs, printed matter, and artifacts; Charles R. Morey's correspondence; and Elihu Vedder's Bible.
Records of the Association of the Alumni of the American Academy in Rome, 1913-1945 and undated), consist of a small number of scattered records including correspondence, fellows' war/government service information (compiled by Sidney Waugh), membership lists, and a newsletter.
Miscellaneous records, 1899-1926 and undated, are writings and architectural records. Writings consist of published and unpublished manuscript material about the American Academy in Rome and its history, and article by H. Siddons Mowbray advising on ornamentation, and text and illustrations for the Art and Archaeology issue on the Academy. Also included are fragments of unidentified letters. Architectural records [oversize] include property and floor plans of Villas Aurora, Chiaraviglio, Ferrari, and Ludovisi.
Series 4: Rome Office Records, consist of records of staff and personal papers. Records of staff, 1903-1947 and undated, include the office files of Directors H. Siddons Mowbray, George Breck, Jesse Benedict Carter, Gorham Phillips Stevens, James Monroe Hewlett, Chester H. Aldrich, Amey Aldrich [Acting Director, very briefly, perhaps unofficially], Charles R. Morey, and Laurance P. Roberts; and records of two members of the School of Fine Arts faculty, Frank P. Fairbanks, Professor of Fine Arts, and Felix Lamond, Professor of Music. Records of Carter, Stevens, Hewlett, and Aldrich appear to be fairly complete; records of early directors are sparse; those of Morey and Roberts appear to be missing significant portions; and those of Professors Fairbanks and Lamond consist of a few scattered items.
Also surviving are the personal papers of Director Gorham Phillips Stevens, 1912-1931 and undated), consisting of correspondence, financial records, and documentation of professional and charitable activities.
Series 5: Unprocessed Addition to the American Academy in Rome Records was received in 2014 and consists of 31.6 linear feet of the New York office's records for officers, directors, and executives.
Arrangement:
It was obvious that before they came to the Archives of American Art the records had been rearranged more than once, and in such a way that materials from many different departments had been intermingled. In keeping with archival theory and practice, the records were organized to reflect the structure and operation of the institution that created the records, making them more understandable and accessible to a wide variety of researchers.
In general, the records of each officer and staff member are arranged alphabetically, with general correspondence preceding the alphabetical sequence; arrangement within each file is chronological, unless noted otherwise.
Records of the American Academy in Rome are organized into five major series. Each series, except series 5, is divided into several subseries, with the arrangement described in detail in the series descriptions.
Series 1: Predecessor Institutions, 1894-1913 (box 1; 0.88 linear ft.; Reels 5749-5750)
Series 2: Board of Trustees Records, 1897-1957, undated (boxes 1-17, 35, 37; 15.25 linear ft.; Reels 5750-5777)
Series 3: New York Office, 1855-circa 1981, undated (boxes 17-32, 36; 15 linear ft.; 5777-5795)
Series 4: Rome Office, 1903-1943, undated (boxes 32-34; 3 linear ft.; 5795-5800)
Series 5: Unprocessed Addition to the American Academy in Rome Records, 1933-2002 (boxes 35-103; 31.6 linear ft.)
Historical Note:
While in Chicago to advise and work on the fine arts section of the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition, architects Charles F. McKim, Daniel Burnham, and Richard Howland Hunt, painters John La Farge and Frank Millet, and sculptors Augustus Saint-Gaudens, and Daniel Chester French, among others, met regularly. From their collaborative experience and discussions came the idea for an American school for artists in Europe. Charles F. McKim was especially enthusiastic. He strongly believed that collaborative experience should be available to future American artists, and perceived a real need for an American school in Europe--preferably in Rome, the very best place to study art, in his opinion.
By March of the following year, McKim was busy devising plans for the school and persuading like-minded architects and artists to assist. He proposed to finance the school by convincing institutions with traveling scholarships in the arts to send those students to Rome. Columbia University, University of Pennsylvania, and the Rotch Scholarship fund readily agreed to the scheme, and in ensuing years many others followed suit. In October, 1894, the American School of Architecture in Rome opened temporary quarters in the Palazzo Torlonia. The school consisted of its Director, Austin Lord, three fellows, and a visiting student; its "library" contained but one volume.
A move to the larger, more suitable Villa Aurora occurred in July 1895. Rent from two subtenants (the newly established American School of Classical Studies in Rome and the British and American Archaeological Society Library in Rome), along with a personal contribution from McKim, made this financially feasible.
The American School of Architecture in Rome was incorporated in the State of New York, 1895, and 10 shares of capital stock were issued. Despite substantial fundraising efforts in Chicago, New York, and Boston, severe financial problems continued. The American School of Classical Studies in Rome vacated the Villa Aurora in 1896--and with it went a sizeable portion of the School of Architecture's income. McKim frequently made up the deficit from his own pocket.
Eventually, it was decided that the American School of Architecture in Rome must be reorganized along the lines of the French Academy and that national sponsorship needed to be obtained through an act of Congress. In June of 1897, the American School of Architecture in Rome voted to dissolve itself and create the American Academy in Rome. The new institution would assume all assets and obligations, fellowships in painting and architecture were to be added to the program, and its Board of Trustees would include architects and artists. The Academy is not a school. Its fellows and visiting students, already professionally trained, go to Rome for further development and for collaboration and association with others. In the words of Director Gorham Phillips Stevens: "The object of the American Academy in Rome is not to afford opportunities for a few individuals to perfect themselves for the practice of their chosen professions. The ideal is to create an atmosphere in which a limited number of carefully selected artists and scholars may develop that synthesis of intellectual culture which will make them worthy to preserve and continue the great traditions of the past in order that the standard of art and literature may be handed on from year to year, constantly strengthened and improved."
Beginning in 1901, bills to make the American Academy in Rome a "national institution" were introduced in Congress on several occasions. A hearing was finally scheduled in 1905, and a revised bill that prohibited government funding and specified that U.S. officials may not be Trustees was signed into law. Serious efforts to create an Endowment Fund and secure better quarters were associated with the movement to obtain status as a national institution. The Academy was successful in meeting all of these objectives. In 1904, the Academy moved to the Villa Mirafiore (also known as Villa Mirafiori), which it soon purchased and renovated. The Endowment Fund raised well over a million dollars. Donors of $100,000 to the Endowment Fund, designated "Founders" of the American Academy in Rome, were: The Carnegie Foundation, Henry C. Frick, Harvard College, Charles F. McKim, J. P. Morgan, Sr., J. P. Morgan, Jr., The Rockefeller Foundation, John D. Rockefeller, Jr., William K. Vanderbilt, and Henry Walters. Other categories of donors were "Incorporators" (a new Act of Incorporation was required at the time the American Academy in Rome was chartered as a national institution) and "Life Members."
The American School of Classical Studies in Rome, which had been established by the Archaeological Society in 1895 and during its first year shared the Villa Aurora with the American School of Architecture in Rome, entered into a consolidation agreement with the American Academy in Rome in 1911. Their merger went into effect on the last day of 1912, and ever since, the American Academy in Rome has consisted of the School of Fine Arts and the School of Classical Studies, administered by a common director. The School of Classical Studies is composed of fellows and visiting scholars who are graduate students, secondary teachers, or professors engaged in research in the areas of archaeology, ancient art, philology, and humanistic studies. Women were a part of the School of Classical Studies from its beginning, but were not permitted to participate in the School of Fine Arts until well after World War II. Beginning in 1923, the School of Classical Studies instituted Summer Sessions which appealed to secondary teachers, and attracted an enrollment that was largely female.
Originally, the School of Fine Arts offered fellowships in architecture, painting, and sculpture. Fellowships in landscape architecture were added in 1915; in 1920, a Department of Music was established, and along with it fellowships in musical composition. Fellowships in art history were established in 1947. Unmarried men under age 30 were eligible to compete for the fine arts fellowships awarded annually (except for landscape architecture, awarded every third year); the duration of fellowships ranged from one to three years at various points in the institution's history. In residence along with fellows of the American Academy in Rome, might be holders of various traveling scholarships: the McKim Fellowship, the Columbia Traveling Scholarship, the Perkins Scholarship, the Robinson Traveling Scholarship (Harvard), the Rotch Scholarship, the Julia Appleton Scholarship, the Traveling Scholarship and Stewardson Memorial Scholarship (University of Pennsylvania), the Cresson Scholarship (Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts), the Drexel Institute Traveling Scholarship, the Lazarus Scholarship (Metropolitan Museum of Art), the Lowell Scholarship (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), and the Rinehart Scholarship (Peabody Institute, Baltimore). Visiting students, who remained for a much briefer period than fellows or recipients of various traveling scholarships, were admitted to all lectures and granted use the library, but resided elsewhere. The Academy opened an Atelier in downtown Rome for visiting students in 1927, which operated until financial considerations forced its discontinuation seven years later.
As the merger was being planned, J. P. Morgan, Sr., who was interested in both the American Academy in Rome and the American School of Classical Studies in Rome, began buying properties on the Janiculum, adjacent to Villa Aureilia. Villa Aurelia, built on the summit of the Janiculum in 1650, had been bequeathed to the American Academy in Rome in 1909 by Clara Jessup Heyland. Complications surrounding the gift of Villa Aurelia--including the will being contested by Mrs. Heyland's brother, and problems with unsettled tax assessments--were overcome in the interest of acquiring the outstanding building and its extensive grounds. Not long before his death in 1913, Morgan donated his neighboring land, and the American Academy in Rome continued to expand its Janiculum holdings through purchases and gifts from others. Morgan also agreed to provide a loan for construction of a new building. This building, designed by McKim, Mead, and White and known as the Main Building or Academy Building, opened in 1915; it served as the fellows' residence and work area, and included room for the library, offices, and space for exhibitions and other public events.
During World War I, the American Academy in Rome managed to remain open, although no new fellows arrived during the war years and the number of resident fellows and staff dwindled considerably. Most who remained were involved in some type of civilian war work, often with the Red Cross. In fact, Villa Aurelia was rented by the Red Cross in Italy for office space, and the Main Building was offered as a convalescent hospital, but the war ended before it could be put to that use.
After Italy declared war on the United States in 1941, the American Academy in Rome closed for the remainder of World War II. Those who had been awarded fellowships in classics just prior to the Academy's closing were given the option of using their stipends for study at home or waiting until conditions permitted travel to Rome. A very reduced staff stayed to care for the property and continue library cataloguing, coping with often severe wartime shortages of food and fuel. In addition, there were financial hardships. When bank accounts of enemy aliens were frozen and it was no longer possible to transfer funds from the United States, the Swiss Legation and Vatican arranged for loans to keep the Academy and its staff afloat. Funds that would have been awarded to new fellows during this period were put to use in other ways. In 1943, the American Academy in Rome made a grant to the Citizen's Committee for the Army and Navy, Inc. for competitions to award commissions to artists and art students throughout the country, funding more than 100 triptychs for chapels, as well as murals, medals, and sculpture. Seniors in American colleges and universities were eligible to compete for several scholarships for graduate work in classical studies awarded by the American Academy in Rome.
In 1945, the Academy was the site of Leave Courses on various aspects of Italian culture offered to servicemen. From the end of the war until the Academy reopened at the start of the 1946/47 academic year, G.I. Fellowships were offered to discharged soldiers wishing to study at the Academy, making the institution eligible to receive surplus equipment and rations. During this time intensive planning was underway for administrative changes and new programs.
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1893 -- While in Chicago to collaborate on the fine arts section for the World's Columbian Exposition, architects Charles F. McKim, Daniel Burnham, Richard Howland Hunt, painters John La Farge, and Sculptors Augustus Saint-Gaudens, and Daniel Chester French, among others, met regularly and from their collaborative experience and discussions came the idea for an American school in Europe.
1894 -- American School of Architecture in Rome opened in temporary quarters at the Palazzo Torlonia with Austin Lord, Director, three fellows, and a visiting student.
1895 -- Villa Aurora leased with 2 subtenants, the American School of Classical Studies and the British and American Archaeological Society Library in Rome American School of Architecture incorporated and 10 shares of capital stock issued (2 each to McKim and Hunt, and 1 to Burnham, Kendall, Schermerhorn, Boring, Garland, and Dill) McKim visits Rome.
1896 -- Metropolitan Museum of Art, administrator of Jacob H. Lazarus Scholarship for the study of mural painting, agrees to send the winner to Rome American School of Classical Studies in Rome vacates Villa Aurora.
1897 -- American School of Architecture in Rome dissolved and reorganized as the American Academy in Rome; the assets (including the lease on Villa Aurora) of the American School of Architecture in Rome were transferred and its program expanded to include fellowships in painting and sculpture Samuel A. B. Abbott appointed first Director Rome Prize discontinued (for 9 years) due to lack of funds.
1898 -- Incorporated in New York State; trustees begin to focus on raising an endowment.
1904 -- Move to Villa Mirafiore (also known as Villa Mirafiori); occupied until 1914.
1905 -- Chartered by the Congress of the United States; a bill signed by President Roosevelt made the American Academy in Rome a national institution (receiving no government funding and barring U.S. officials from acting as Trustees).
1906 -- Purchase of Villa Mirafiore finalized; renovations begun.
1909 -- Villa Aurelia bequeathed to the Academy by Clara Jessup Heyland (used until 1932); there were protracted problems surrounding the acquisition of the property including a brother who contested the will and unsettled taxes.
1911 -- School of Classical Studies in Rome (established by the Archaeological Institute of America in 1895) and the American Academy in Rome announce their consolidation [the merger became effective on the final day of 1912].
1912 -- Lands on the Janiculum adjacent to Villa Aurelia, recently acquired by J. Pierpont Morgan, Sr., transferred to the American Academy in Rome.
1913 -- American Academy in Rome now consists of the School of Fine Arts and the School of Classical Studies. New York office moves to the Architect's Building, 101 Park Ave., remaining at this location until 1973. By this date, largely through the generosity of J. Pierpont Morgan, Sr., nearly all of the land bounded by Via Angelo Masina, Via Giacomo Medici, Via Pietro Riselli, and the Aurelian Wall on the Janiculum had been purchased and many improvements made to the properties near the Villa Aurelia. Construction begins on the new Academy building designed by McKim, Mead, and White and situated on the grounds of Villa Aurelia; financed through a loan from J. Pierpont Morgan, Sr. (after Morgan Sr.'s death, his son offered to cancel the loan at an amount equal to funds raised by the Academy for the purpose).
1915 -- First Fellowship in Landscape Architecture established; opening of new Academy building housing the fellows' residential quarters, work areas, library, offices, and spaces for public programs.
1917 -- Villa Aurelia rented to the Red Cross for office space, and the new Main building was slated to become a convalescent hospital, but the war ended before it could be put to use.
1919 -- New York office reorganized by Roscoe Guernsey, executive secretary; sale of Villa Mirafiore; Academic Council established in Rome.
1920 -- Department of Music and Fellowship in Musical Composition established.
1923 -- School of Classical Studies establishes summer sessions, largely attended by teachers.
1926 -- Second Fellowship in Landscape Architecture funded by Garden Club of America (later permanently endowed).
1927 -- Academy opens an Atelier in downtown Rome, providing studios for visiting students (operated until 1934).
1929 -- First Thomas Spencer Jerome lecturer appointed.
1941 -- Academy closes for duration of World War II; a skeletal staff remain behind to care for the property and continue library cataloguing; Italy declares war on the United States.
1942 -- After transfer of funds from the U.S. proved impossible and enemy aliens were prohibited from withdrawing their own funds from Italian banks, the Swiss Legation and Vatican offered assistance to the Academy by providing loans.
1943 -- Academy grant to Citizen's Committee for the Army and Navy, Inc., funded hundreds of triptychs; murals, medals, and sculptures also commissioned Academy awards scholarships in classical studies at American colleges and universities.
1945 -- "Leave courses," held at the Academy, consisting mainly of lectures by distinguished scholars still in Rome, instituted for U.S. servicemen.
1946 -- Regular program resumes at the start of the academic year.
1947 -- Fellowship in the History of Art established.
1965 -- Loan of printed matter for microfilming by the Archives of American Art (reels ITRO 2-3 and 11-13).
1973 -- New York office moves to American Federation of Arts building, 41 East 65th St. (until 1993).
1982 -- Gift of New York office records to the Archives of American Art.
1990 -- Gift of Rome office records to the Archives of American Art.
1993 -- New York office moves to Metropolitan Club, 7 East 60th St.
Related Material:
Papers of a number of former fellows, trustees, and other individuals associated with the American Academy in Rome are among the holdings of the Archives of American Art.
Chaloner Prize Foundation records, 1915-1974 (microfilm reels 5664-5669) were received with the American Academy in Rome records. They have been arranged and described as a separate collection.
Valentine, Lucia and Alan Valentine. The American Academy in Rome, 1894-1969. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1973.
Separated Material:
The Archives of American Art also holds microfilm of material lent for microfilming (reels ITRO 2-3, and ITRO 11-13) including annual reports, exhibition catalogues, a history of the American Academy in Rome, the American Academy in Rome at the World's Fair, and the Golden Gate Exposition and newsletter. Loaned materials were returned to the lender and can be found at the American Academy in Rome, Italy. This material is not described in the collection container inventory.
Provenance:
The material on reels ITRO 2-3 and ITRO 11-13 were lent to the Archives of American Art for microfilming by the American Academy in Rome in 1965. Records of predecessor institutions, the Board of Trustees, and the New York office, including photographs and personal papers, were donated in 1982 by the Academy president, Calvin G. Rand. In 1990, Rand also gifted the Rome office records and the personal documents of Gorham Phillips Stevens. An addition of New York office records was donated in 2014 by the Academy director, Adele Chatfield-Taylor.
Restrictions:
Use of original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C. research center. Contact Reference Services for more information.
Rights:
The American Academy in Rome records are owned by the Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution. Literary rights as possessed by the donor have been dedicated to public use for research, study, and scholarship. The collection is subject to all copyright laws.
Records of staff include the office files of executive secretaries Roscoe Guersney (reels 5777-5787), Meriwether Stuart (reels 5787-5788), and Mary T. Williams (reel 5788); librarian George K. Boyce (reel 5788); and endowment fund campaign secretaries Phillilps B. Robinson (reel 5788) and Edgar I. Williams (reel 5788-5789).
The executive secretary, based in New York, handled nearly all routine administrative matters. Records of this office (8 linear feet) are mainly those of Roscoe Guernsey (7.33 linear feet), who held the post from 1919 to 1946; they represent the most extensive and comprehensive set of files among all of American Academy in Rome records. Prior to 1919, this type of information is found among the records kept by the Secretary and, to a slightly lesser extent, the president. Records of two later executive secretaries, Meriwether Stuart and Mary T. Williams, are less comprehensive (each 0.33 linear feet).
Other staff records are those of the librarian (2 folders) and endowment fund campaign secretaries (0.25 linear ft.). Although the library and its staff are based in Rome, records of George K. Boyce (former fellow in classical studies who was appointed librarian in 1939) are placed with those of the New York office staff because they are from the period when the academy was closed during the Second World War and all correspondence concerning library matters was addressed to him at the academy's New York office.
Arrangement note:
Records of the executive secretaries are first in the series, followed by the files of the librarian and the endowment fund campaign secretaries. For each individual correspondence files are followed by files arranged alphabetically by subject or name of the person to whom the file relates.
Collection Restrictions:
Use of original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C. research center. Contact Reference Services for more information.
Collection Rights:
The American Academy in Rome records are owned by the Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution. Literary rights as possessed by the donor have been dedicated to public use for research, study, and scholarship. The collection is subject to all copyright laws.
Collection Citation:
American Academy in Rome records, 1855-2012. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Anna Evans Murray (1857- 1955), the paternal aunt of opera singer Lillian Evanti was an African American educator and civic leader in Washington, D.C. She was born in 1857 in Oberlin, Ohio to Henrietta Leary (1827-1908) and Henry Evans (1817-1886). Anna graduated from Oberlin College in 1876 and married Daniel Murray (1852-1925), assistant to the Librarian of Congress in 1879. Murray taught music at the Mott School and Howard University. She was an advocate for kindergarten education and the training of teachers for that purpose within the District of Columbia public school system. Mrs. Murray also served as chair of the Education Committee of the National League of Colored Women (NLCW) and the State Federation of Colored Women's Club.
Collection Restrictions:
Use of the materials requires an appointment. Please contact the archivist at acmarchives@si.edu.
Collection Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Anna Evans Murray (1857- 1955) the paternal aunt of opera singer Lillian Evanti, was an African American educator and civic leader in Washington, D.C. She was born in 1857 in Oberlin, Ohio to Henrietta Leary (1827-1908) and Henry Evans (1817-1886). Anna graduated from Oberlin College in 1876 and married Daniel Murray (1852-1925), assistant to the Librarian of Congress in 1879. Murray taught music at the Mott School and Howard University. She was an advocate for kindergarten education and the training of teachers for that purpose within the District of Columbia public school system. Mrs. Murray also served as chair of the Education Committee of the National League of Colored Women (NLCW) and the State Federation of Colored Women's Club.
Collection Restrictions:
Use of the materials requires an appointment. Please contact the archivist at acmarchives@si.edu.
Collection Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Willis' correspondence with Edgar J. Kaufmann, Jr., architectural historians, and librarians concerning the preparation of a bibliography of Kaufmann's writings, sponsored by the Buell Center for the Study of American Architecture, Columbia University, to be published by Architectural History Foundation.
Biographical / Historical:
Kaufmann and Willis are architectural historians.
Provenance:
Donated by Alfred Willis, 1993.
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.
The collection has been digitized and is available online via AAA's website.
Collection Rights:
The Henry Ossawa Tanner papers are owned by the Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution. Literary rights as possessed by the donor have been dedicated to public use for research, study, and scholarship. The collection is subject to all copyright laws.
Collection Citation:
Henry Ossawa Tanner papers, 1860s-1978 (bulk 1890-1937). Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Sponsor:
Funding for the processing and digitization of this collection was provided by the Terra Foundation for American Art.
The papers of Washington, D.C. art historian, librarian, author, educator, and art consultant Marchal Landgren measure 15.3 linear feet and date from 1881 to circa 1982, with the bulk of the material dating from 1930 to 1975. Included are biographical materials, correspondence, writings and notes, professional and organization files, research projects' files, scattered personal business records, printed materials, two clippings scrapbooks, photographical materials, and scattered artwork.
Scope and Contents:
The papers of Washington, D.C. art historian, librarian, author, educator, and art consultant Marchal Landgren measure 15.3 linear feet and date from 1881 to circa 1982, with the bulk of the material dating from 1930 to 1975. Included are biographical materials, correspondence, writings and notes, professional and organization files, research projects' files, scattered personal business records, printed materials, two clippings scrapbooks, photographical materials, and scattered artwork.
Biographical material includes address cards, an appointment book, curriculum vitaes, genealogical materials, and military records. Correspondence is with artists, clients, colleagues, museums, and universities, and is predominantly professional in nature. Correspondents include Albert E. Gallatin, George Gershwin, Ira Glackens, Sidney Laufman, Elliot Orr, Candido Portinari, and Carl Sprinchorn, among others.
Writings include miscellaneous published and unpublished writings and drafts by Marchal Landgren primarily those not associated with his major research projects. These include various articles written for magazines and journals, manuscript drafts, research notes, and notebooks. There is also a file of writings by others that includes the John Mitchell Gallery Notes.
Professional and organizational files document Landgren's positions and work for educational institutions and arts organizations, including the American Abstract Artists Group, Art Students League of New York, Association of Artists Equity of Washington D. C., Contemporary Arts, D. C. Public Library, Library Journal, New York City Municipal Art Committee, Old Print Shop, Inc., and the University of Maryland, among others. These files also contain correspondence, perhaps the most notable found in the file on the American Abstract Artists Group which includes letters from Josef Albers, Eleanor de Laittre, Sidney Geist, Balcomb Greene, Hananiah Harari, and Harry Holtzman.
Well over one-half of the collection consists of files for Landgren's ongoing research projects on numerous artists and photographers, Latin American art, as well as his bibliographic reference projects. The bulk of the files cover his research, writing, and curatorial work on Robert Loftin Newman. Files are also found for Berenice Abbott, Milton Avery, George Constant, George Collins Cox, Aline Fruhauf, Eugene Higgins, William Morris Hunt, John Kane, Charles Logasa, Elliot Orr, and Albert Pinkham Ryder, among many others.
Personal business records include personal and general expense documentation and scattered exhibition price lists. Printed materials include clippings, exhibition catalogs, and miscellaneous published articles and essays. There are two scrapbooks of clippings.
There are photographs, slides, and negatives of images of Landgren, other artists and notable figures in the art world, and of artwork. Of note is a portrait photograph of Juliana Force by Cecil Beaton, one photograph by Berenice Abbott, "Barclay Street Ferry", and 14 taken by George C. Cox of Rudyard Kipling, Clyde Fitch, Augustus Saint-Gaudens, Madame Fanny Janauschek, Donald G. Mitchell, and others.
The papers also include scattered artwork, including holiday cards illustrated by artists, and sketches and drawings by other artists.
Arrangement:
This collection is arranged as 10 series.
Series 1: Biographical Materials, circa 1890-circa 1981 (0.2 linear feet; Box 1)
Series 2: Correspondence, circa 1930-circa 1982 (0.6 linear feet; Box 1)
Series 3: Writings and Notes, circa 1932-circa 1982 (1.2 linear feet; Boxes 1-3)
Series 4: Professional and Organizational Files, circa 1910-circa 1977 (3.4 linear feet; Boxes 3-6)
Series 5: Research Projects' Files, 1881-circa 1982 (6.9 linear feet; Boxes 6-13, 15)
Series 6: Personal Business Records, circa 1934-circa 1982 (0.4 linear feet; Box 13)
Series 7: Printed Material, circa 1927-circa 1981 (1.0 linear feet; Boxes 13-14)
Series 8: Scrapbooks, circa 1931-circa 1979 (0.2 linear feet; Boxes 14-15)
Series 9: Photographic Materials, circa 1930s-circa 1978 (0.2 linear feet; Boxes 14-15)
Series 10: Artwork, circa 1930s-circa 1940s (0.2 linear feet; Boxes 14-15)
Biographical / Historical:
Marchal E. Landgren (1907-1983) was an art historian, librarian, educator, author, and art consultant, active in New York and Washington, D. C.
As associate director and board member of Contemporary Arts, Inc. in New York, Landgren established a program for providing artists with their first solo exhibition in New York, including those of John Kane and Mark Tobey. In 1932, he directed the exhibition schedule at the New School for Social Research; and in 1935, Landgren served as the director of art activities for the New York City Municipal Art Committee where he facilitated many exhibitions over the course of five years, including Recent Paintings by Boris Aronson at Babcock Galleries in 1938.
Working as a freelance art consultant, researcher, and author, Landgren organized numerous exhibitions between 1932 and 1950 of the work of Milton Avery, George C. Cox, Elliot Orr, Robert Loftin Newman, and Albert Pinkham Ryder. He also edited several arts publications, including the Old Print Shop Portfolio, John Mitchell Gallery Notes, and arts manuscripts for Oxford University Press.
In 1939, Landgren was selected by the New York World's Fair Commision to prepare historical notes on Latin American art for the exhibition catalogs of the Latin American art exhibition. After the Fair, he continued his research on this topic and wrote several articles, as well as lecturing on Latin American painting at the Art Students League of New York, the Newark Art Club, and the National Education Association at the Boston Museum.
After serving in the U. S. Army Air Force during World War II, Landgren moved to Washington, D. C. in 1950 and began work as the arts division readers' advisor for the D. C. Public Library. For seventeen years, he built up the library's general collection of art books and created extensive files of art exhibition catalogs.
In 1967, he took a position as a bibliographic consultant for the fine arts department at the University of Maryland. He became director of the University's art gallery and of the art department museum training program. During his tenure at the University of Maryland, Landgren conducted graduate seminars in art history, edited and published exhibition catalogs, and organized exhibitions, including The Late Landscapes of William Morris Hunt in 1976.
Landgren was a visiting scholar at the Smithsonian Institution's National Collection of Fine Arts and curated an exhibition of paintings by Robert Loftin Newman held there from 1973 to 1974 and at the Tennessee Fine Arts Center in 1974.
Marchal Landgren authored two books: Years of Art: The Story of the Art Students League of New York (Robert M. McBride and Company, 1940), and Robert Loftin Newman (Smithsonian Institution Press, 1974). He was a regular reviewer of art books for the Library Journal from 1958 to 1972, and contributed reviews to Trend, Magazine of Art, and other journals. He was awarded a research grant by the American Council of Learned Societies in 1963 for his study of George C. Cox and did a great deal of research in American art and American art institutions for an unfinished manuscript. He also worked on a bibliography of art literature which he never completed.
Provenance:
The Marchal Landgren papers were donated by Landgren in 1974, and by the Landgren estate via David Huddle in 1983.
Restrictions:
Use of original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C. Research Center. Contact Reference Services for more information.
Rights:
The Marchal Landgren papers are owned by the Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution. Literary rights as possessed by the donor have been dedicated to public use for research, study, and scholarship. The collection is subject to all copyright laws.
The papers of art historian, art critic, author, librarian and educator Ellen Hulda Johnson measure 60.3 linear feet and date from 1872-1994, with the bulk of the material dating from 1921-1992. The papers include biographical materials; personal and family files; personal, professional, and business correspondence; extensive research and writing files; teaching files; subject files; professional and curatorial files; and artists' files. Johnson's papers reflect the full range of her career, interests, and close relationships with many artists. There is a 5.0 linear foot addition to this collection donated in 2019. Included are biographical material; correspondence; teaching and lecture files; financial and legal records; photographs of artists, events, and travels; sketchbooks; and video cassette tapes of events.
Scope and Contents:
The papers of art historian, art critic, author, librarian and educator Ellen Hulda Johnson measure 55.3 linear feet and date from 1872-1994, with the bulk of the material dating from 1921-1992. The papers include biographical materials; personal and family files; personal, professional, and business correspondence; extensive research and writing files; teaching files; subject files; professional and curatorial files; and artists' files. Johnson's papers reflect the full range of her career, interests, and close relationships with many artists.
Personal papers consist of biographical materials and personal and family files, including "memorabilia" files compiled by Johnson. Correspondence is a mix of personal, business, and professional correspondence. Significant correspondents include David Saunders (who painted a portrait of Johnson), Claes Oldenburg, Jack Tworkov, Robert Venturi, the American Scandinavian Foundation. A folder of correspondence compiled for the Archives includes letters from Alfred Stieglitz, Wendell Wilkie, Carl Milles, Jim Dine, and Alexander Archipenko.
Extensive and comprehensive writing and research project files include articles, lectures, presentations, manuscripts, notes and notebooks, including her class notebooks from courses she attended in Paris in 1935, and additional notes and notebooks on a wide variety of subjects. The numerous articles, lectures, papers, and drafts were written primarily by Johnson for the College Art Association, the Allen Memorial Art Museum bulletin, and numerous additional publications and presentations; but there are also writings by others included in the research files. Major writing projects and related research files cover Scandinavian art, the Ossabaw Island artist's colony, Cezanne, Eva Hesse, John Frederick Kensett, Claes Oldenburg, Picasso, David Saunders, Athena Tacha, Pop Art, and many other topics. Johnson's research files, manuscripts, correspondence, and photographs for major exhibitions, including one on Eva Hesse (1982) and for her published books including American Artists on Art from 1940-1980 (1982), Claes Oldenburg (1971), Fragments Recalled at 80: The Art Memoirs of Ellen H. Johnson (1993), and Modern Art and Object (1976) are arranged with the writing project files. Johnson's bibliographic index cards are found here as well.
The collection contains extensive teaching files for courses taught by Johnson at Oberlin and as a visiting professor at other institutions; professional and curatorial files reflecting her curatorial career at Allen Memorial Art Museum, as a consultant, jury member, and continuing education courses she later attended, including the Baldwin Lecture Series; and 18 linear feet of artist's files assembled by Johnson.
There is a 5.0 linear foot addition to this collection donated in 2019. Included are biographical material; correspondence; teaching and lecture files; financial and legal records; photographs of artists, events, and travels; sketchbooks; and video cassette tapes of events.
Arrangement:
The Ellen Hulda Johnson papers are arranged into eight series:
Series 1: Personal Papers, 1910-1994 (2 linear feet; Boxes 1-2, 56)
Series 2: Correspondence, 1937-1992 (4.5 linear feet; Boxes 3-7)
Series 3: Writing and Research Projects, 1872, 1932-1994 (13.5 linear feet; Boxes 7-20, 56)
Series 4: Subject Files, 1930-1993 (5 linear feet; Boxes 21-25)
Series 5: Teaching Files, 1928-1989 (6 linear feet; Boxes 26-31)
Series 6: Professional and Curatorial Files, 1936-1991 (6 linear feet; Boxes 32-37, 56)
Series 7: Artists Files, 1935-1992 (18.3 linear feet; Boxes 37-55)
Series 8: Unprocessed Addition, circa 1930-1990 (5 linear feet; Boxes 57-61)
Biographical / Historical:
Ellen Hulda Johnson (1910-1992) was an art historian, critic, and professor who worked and taught at Oberlin College in Ohio for most of her career.
Ellen Hulda Johnson was born in 1910 in Warren, Pennsylvania. She received her Bachelor's and Master's degrees in art history at Oberlin in 1933 and 1935. She worked briefly at the Toledo Museum of Art before returning to Oberlin as the art librarian. In 1940 she started Oberlin's art rental program, the first of its kind in the country. She was appointed to the faculty in 1948 and taught nineteenth and twentieth century art, American art from colonial times to the present, contemporary art, and Scandinavian art. She was a member of the Allen Memorial Art Museum's acquisition committee and appointed honorary curator of modern art in 1973. She remained at Oberlin her entire career, retiring from teaching in 1977.
Johnson was a scholar of Cézanne, Claes Oldenburg, Eva Hesse, Pablo Picasso, Edvard Munch, John F. Kensett and other modern masters, as well as Scandinavian art. In 1962 she wrote the first important article on Claes Oldenburg and, in 1970, assisted curator Athena Tacha commission his first permanent large sculpture (3-Way Plug) for the grounds of the Allen Memorial Art Museum. She was the first to show the black-striped paintings that established Frank Stella's reputation. Her efforts in promoting acquisitions of young contemporary artists helped make the Allen Memorial Art Museum a leading institution in contemporary art. Her Oberlin lectures on modern art became so popular that they had to be held in the college's largest auditorium and influenced generations of students, many of whom went on to signficant positions in the field. A new wing of the museum designed by Robert Venturi opened in 1977 and was named in honor of Johnson.
Johnson was the author of numerous articles, books, and exhibition catalogs including Cezanne (Penquin, 1967); Claes Oldenburg (Penquin, 1971); American Artists on Art from 1940-1980 (Harper and Row, 1982); and Modern Art and the Object (Thames and Hudson, 1976).
In 1968, Johnson purchased the Frank Lloyd Wright-designed Weltzheimer house in Oberlin, and spent a considerable part of her time and money restoring the building where she lived the rest of her life. She bequethed the house and her significant art collection to Oberlin upon her death in 1992.
Related Materials:
Papers of Ellen H. Johnson, 1933-1992, are also located at Oberlin College Archives.
Separated Materials:
Shortly after aquisition, the Archives transferred Ellen Hulda Johnson's vertical file (16 linear feet) of clippings, press releases, and exhibition announcements to the library of the Smithsonian American Art Museum and National Portrait Gallery.
Provenance:
The Ellen Hulda Johnson papers were donated in 1994, 1998, and 2019 by the estate of Ellen Hulda Johnson via exectutor Athena Tacha.
Restrictions:
Use of original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Washington D.C. Center. Use of archival audiovisual recordings with no duplicate access copy requires advance notice. Contact Reference Services for more information.
Rights:
The Ellen Hulda Johnson papers are owned by the Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution. Literary rights as possessed by the donor have been dedicated to public use for research, study, and scholarship. The collection is subject to all copyright laws.
Tolman, Ruel P. (Ruel Pardee), 1878-1954 Search this
Extent:
5.1 Linear feet ((partially microfilmed on 5 reels))
Type:
Collection descriptions
Archival materials
Date:
1917-1958
Scope and Contents:
Correspondence, typescripts of books, publications and clippings relating to Bolton's published and unpublished works on American art.
UNMICROFILMED: Included are drafts for AMERICAN BOOK ILLUSTRATORS (N.Y., 1938), EARLY AMERICAN PORTRAIT PAINTERS IN OILS, DICTIONARY OF AMERICAN ARTISTS, A WORKING BIBLIOGRAPHY...RELATING TO ART IN PENNSYLVANIA...NOTES FOR A REVISION (Philadelphia, 1948), a portion of Sinclair Hamilton's EARLY AMERICAN BOOK ILLUSTRATORS, 1670-1870 (Princeton, 1958), "A Brief History of the French Impressionists," "Annotated Bibliography of Early American Painters, Sculptors and Engravers to 1860," A Brief History of Colonial American Painting" (1942); 75 typewritten pages of a working bibliography of books, magazine articles and catalogs relating to art in Pennsylvania by Harold E. Dickson and Bolton, 1948; catalogs of works of several artists; notes on artists, Greek vases and architecture, the Dutch masters, the Museum of San Marco, painting technique, the French Impressionists, Early American Painting, and English historical painting. Also included are checklists of books illustrated by Howard Pyle, Katharine Pyle and Joseph Pennell; articles by R. P. Tolman and related correspondence; sketches and drawings by Bolton; and clippings and book reviews relating to Bolton.
REEL N140: A revised typescript, 1958, of AMERICAN BOOK ILLUSTRATORS.
REELS D9 & D10: A letter from book designer Bruce Rogers, annotated by Bolton, February 14, 1945 regarding Rogers' design of THE FEDERALIST PAPERS; 2 letters from Ruel Pardee Tolman, June 12, 1949 and May 19, 1953, regarding his own painting and miniatures and other paintings he is buying and studying; and 5 letters from illustrator Thornton Oakley, undated and March 10-April 19, 1946.
REELS 439-440: Copy of a photograph - probably from a book, of Winslow Homer (reel 439); and a photograph, ca. 1850, of (L to R.): Henry Kirke Brown, Henry Peters Gray and Asher Brown Durand and Emanuel Leutze, photographer unknown. [A similiar photo filmed on reel NY59-19, fr. 1-2, Mary Bartlett Cowdrey artists' files pictures William Kemble (non-artist) on Brown's right.]
Biographical / Historical:
Art historian, scholar and librarian of the Century Association; New York, N.Y. Died 1973. He specialized in book illustration and portrait miniatures.
Provenance:
From 1956-1959, Bolton donated 3 feet of material to the Archives and 2 feet to the Library of the National Museum of American Art, which subsequently transferred it to the Archives, 1981. There is some duplication within the two groups of material.
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.
Biographical material, professional and personal correspondence, subject files, financial records, artwork, printed material and an audio cassette.
Biographical information includes a résumé and award. Business correspondence, 1964-1984, regards the opening of The Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden and Block's teaching position at California State University, Northridge, and personal correspondence includes 5 illustrated letters by Block to his wife and two printed cards from Fritz Faiss. Subject files regard the WPA, 1938-1983, film animation, 1957-1976, and book illustration, 1978-1984. Financial records relate to Block's association with the Ankrum Gallery, 1936-1981. Photographs are of Block, his friends, family and works of art.
Artwork includes 2 sketches, 1962, and approximately 60 pencil figurative drawings and studies done during weekly life drawing sessions established by Block and Hans Burkhardt at the Studio Club on the MGM lot from the 1950s to mid-1970s (among them is a pastel by Burkhardt of Block drawing the nude model); and 16 drawings and one print and one poster, most of which were executed by Irving Block for Santa Susana Press, California State University, Northridge's 1986 broadside of John Updike's poem, A Pear Like a Potato. Printed material, 1941-1982, includes exhibition catalogs and clippings. An audio cassette contains Block's reminiscences of his friendship with Burkhardt and a recording of Block delivering a lecture to a senior seminar class on Walt Whitman.
Biographical / Historical:
Irving Block (1910-1986) was a painter and educator in Los Angeles, California. Block was born in New York City. He was involved in the Works Projects Administration's Federal Art Project in the 1930s, and worked as a matte shot artist at 20th Century Fox during the 1940s and 50s. He taught for many years at California State University, Northridge (1963-1980). Block co-authored with Alan Adler the original story for the science fiction film Forbidden Planet, for which he designed Robbie the Robot.
Provenance:
Donated 1984 by Block and in 1996 by Jill Block, the widow of Irving Block. Additional drawings, print and poster donated 2015 by Virginia Elwood-Akers, a former librarian at California State University, Northbridge who received the drawings from colleague Dean Norman Tanis, head of the Santa Susana Press.
Restrictions:
Use of original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C., Research Center.
Occupation:
Art teachers -- California -- Los Angeles Search this
The National Academy of Design minutes and committee files consist of official, original, and transcribed proceedings for the council, annual, business, and some committee meetings, as well as related correspondence, reports, financial documents, notes, drafts, and ballots pertaining to the Academy's administration and activities from its 1825 founding until 2006.
As an organization actively engaged in the development of art and art education in the United States, the Academy minutes and committee files are a valuable resource on subjects and topics including the Academy's history; the formation, development, contents, and loans of its art collection; art and design education; Academy exhibits and public programs; relationships with other art and educational organizations in the United States and Europe, including Columbia University, New York University, National Arts Club, and many others; interactions with officials of the City of New York; the Academy's role in shaping the architectural and sculptural environment of New York City and Washington, DC; contemporary art movements and schools; the development of American art, and the integral role that Academy members, faculty, and students played in that development; the role of women artists at the Academy; and the Academy's involvement in the standardization of materials for painters and sculptors, such as analysis of colors in oil and pigments.
Official council minutes (subseries 1.1) have been approved by the appropriate governing body and consist of seven bound volumes of handwritten minutes and, after May 1894, unbound typewritten pages housed in folders and boxes. The official minutes were copied from the handwritten notes in bound books, identified as the original council minutes (subseries 1.2). Official minutes contain the proceedings of the council, officers, trustees, and committees, as well as related records inlaid or pasted among the pages. These items include council officers' reports, resolutions, correspondence, occasional drafts and notes, constitutions and by-laws for some of the early years, obituaries of Academy members, and other assorted materials. Gaps in the official minutes may be filled in or appear to be more complete in the original minutes.
Original council minutes (subseries 1.2) are the most original of the minutes and consist of handwritten notes in bound books, supposedly from draft notes taken during meetings. Minutes are comprised of the proceedings of the council, officers, trustees, and committees, and related material including drafts, notes, leaflets, brochures, and correspondence. The distinction between official and original minutes essentially disappeared after 1916. Minutes after 1916 are arranged in subseries 1.4.
The council minutes excerpts (subseries 1.3) are handwritten summaries of the Academy minutes, thought to have been prepared from 1915-1919 by the Academy librarian George W. Maynard. Occasionally, reports, loose notes (some of which might be initial draft notes from meetings), and bookmarks with short annotations presumably created in the late 1970s are included. Box 4, folder 10 contains handwritten committee reports, agreements, and other documents referred to in the council minutes, requested to be transcribed, but ultimately not transcribed. The excerpts for 1863-1878 were typed at some point and are included in this subseries. All excerpts are indexed: indices for the years 1825-1863 are included in their respective folders; an index for the years 1863-1909 is in box 3, folder 13; an index for the years 1909-1916 is in box 4, folder 11; and an index for the years 1916-1919 is in box 4, folder 16. The last folder contains correspondence related to the transcription project.
Minutes and reports (subseries 1.4) include proceedings for the council, annual, business, election, and committee meetings, as well as annual, financial, librarian, and committee reports. Committees include or have included the Abbey Fund, building, exhibition, executive, finance, membership, nominating, school, Ranger Fund, women's, and various ad-hoc committees. Over the years the structure, powers and duties of committees were modified. Occasional correspondence, notes, exhibition catalogues, and handwritten texts (mostly original drafts of minutes) are included. This is especially true for the period 1897-1913, when handwritten drafts and notes of minutes were more or less consistently incorporated with typewritten minutes in chronological order.
Committee files (subseries 1.5) contain the same types of materials found in subseries 1.4, including committee minutes, reports, and related material.
Arrangement:
The series is arranged as five subseries. The original order of the minutes and committee files have undergone several alterations over the years. Subseries 1.4 and 1.5 both contain extensive committee records. Minutes and reports (1.4) are arranged chronologically while committee files (1.5) have been arranged alphabetically.
1.1: Official Council Minutes, 1825-1916
1.2: Original Council Minutes, 1825-1898
1.3: Council Minutes Excerpts, 1902-circa 1919
1.4: Minutes and Reports, 1826-2001
1.5: Committees, 1826-2006
Collection Restrictions:
This bulk of 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 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:
National Academy of Design records, 1817-2012. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Research material gathered by Ruth Post (ca. 1970-1980) regarding painter Virgil Macey Williams (1830-1886) including correspondence with art historians, heirs, reference librarians, archivists, and others; printed material, notes and writings.
Biographical / Historical:
Post, a writer from Silver Spring, Md., researched painter Virgil Macey Williams (1830-1886) for more than a decade.
Provenance:
Donated 1998 by William E. Carnahan, attorney for Ruth Post.
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.
Also inscribed on card, "Entered according to act of Congress , A.D. 1873, by CHAS. POLLOCK, in the Office of Librarian of Congress at Washington, C. SEAVER, Jr. Photog'r."
Henry and Nancy Rosin Collection of Early Photography of Japan. Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery Archives. Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C. Purchase and partial donation.
The papers of art historian E. P. Richardson measure 28.7 linear feet and date from 1814-1996, with the bulk of the materials dating from 1921-1996. Within the papers are scattered biographical materials; acquisition files for Richardson's personal art collection; professional and personal correspondence with colleagues, art historians and critics, artists, museums, galleries, and dealers; numerous writings, including manuscripts and research files for his published books, articles, and lectures; general research notebooks and files compiled by Richardson on a wide variety of art-related topics and artists; professional and committee files; as well as a smaller amount of Constance C. Richardson's papers.
Scope and Contents:
The papers of art historian E. P. Richardson measure 28.7 linear feet and date from 1814-1996, with the bulk of the materials dating from 1921-1996. Within the papers are scattered biographical materials; acquisition files for Richardson's personal art collection; professional and personal correspondence with colleagues, art historians and critics, artists, museums, galleries, and dealers; numerous writings, including manuscripts and research files for his published books, articles, and lectures; general research notebooks and files compiled by Richardson on a wide variety of art-related topics and artists; professional and committee files; as well as a smaller amount of Constance C. Richardson's papers.
Biographical materials include certificates, awards, and honorary degrees, membership information, personal and family photographs, a few sketches, and a transcript of an oral history Interview with E.P. Richardson conducted by the National Endowment for the Humanities in 1982.
There are acquisitions files for the Richardsons' personal art collection that invoices, photographs, correspondence with galleries and collectors, appraisals, price lists, and artwork examination forms.
Correspondence is with colleagues, art dealers, collectors, museums and museum curators, foreign scholars, organizations, galleries, artists, art historians and critics, publishers, editors, librarians, friends, and family. Topics regard purchasing art for various collections, consultations about art and collecting including authentications and attributions, publishing, general art history, lectures, and personal matters, among other topics. There is correspondence with the Archives of American Art, Castano Galleries, Lawrence Fleischman, James Thomas Flexner, Alfred V. Frankenstein, George Croce, Walter Heil, Earl Krentzin, Wilmarth Lewis, Russel Lynes, John Francis McDermott, Philadelphia Museum of Art, J. Hall Pleasants, Anna Rutledge, Charles Sellers, Smithsonian Institution, Regina Soria, Victor Spark, William Stevens, Robert Vose, William Woolfenden, and many others. Scattered correspondence with artists is with Isabel Bishop, Louis Bouche, William Bostick, Eve Garrison, Edward Hopper, Irene Jungwirth, Yasuo Kuniyoshi, Hughie Lee-Smith, Reginald Marsh, Gerald Mast, Georgia O'Keefe, Charles Sheeler, Walt Speck, and John Wedda, among many others. The greatest extent of correspondence is with Andrew Wyeth, Harold Cohn, and Frederick Simper. There is also personal correspondence with family and friends, and between E.P. and Constance Richardson.
E.P. Richardson's prominence as an art historian, writer, and expert on collecting is well documented through his prolific writings. Materials include drafts, notes, typescripts, and outlines for articles, exhibition catalog essays, and lectures. Also found are research files and publishing documentation for Richardson's books, including Washington Allston: A Study of the Romantic Artist in America (1948), Painting in America (1956), Charles Willson Peale and his World (1983), and American Romantic Painting (1944). There are also miscellaneous notes and four diaries. Two of the diaries comment on the social and cultural life of Detroit; the authenticity of paintings; Richardson's reflections on contemporary American painting, thoughts about museums, dealers, artists, and art historians (especially Wilhelm R. Valentiner); and travel.
Notebooks compiled by Richardson on a wide variety art-related topics cover nearly six decades. There are also numerous research files organized Richardson about individual artists and art history. And, the art collector files contain reference materials about art collectors and their collections including Lamont du Pont Copeland, Michael W. Freeman, Nelson Rockefeller, Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Allen, and the Marquis de Somerlous. There are three index card file boxes containing bibliographic data on published books and articles.
Professional and committee files document Richardson's professional and consulting work for the Art Quarterly, Detroit Institute of Arts, National Collection of Fine Arts, the National Portrait Gallery, the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, the John D. Rockefeller III collection, Winterthur Museum, the White House, and the Historical Society of Pennsylvania.
Constance C. Richardson's papers include business and professional correspondence with various institutions, most extensively with the Macbeth Gallery. In addition, there is a smaller amount of personal correspondence, photographs and slides of her artworks, printed materials, two illustrated notebooks on her work, and miscellaneous notes. Also included is Constance's artist palette.
Biographical / Historical:
Art historian, museum director, and writer E. P. (Edgar Preston) Richardson (1902-1985) served as director of the Detroit Institute of Arts (1945-1962) and Winterthur Museum (1963-1966). He was also a board member of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts from 1966-1977 and, in 1954, co-founded the Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
E. P. Richardson was born in 1902 in Glens Falls, New York and died in Philadelphia in 1985. He graduated from Williams College in Massachusetts in 1925 and studied painting at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts for the three years following graduation. In 1930 he became educational secretary at the Detroit Institute of Arts, was quickly named assistant director in 1933, and served as director from 1945 to 1962. He left Detroit to take the position of director of the Winterthur Museum, where he remained until 1966.
Richardson married Constance Coleman in 1931. Born in Berlin, Germany in 1905, Constance Coleman Richardson was an award-winning and widely exhibited realist style painter of American landscapes. She gave up painting in the 1960s and died in 2002.
While at the Detroit Institute of Arts, E. P. Richardson co-founded the Archives of American Art with Lawrence Fleischman, and served as the Archives' first director. Richardson was also art advisor to John D. Rockefeller III for over ten years, editor of Art Quarterly from 1938 to 1967, and a member of various boards, including the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, the Smithsonian Arts Commission, and the National Portrait Gallery. He authored numerous books including ones on artists Washington Allston and Charles Willson Peale, and The Way of Western Art: American Romantic Painting (1939), Painting in America: The Story of Four Hundred and Fifty Years (1956), A Short History of Painting in America (1963), and American Art, an Exhibition of the Collection of Mr. and Mrs. John D. Rockefeller, 3d (1976).
Related Materials:
Related collections among the holdings of the Archives of American Art include an interview with E.P. Richardson dated February 6, 1978 conducted by Linda Downs; and several miscellaneous manuscripts that include an E.P. Richardson Letter to Rockwell Kent, June 15 1959; E.P. Richardson letters to Lawrence Arthur Fleischman, May 13, 1962 and August 22 1954; and a Yasuo Kunioshi letter to E.P. Richardson, July 25 1948.
Additional E.P. Richardson papers are found at the Detroit Institute of Arts and in the archives of the Henry Francis du Pont Winterthur Museum.
Separated Materials:
The Archives of American Art also holds material lent for microfilming (reel D46) including E.P. Richardson's research material on Jeremiah P. Hardy. These materials are housed at the Smithsonian American Art Museum Library and are not described in the collection container inventory.
Provenance:
Edith Wilkinson first donated a letter to E. P. Richardson from herself in 1957. E.P. Richardson donated papers to the Archives of American Art in 1958 and 1960 and lent materials for microfilming in 1961. Addition material was donated by Constance Richardson in 1985, and by Martha Fleischman in 2003.
Restrictions:
Use of original material requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C. Research Center. Contact References Services for more information.
Rights:
The E.P. (Edgar Preston) and Constance Richardson papers are owned by the Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution. Literary rights as possessed by the donor have been dedicated to public use for research, study and scholarship. The collection is subject to all copyright laws.
An interview of John Langley Howard (1902-1999) and his wife, Mary conducted by Robert Campbell. The interview was conducted for a proposed article by Campbell about the WPA Coit Towers murals in San Francisco.
Biographical / Historical:
John Langley Howard was a muralist who worked on the often controversial murals for the Coit Tower for Public Works of Art Project. The interviewer and donor, Bob Campbell, is a retired librarian for the San Franscisco School District, who conducted the interview as part of an educational multimedia database "Voices of the 30s."
Provenance:
Donated 2002 by Robert Campbell.
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.
Topic:
Coit Memorial Tower (San Francisco, Calif.) Search this
The papers of rubberstamp and artistamp artist, performance artist, collector of mail art, and fine arts librarian John Held, Jr. date from 1947-2018, bulk 1973-2013, and measure 12.9 linear feet. Found within the papers are biographical material, 18 printed diaries, letters received by Held from mail artists around the world, art work consisting of artistamps designed by miscellaneous mail artists, interview transcripts, writings, project and event files, printed material, mail art sent for the Gutai Historical Survey Exhibition held at the San Francisco Art Institute in 2013, and a collection of biographical material presented by Held at a Mail Art Study Day held at the Archives of American Art in 2018.
Scope and Content Note:
The papers of rubberstamp and artistamp artist, performance artist, collector of mail art, and fine arts librarian John Held, Jr. date from 1947-2018, bulk 1973-2013, and measure 12.9 linear feet. Found within the papers are biographical material, 18 printed diaries, letters received by Held from mail artists around the world, art work consisting of artistamps designed by miscellaneous mail artists, interview transcripts, writings, project and event files, printed material, and mail art sent for the Gutai Historical Survey Exhibition held at the San Francisco Art Institute in 2013.
Scattered biographical material consists primarily of miscellanous biographical writings and accounts. Eighteen printed diaries provide very brief descriptions of daily activities and more detailed descriptions of art mail events, conferences, and travel experiences.
Letters comprise the largest and most significant series in the collection. Letters received by John Held, Jr. are from an extensive number of national and international mail artists, including Mark Bloch, Hans Braumüller, Jean Brown, William Gaglione (a.k.a. Picasso Gaglione), Dick Higgins, Ray Johnson, Shozo Shimamoto, Ryosuke Cohen, Michael Leigh, Guglielmo Cavellini, and Rod Summers. There are also scattered letters from Carl Andre and Clement Greenberg, typescripts of letters sent by Held, and a file of letters exchanged with Steve Durland.
There are twelve folders of artistamps, non-official or pseudo-postage stamps designed by miscellaneous participants in the international mail art network.
Transcripts are of interviews conducted by John Held, Jr. with some of the more notable artists involved with the mail art movement including Al Ackerman, John Cage, Ray Johnson, and Allan Kaprow. There are also interviews with John Held, Jr., William (Picasso) Gaglione, and Milan Knizak, including an interview with Held conducted by Ruud Janssen.
Extensive writings by John Held, Jr. consist of catalog essays, miscellaneous essays, bibliographies, miscellaneous box set texts, and miscellaneous typescripts. Project and event files concern miscellaneous projects, tours, lectures, and exhibitions with which John Held, Jr. was involved.
Printed material consists primarily of printouts of Bibliozone issues, a newsletter, exhibition catalogs, and press releases concerning mail art.
The Gutai exhibition project files include printed material related to the 2013 Experimental Exhibition of Modern Art to Challenge the mid-Winter Burning Sun: Gutai Historical Survey and Contemporary Response held at the San Francisco Art Institute. The bulk of the series consists of mail art created by over 135 artists who were asked to submit work inspired by Gutai and the artist Shozo Shimamoto.
The Mail Art Study Day Material consists of mostly biographical material regarding John Held, presented by him at the Archives of American Art's Mail Art Study Day on November 9, 2018. This assortment of largely printed material (news clippings, invitations, and programs) as well as select correspondence and photographs, each representing a year in the life of the artist, accompanied by a key for around 450 items dating from 1947-2018. They serve to document his career with regard to creating and disseminating Mail Art.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged as 10 series:
Series 1: Biographical Material, 1990-1999 (5 folders; Box 1)
Series 2: Diaries, 1990-2000 (20 folders; Box 1)
Series 3: Letters, 1973-2008 (7.9 linear feet; Box 1-8, Box 12)
Series 4: Artwork, 1985-2007 (12 folders; Box 8)
Series 5: Interview Transcripts, 1977-1995 (7 folders; Box 8)
Series 6: Writings, 1984-2000 (0.5 linear feet; Box 8)
Series 7: Project and Event Files, 1982-2000 (11 folders; Box 8)
Series 8: Printed Material, 1989-2000 (11 folders; Box 8)
Series 9: Gutai Exhibition Project Files, 2012-2013 (Box 9-11, Box 13, OV 14)
Series 10: Mail Art Study Day Materials, 1947-2018 (Box 15)
Biographical Note:
John Held, Jr. (1947-) of San Francisco, California, is a rubberstamp and artistamp artist, participant in the international mail art network, activist, performance artist, collector of mail art, and a fine arts librarian.
Jonathan Held was born on April 2, 1947. In the mid-1970s he took the name of the early twentieth century illustrator, John Held, Jr., famous for his images of "flapper girls" in the 1920s. This name change was both in tribute to the older artist as well as an expression of Dada.
Earning a Bachelor's Degree in 1969, Held received a Master of Library Science Degree from Syracuse University School of Information Studies in 1972 and expanded his interests toward participating in the international mail art network and assembling one of the largest archives of mail art in the United States. He was mentored by mail artist Ray Johnson, and Jean Brown, a leading participant in Fluxus, whose interest in the Dada and Surrealism movements promoted emerging art forms including mail art, visual poetry, and artists' books.
From 1981 to 1995, Held was a Fine Arts Librarian at the Dallas Public Library. In 1982, he began making artistamps, pseudo-postage stamps used as an art medium, and opened the Modern Realism Gallery and Archive in Dallas, Texas, with his future wife Paula Barber. The gallery sought to preserve the record of contemporary avant-garde cultural activity.
Held published Mail Art: An Annotated Bibliography, a five-hundred page listing of secondary sources on the field in 1991. In 1996, Held moved to San Francisco, California, where he established the Modern Realism Gallery and acted as curator of the Stamp Art Gallery, an exhibition space devoted to rubberstamp and artistamp works.
John Held, Jr. has lectured at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London; the Museum of Fine Arts, Havana; and at the National School of Art, Prague. He participated in international exhibitions and, since 1986, engaged in international performance work, appearing in Japan, Russia, Uruguay, and Yugoslavia, as well as in the United States. One of Held's more notable performance creations is the Fake Picabia Brothers, in partnership with artist Picasso Gaglione.
John Held, Jr. lives in San Francisco, California.
Provenance:
John Held donated his papers relating to mail art in 1999, 2008, 2013, and 2018.
Restrictions:
This collection is open for research. Access to original papers requires an appointment and is limited to the Archives' Washington, D.C. Research Center.
Rights:
The Archives of American Art makes its archival collections available for non-commercial, educational and personal use unless restricted by copyright and/or donor restrictions, including but not limited to access and publication restrictions. AAA makes no representations concerning such rights and restrictions and it is the user's responsibility to determine whether rights or restrictions exist and to obtain any necessary permission to access, use, reproduce and publish the collections. Please refer to the Smithsonian's Terms of Use for additional information.
Occupation:
Mail artists -- California -- San Francisco Search this
Performance artists -- California -- San Francisco Search this
Librarians -- California -- San Francisco Search this
