The Peppino Mangravite papers measure 6.2 linear feet and are dated 1918-1982. They consist of correspondence, subject files, recorded interviews with significant artists and transcripts, writings and notes, miscellaneous records, printed matter, and photographs documenting Mangravite's career as a painter and educator.
Scope and Content Note:
The Peppino Mangravite papers measure 6.2 linear feet and are dated 1918-1982. They consist of correspondence, subject files, interviews with artists, writings and notes, miscellaneous records, printed matter, and photographs documenting Mangravite's career as a painter and educator.
Series 1: Correspondence includes chronological correspondence documenting Mangravite's career as a painter and educator. Correspondence is with employers, dealers, museums, galleries, collectors, clients, arts and educational organizations, publishers, and other artists. Much of the correspondence is between Mangravite and his dealers, the Dudensing Gallery and the Rehn Galleries, and with other galleries and museums where his paintings were exhibited. Mangravite's mural commissions are also discussed. Additional events documented include Mangravite's two Guggenheim Fellowships and his trip to Europe in 1955 to interview famous artists.
Mangravite's long teaching career is also documented in correspondence with Columbia University, Sarah Lawrence College, Avon School, Fieldston School of the Ethical Culture Schools, Potomac School, Dana Hall School, and the Colorado Springs Fine Art Center. Other topics covered in the correspondence concern Mangravite's published or proposed writings, particularly articles and books reviews, most notably for the Saturday Review of Literature and American Magazine of Art. Mangravite's membership activities in a variety of artists' organizations, such as the College Art Association, the American Society of Painters, Sculptors and Gravers; the American Artists' Congress, and the American Federation of Arts is well-represented in the correspondence.
A list of major correspondents can be found in the series description for Series 1: Correspondence.
Series 3: Interviews with Artists includes audio recordings, transcripts, photographs, notes and reports. During the summer of 1955, Mangravite traveled to England, France, and Italy where he conducted interviews with eight artists - Georges Braque, Marc Chagall, Giorgio De Chirico, Marino Marini, Henry Moore, Giorgio Morandi, Georges Rouault, and Graham Southerland - recording their ideas about art, life, and education. In 1972, Mangravite recorded an interview with Rufino Tamayo in Mexico City, and the two artists were photographed together on that occasion.
Series 4: Writings, Notes, and Lectures consists of articles, papers, talks, lectures, miscellaneous writings, and notes by Mangravite, and a small number of items by other writers. Series 5: Miscellaneous Records includes art work by Mangravite and others, audiovisual records, biographical information, and financial records. Among the printed matter in Series 6 are articles, exhibition announcements, invitations, catalogs, and miscellaneous printed items by and about Mangravite, art-related topics, and other subjects. In Series 7: Photographs, photos of people include Mangravite, students, and other artists. Photos of works of art are of murals and paintings by Mangravite and sculpture by Edgar Britton.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged into 7 series:
Missing Title
Series 1: Correspondence, 1918-1977 (Boxes 1-2; 1.75 linear ft.; Reels 5878-5880)
Series 2: Subject Files, 1940-1960 (Box 2; 0.25 linear ft.; Reel 5880-5881)
Series 3: Interviews with Artists, 1955, 1972 (Boxes 3, 8; 0.65 linear ft.; Reel 5881)
Series 4: Writings, Notes and Lectures, 1928-1965 (Box 3; 0.35 linear ft.; Reel 5881)
Series 6: Printed Matter, 1918-1982 (Boxes 4-6; 2.65 linear ft.; Reels 5881-5882)
Series 7: Photographs, circa 1926-circa 1970 (Boxes 7-8; 0.4 linear ft.; Reel 5882)
Biographical Note:
In 1914, at the age of eighteen, Peppino Gino Mangravite (1896-1978) settled in New York City with his father. The young man had already completed six years of study at the Scuole Techiniche Belle Arti in his native Italy, where coursework included the study of anatomy and Renaissance fresco techniques. Upon arrival in New York, he enrolled at Cooper Union, and by 1917 was studying under Robert Henri at the Art Students League.
Mangravite began his teaching career - one that lasted half a century - as assistant to Hans Peter Hansen at the Hansen School of Fine Arts in New York during the academic year 1918/19. He was an involved and committed teacher who worked equally well with young children and college students. For several summers in the 1920s, he ran summer art camps in the Adirondacks for children and adults. From 1926-1928 Mangravite lived in Washington D.C., where he taught at the Potomac School. The majority of his life was spent in New York where he served on the faculties of Sarah Lawrence College, Cooper Union, the Art Students League, and, most notably, Columbia University. In addition, he spent 1937-38 as head of the art department of Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center, and from 1940-1942 taught at the Art Institute of Chicago. Mangravite was active in professional arts and education organizations. He wrote a number of articles about art education and served as chairman of the College Art Association's Committee for the Study of the Practice of Art Courses, 1943-1944.
In addition to teaching studio courses, Mangravite was a working artist. Represented by Dudensing Gallery, and later Rehn Galleries, he exhibited widely throughout the United States, and, occasionally, abroad. He won a number of awards, including a gold medal for mural painting at the Philadelphia Sesquicentennial Exhibition, 1926; the American Gold Medal Purchase Prize, Golden Gate Exposition, San Francisco, 1939; Alice McFadden Eyre Medal for best print, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, 1946; and a silver medal for mosaic design, Architectural League of New York, 1955. Mangravite was awarded Guggenheim Fellowships in 1932 and 1935, and during that same period was commissioned by the U.S. Treasury Department to paint murals for post offices in Hempstead, N.Y. and Atlantic City, N.J. Other commissions of note include a mural for the Governor's Mansion in the Virgin Islands, and a mosaic mural for the main altar of the Workers' Chapel, St. Anthony's Shrine, Boston, Mass.
Sponsored by Columbia University and with the assistance of the United States Information Agency, Mangravite met with art department heads of several European universities in 1955 to discuss Columbia University's plans for a new arts center. He also interviewed eight artists - Georges Braque, Marc Chagall, Giorgio De Chirico, Marino Marini, Henry Moore, Giorgio Morandi, Georges Rouault, and Graham Southerland -recording their ideas about art, life, and education.
Peppino Mangravite died in 1978.
Provenance:
Most of the collection was donated by Peppino Mangravite in 1977. Additional papers were donated in 2003 by his daughter Denise Mangravite Scheinberg that include records documenting Mangravite's 1955 interviews with European artists, a sound recording and photographs of his meeting with Rufino Tamayo in 1972, a motion picture film of Mangravite's painting class at the Potomac School, and a small number of printed items.
Restrictions:
The collection is open for research. Patrons must use microfilm copy.
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.
The Jane Wade papers regarding art dealer and New York gallery owner Curt Valentin, measure 0.6 linear feet and date from 1903-1971. This small collection consists of papers donated by former Curt Valentin Gallery employee Jane Wade, which provide scattered documentation of Valentin's life and exhibitions at the Buchholz Gallery (renamed Curt Valentin Gallery in 1951) including biographical material, correspondence from artists Valentin represented, writings and notes, lists documenting clients, exhibitions held, and artwork by Picasso sold by the gallery, clippings of obituaries for Valentin, and a complete set of Buchholz Gallery exhibition catalogs from 1937-1948.
Scope and Contents:
The Jane Wade papers regarding art dealer and New York gallery owner Curt Valentin, measure 0.6 linear feet and date from 1903-1971. This small collection consists of papers donated by former Curt Valentin Gallery employee Jane Wade, which provide scattered documentation of Valentin's life and exhibitions at the Buchholz Gallery (renamed Curt Valentin Gallery in 1951) including biographical material, correspondence from artists Valentin represented, writings and notes, lists documenting clients, exhibitions held, and artwork by Picasso sold by the gallery, clippings of obituaries for Valentin, and a complete set of Buchholz Gallery exhibition catalogs from 1937-1948.
Valentin's biographical material is in German and includes his baptismal certificate, a report book from Hamburg University, a letter of recommendation from Commetersche Kunsthandlung, a 1937 permit authorizing Valentin to buy and sell the work of German artists outside Germany, and his 1950 passport.
Valentin's correspondence is primarily with artists and includes letters from Ben-Zion, Reg Butler, Alexander Calder, Jan Cox, Lyonel Feininger, John Flannagan, Barbara Hepworth, Karl Knaths, Gerhard Marcks, André Masson, Henry Moore, Clifford Odets, Carl Pickhardt, Alton Pickens, John Piper, Kurt Roesch, and Graham Sutherland. There are also photocopies of three letters in German from Georg Kolbe. Many of the letters are substantial and provide details about the artists and their work. Also found are a letter vouching for Valentin's loyalty to the United States from Alfred Barr, and two 1942 letters from France from art dealer Henry Kahnweiler, containing news of European artists including Picasso and André Masson.
Jane Wade's correspondence extends to her time working for Otto Gerson at Fine Arts Associates, and includes letters from some of the artists whose work was handled by Curt Valentin, including Alexander Calder, Lois Dailey, and Henry Moore. There are also thirteen letters and telegrams from David Smith, with some responses from Jane Wade and Otto Gerson, which document exhibitions and details of his artist-dealer relationship with Gerson and include sketches of his sculpture with information about prices. Also found in Wade's correspondence are letters from Gertrude Lennart and Marino Marini. Lennart describes the last days of Valentin's life as she accompanied him on a visit to Marini in Italy in August 1954.
There are three folders of condolence letters written upon Valentin's death, from artists, museum and gallery professionals, and other colleagues and friends.
Writings and notes include two appreciations of Valentin written after his death by André Masson and Henry Moore, and a sheet of notes written by John Flannagan with an accompanying note entitled "Some of Johns' thoughts...."
Printed material is comprised of news clippings of obituaries and reviews of a memorial exhibition for Valentin, in addition to a complete set of bound exhibition catalogs for Buchholz Gallery from 1937-1948. Also found is a bound collection of 1929 exhibition catalogs for Galerie Alfred Flechtheim.
Artwork includes a Christmas card from Valentin designed by an artist whose name is illegible; a print by Gerhard Marcks; and a colored pencil sketch of "127 Evil Eye II" on Curt Valentin letter head, with an address on the Rue de Seine written beside it.
Photographs include two of Valentin in his gallery and two of an unidentified woman, possibly Jane Wade, in the gallery; a folder of photographs of Valentin's apartment showing his art collection; a photo of a Robert Osborn cartoon about Valentin; and a photo of "Portrait of Curt Valentin" by Jacques Lipchitz.
Arrangement:
The collection is arranged as a single series.
Series 1: Jane Wade Papers Regarding Curt Valentin, 1903-1971 (0.6 linear feet; Boxes 1-2)
Biographical / Historical:
Born in Germany in 1902, modern art dealer Curt Valentin immigrated to the United States in 1937 where he opened the Buchholz Gallery on West Forty-sixth Street in New York city. After two years he moved the gallery to West Fifty-seventh Street and in 1951 it was renamed the Curt Valentin Gallery.
Valentin's first job was with Alfred Flechtheim, the leading dealer in modern art in Berlin at that time. In 1934 he began working with Karl Buchholz in Hamburg, selling modern art classified as degenerate by the Nazi government from the rear of Buchholz's bookstore. In 1937 Valentin was granted a permit from the Reichskammer der bildenden Kunste in Berlin to purchase and sell German artwork outside of Germany. He left Germany that same year with a number of pictures and came to the United States.
Valentin was a widely respected dealer who specialized in modern paintings, sculpture, and prints, and handled the work of major artists including Alexander Calder, John Flannagan, Gerhard Marcks, Marino Marini, and Henry Moore.
Valentin died suddenly of a heart attack at the age of 52, while visiting Mario Marini in Italy in 1954.
Jane Wade was employed as Valentin's assistant and continued to help run the Curt Valentin Gallery after his death, until it closed in 1955. She then worked for Otto Gerson at Fine Arts Associates, where she helped to handle the works of some of the artists previously represented by Valentin.
Related Materials:
The bulk of Curt Valentin's papers are held by the Museum of Modern Art Archives.
Provenance:
The Jane Wade papers were donated by Jane Wade in 1976. The catalogs of exhibitions organized by Curt Valentin were donated in 1977 by Jane Wade. In 2018 the two collections were merged and named the Jane Wade papers regarding Curt Valentin.
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.
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Gallery owners -- New York (State) -- New York Search this
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The Coventry tapestry : The genesis of the great tapestry in Coventry Cathedral. Text edited by Andrew Révai based on conversations with the artist. Introd. by Eric Newton
