The Museum of American Folk Art New York City
MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN INDIAN ART
Crow Pictographic Shirt, c. 1890
MORNING
STAR GALLERY
513 CANYON ROAD SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO 87501 TEL 505 982-8187
STEVE HILLER • AMERICAN FOLK ART •
THOMAS CHAMBERS 1807-after 1865 "Storm Tossed Ship", 14" x 18" sight, oil on canvas. This subject has been seen before in Chamber's paintings. See: AMERICAN NAIVE PAINTING OF THE 18TH AND 19TH CENTURIES; 111 Masterpieces from the collection of Edgar William and Bernice Chrysler Garbisch, plate 72, illus.
17 East 96th Street, New York, New York 10128.(212) 348-5219 Hours: 2 pm to 6 pm daily plus by appointment
THIRD ANNUAL POTTERY SHOW with RobertE Nichols ofSanta Fe, New Mexico
January 24
until February 10. Zuni Jar, Circa 1900.
Opening reception Tuesday,January 23,5-8 PM at:
KELTER-MALCE
3A 61. 131eeN cke:StT / New i. York City 101 0 U 4 / 212-9E89:676S O
Navajo pictorial rug 5'8" x 4' 7" Circa 1920's.
KELTER- ALCE
1001U 4 / 212-9E89:676SO City . i cker7StT I New York 3 A 61 BileeN
RICCO/MARESCA "You've Got the Mind of Me Because Everytime You Look at My Art,That's the Mind" Thornton Dial, Sr., August 27, 1989
"The Tiger Cat Standing Straight Up(Tired of Walking on Four Legs)"by Thornton Dial, Sr., 1989. 72"11x 48"W We are pleased to announce our representation and first show of work by members ofthe Dial Family, January 16th - February 17th. Hours are Tuesday - Friday Ilam - 6pm,Saturday Noon - 6pm. 105 HUDSON STREET/NEW YORK, N.Y. 10013/212.219.2756
SYMBOLS ,oirAMERICA
China trade Ship portrait,"THE UNITED STATES"
(Circa 1800-1810)
15 x 20 inches
In 1797 "THE UNITED STATES" was launched in Philadelphia. William Rush created her allegorical figurehead "THE GODDFsS OF LIBERTY, THE GENIUS OF THE UNITED STATES The first U.S. Navy frigate, she was the flag ship of Commodore John Barry. He received his commission directly from George
Washington. Here"THE UNITED STATES"is proudly flying her own private ensign,an EAGLE WITH SHIELD AND SUNBURST OF STARS. Her commission pennant and THE STARS AND STRIPES FLAG are emphasized by their sizes. She is also displaying the flags, each numbered,of the late 18th century maritime nations. Each nation is named, with its flag numbered, in the diamond and oval border.
Through its iconography. the painting lays claim to a prominent place among trading nations for the fledgling United States of America.
PETER HILL,INC. Significant Nineteenth Century American Arts Maplewood Manor,East Lempster, NH 03605
"Mephone and Fax:603-863-3656 (by appointment)
friv 114 lirlrprr 41
Broken Star wrIlimbling Block Border
c. 1850 Ohio
78" x 78"
Wool Log Cabin
Mennonite
c. 1850
Lancaster County, Pennsylvania
78" x 78"
he country's foremost collection of antique American quilts and Folk Art from the 19th and 20th centuries. Hundreds of quilts available, including Amish, Patriotic, Album, Chintz, and Applique. Quilts bought and sold. Catalog available upon request—$3.00
Rare Silk Touching Star Quilt 86" x 87"
c. 1860
New York State
Quilts of America, Inc., 431 E. 73rd St., New York, N.Y. 10021 212/535-1600 Mon-Sat 10:30 to 6:30 or by appointment
6
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c 1920 Indiana
Quilts of America, Inc., 431 E. 73rd St., New York, N.Y. 10021 212/535-1600 7
Robert Cargo
FOLK ART GALLERY Southern, Folk, and African-American Quilts Antiques • Folk Art
• • or, • • • • • • • • • • ••• • • fp • • • • • • • • • • • • •
• • • • • • • • • • • • co • • • • • • • • • • • • • 411 • • • • • 4
Yvonne Wells. Yesterday: Civil Rights in the South, 66" x 68", cottons and cotton blends, 1989. Mrs. Wells' quilts are included in the exhibition "Stitching Memories: African-American Story Quilts," Williams College, Williamstown, MA. They were shown at the Terrada Gallery in Tokyo in 1987 as part of a show entitled "The Art of Black America," and her work has been shown at the Museum of Art in Birmingham and at the Museum of Fine Arts in Montgomery. Her Noah's Ark quilt will be in an up-coming exhibition at the Museum of American Folk Art in New York and she was recently invited to show her work at the symposium held in conjuction with the exhibition of slave-made quilts at the Museum. Open weekends only and by appointment
8
Robert Cargo FOLK ART GALLERY 2314 Sixth Street, downtown Tuscaloosa, Alabama 35401 Saturday 10:00-5:00, Sunday 1:00-5:00 In New York area call 201/322-8732.
205/758-8884 Home phone
JOSEPH YOAKUM 1 8 8 6 - 1 9 7 2
Joseph Yoakum, Mt. Olympus of Cumberland Mountain Range near Wincheste Kentuckey, 1971, colored pencil and pen on paper, 12 x 19".
The Janet Fleisher Gallery represents Joseph Yoakum watercolors from several important collections. We are also actively acquiring works by Joseph Yoakum. An illustrated color catalogue is available for $18.00 ppd."
Janet Fleisher GALLERY 211 South 17th Street PHILADELPHIA PA 1 9 1 0 3
9
AMERICAN ANTIQUES & QUILTS
Framed center child's quilt Pieced and applique New York State Doted 1851 54 x 43 inches Illustrated in Crib Quilts and Other Small Wonders,(E P Dutton New York), plate 27
BLANCHE GREENSTEIN THOMAS K. WOODARD 835 Madison Avenue New York, N.Y. 10021 •(212) 988-2906 •
We are always interested in purchasing exceptional quilts Photographs returned promptly
THE CIA,"ION MI ,
AMERICA'S FOLK ART MAGAZINE The Museum of American Folk Art New York City
Volume 15, No. 1
FEATURES
Ben Apfelbaum
FISH DECOYS
Winter 1990
46
A Native American Craft Jacqueline M. Atkins
JOSEPH E. YOAKUM
50
Visionary Traveler Lee Kogan
THE QUILT LEGACY OF ELIZABETH,NEW JERSEY
58
Jeanne Riger
NEW LIGHT ON GERRITT SCHIPPER THE PAINTER
65
DEPARTMENTS EDITOR'S COLUMN
13
MINIATURES
42
DIRECTOR'S LETTER
45
BOOK REVIEWS
72
DEVELOPMENTS
78
MAJOR DONORS
79
NEW MEMBERSHIP
86
MUSEUM NEWS
90
INDEX TO ADVERTISERS
96
Cover: Brook Trout Decoys; Oscar Peterson; Cadillac, Michigan; Circa 1935-1940; Painted wood,tack eyes, metal fins, carved mouth, multiple line tie; Top to bottom:9Y4", Collection of North American Fish Decoy Partners; 7", Private collection; 7", Collection of Steven Michaan; 7", Private collection. 7", Private collection; 7",Private collection. Photo: Fred Collins Studios Inc. The Clarion is published four times a year by the Museum of American Folk Art,61 West 62nd Street, NY,NY 10023, 212/977-7170. Telecopier 212/977-8134. Annual subscription rate for members is included in membership dues. Copies are mailed to all members. Single copy $4.50. Published and copyright 1990 by the Museum of American Folk Art,61 West 62nd Street, NY, NY 10023. The cover and contents of The Clarion are fully protected by copyright and may not be reproduced in any manner without written consent. Opinions expressed by contributors are not necessarily those of the Museum of American Folk Art. Unsolicited manuscripts or photographs should be accompanied by return postage. The Clarion assumes no responsibility for the loss or damage ofsuch materials. Change of Address: please send both old and new addresses and allow five weeks for change. Advertising: The Clarion accepts advertisements only from advertisers whose reputation is recognized in the trade, but despite the care with which the advertising department screens photographs and texts submitted by its advertisers, it cannot guarantee the unquestionable authenticity of objects or quality ofservices advertised in its pages or offered for sale by its advertisers, nor can it accept responsibility for misunderstandings that may arise from the purchase or sale of objects or services advertised in its pages. The Museum is dedicated to the exhibition and interpretation offolk art and feels it is a violation of its principles to be involved in or to appear to be involved in the sale of works of art. For this reason,the Museum will not knowingly accept advertisements for The Clarion which illustrate or describe objects that have been exhibited at the Museum within one year ofthe placing of the advertisement.
Winter 1990
11
THE CLARION
•
Did Barrett, Editor and Publisher Willa S. Rosenberg, Acting Editor and Publisher Faye H. Eng, Anthony T. Yee,Art Directors Marilyn Brechner, Advertising Manager Hildegard 0. Vetter, Production Manager Craftsmen Litho,Printers Nassau Typographers, Typesetters MUSEUM OF AMERICAN FOLK ART Administration Dr. Robert Bishop, Director Gerard C. Wertkin,Assistant Director Cheryl Hoenemeyer, Controller Deborah de Bauernfeind,Assistant to the Director Mary Ziegler, Administrative Assistant Sylvia Sinckler, Shop Accountant Jeff Sassoon, Junior Accountant Brent Erdy, Reception Luis Fernandez, Manager, Mailroom and Maintenance Collections & Exhibitions Elizabeth V. Warren, Curator Michael McManus,Director ofExhibitions Ann-Marie Reilly, Registrar Karen S. Schuster, Director ofthe Eva and Morris Feld Gallery Catherine Fulcushima, Assistant Gallery Director Stacy C. Hollander, Assistant Curator ofCollections Diane Wittner, Assistant Gallery Director Mary Black, Consulting Curator Lee Kogan,Senior Research Fellow
Ball Toss Camiviii Game Figure,circa 1850
THE
AMES GALLERY OF
AMERICAN
FOLK ART
2661 Cedar Street Berkeley, California 94708 415/845-4949
• We specialize in exceptional 18th-20th Century handmade objects. Our extensive selection of quilts, carved canes, tramp art, folk paintings and sculpture are available for viewing. Phone for exhibit information, hours or appointment.
12
Departments Didi Barrett, Director ofPublications Beth Bergin, Membership Director Marie S. DiMaimo,Director ofMuseum Shops Susan Flamm,Public Relations Director Alice J. Hoffman,Director ofArt Services/Licensing and Home Furnishings Johleen D. Nester, Director ofDevelopment Willa S. Rosenberg, Acting Director ofPublications Edith C. Wise.,Director ofLibrary Services Egle Victoria Zygas, Curator ofEducation Janey Fire, Karla Friedlich, Photographic Services Chris Cappiello, Membership Associate Eileen Jear, Development Associate Programs Barbara W. Cate,Director, Folk ArtInstitute Lee Kogan,Assistant Director, Folk Art Institute Phyllis A. Tepper, Registrar, Folk ArtInstitute Dr. Marilyn Karp, Director, New York University Master's and Ph.D.Program in Folk Art Studies Dr. Judith Reiter Weissman, Coordinator, New York University Program Cathy Rasmussen,Director ofSpecialProjects Irma J. Shore, Director, Access to Art Eugene P. Sheehy,Museum Bibliographer Mary Linda Zonana, Coordinator, DocentPrograms Howard P. Fertig, Chairman, Friends Committee Museum Shop Staff Dorothy Gargiulo, Caroline Hohenrath, Sally O'Day, Rita Pollit, Managers Karen Williams, Mail Order, Marie Anderson, Laura Aswad, Judy Baker, Olive Bates, Gloria Blauhut, Sheila Carlisle, Elizabeth Cassidy, Shirley Chaiken, Muriel Chusid, Sally Elfant, Annette Ellis, Millie Galdstone, Elli Gordon, Cyndi Gruber, Carol Hauser, Marci Holden, Eleanor Katz, Nan Keenan, Annette Levande, Dorothy Litchtman, Katie McAuliffe, Nancy Mayer, Nina McLain,Sandra Miller, Theresa Naglack, Pat Pancer, Marie Peluso, Colette Pollitt, Marguerite Raptzian, Mary Rix, Frances Rojack, Myra Shaskan, Kathleen Spear, Maxine Spiegel, Doris Stack, Mary Walker, Mary Walmsly, Gina Westby, Doris Wolfson. Museum of American Folk Art Book and Gift Shops 62 West 50th Street New York, NY 10012 212/247-5611 'No Lincoln Square(Columbus Avenue between 65th and 66th) New York, NY 10023 212/496-2966 The Clarion
EDITOR'S COLUMN DIDI BARRETT
One of the most successful programs introduced by the Museum of American Folk Art is the Folk Art Institute, an accredited, Museum-based curriculum offering a concentration of study in American folk art and related disciplines. Now in its fifth year, the Folk Art Institute, under the direction of Barbara Cate, has expanded to offer individual lecture programs, as well as a course of study culminating in a Museum certificate. In addition, a lively, and very popular, series of hands-on crafts workshops are offered each semester. In fact, the Folk Art Institute schedule has gotten so complex that we can no longer list it fully in The Clarion. For the Spring course list contact the Institute office at 212/977-7170. Perhaps the most important thing to come out of the Folk Art Institute over
the last few years has been a significant body of new research produced by the students of the Institute through their papers and projects. In areas ranging from eighteenth century pottery to twentieth century environments, folk art scholarship has been richly enhanced. Three of the articles in this Winter 1990 issue of The Clarion are adaptations of research projects by students of the Folk Art Institute. Lee Kogan, a graduate, or Fellow, of the Institute and now the Assistant Director, has identified a new style of album quilt from nineteenth century Elizabeth, New Jersey. Her recognition of three examples began with a study of an album quilt in the collection of the Museum of American Folk Art. Jacqueline M. Atkins' article on Joseph Yoakum began as a paper for an
Institute course on Contemporary Expressions in Folk and Outsider Art. Through dogged pursuit of files in the Chicago Art Institute she presents a thorough look at the remarkable twentieth century visionary artist. Jeanne Riger's article on the Dutchborn early nineteenth-century artist Gerrit Schipper also began as a research paper. It turns up new information on the little known pastellist. Our final article is an excerptfrom an upcoming book on fish decoys tied to the Museum exhibition "Beneath the Ice: The Art ofthe Spearfishing Decoy" which opens February 15, 1990. It's an engaging interview with Native American carver Ben Chosa taken by Guest Curator Ben Apfelbaum.
cthsAiwar
Robert Reeves Extraordinary Folk Art Sculptural Objects Eccentric Furniture
49 South Prado Atlanta, Georgia 30309 404-874-1755 By Appointment
Bill Traylor 11" x 18"
Winter 1990
13
This charming domed box of poplar from Mahantongo Valley, Pennsylvania reveals a rare decoration of eagle and shield on each side panel. W. 10", circa 1820. .
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P.O. Box 1653 • Alexandria, Virginia 22313 • (703) 329-8612
THE TARTT GALLERY
CONTINUOUS INVENTORY MOSE T.. GIBSON. BLIZZARD, QUINN, SMITH, WEBSTER SUDDUTH, HARDIN, ALMON. BUTLER
2017 QUE ST. N.W. WASHINGTON D.C. 20009 2()2-332-5652 JOSITI I "NII:XICAN JOE HARDIN, UNTITLED, 1971. MIXED MEDIA ON PAPER, 17 x 131 / 4"
14
Highly Important American Furniture, Silver, Folk Art and Decorative Arts Auction to be held Friday,January 19, 1990 at 10 a.m. and Saturday,January 20, 1990 at 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. in our galleries at 502 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10022. Viewing is January 13 through January 18. For further information contact Dean Failey, Jeanne Sloane or John Hays at 212/546-1181. For catalogues telephone 718/784-1480. A fine and rare pictorial pieced and appliqued cotton coverlet, American, 1891. Estimate: $25,000-35,000. Property from a private New York collection.
CHRISTIE'S
Photo: Ellen Page Wilson
3 4". "Les Ondines"; Gabriel Leveque; Haiti; 1950; oil on masonite; 30 x 24/
CAVIN-MORRIS INC. Contemporary, Self Taught and Tribal Art 100 Hudson Street, New York, N.Y. 10013 212 226 3768 16
The America Hurrah Collection of
During the last 22 years as dealers in American textiles, we have been fortunate in being able to acquire many extraordinary quilts and bedcovers. On the following pages are ten of our earliest and rarest examples. Together they represent the most important assemblage of American bedcovers that has ever been publicly offered. Included in the collection are the antecedents of American quilts such as bed rugs, tambour work, whole cloth resist, and indigo glazed worsted spreads. There are also two dated 18th century quilts that include crewelwork center medallions; as well as superb examples of the more esoteric forms such as stenciling, broderie perse applique, and crewel embroidered blankets. We are offering these ten great American bedcovers as a collection only,and welcome inquiries from museums, prospective donors, and individual collectors. The collection will be shown by appointment only. The price is $285,000. KATE AND JOEL KOPP
HURRAH ERICA*11.
766 MADISON AVENUE • NEW YORK. NY.10021 • 212-535-1930 W.:„„
1753
TAMBOUR WORK CREWEL EMBROIDERED QUILT Block print border. Quilted in a chevron pattern with indigo linen thread. Signed and dated on linen in cross stitch "Mildred Cos Cob, Rhy 1753." Connecticut-New York border. This is the earliest date found on an American quilt. 84" x 78"
KATE AND JOEL KOPP 18
ERICA*HURRAH
766 MADISON AVENUE • NEW YORK, N.Y. 10021 • 212-535-1930
1787
CREWEL EMBROIDERED CENTRAL MEDALLION PIECED QUILT Linen and cotton. Signed "Rachel Mackey" and dated "1787" in three places. Rachel Mackey was born in September 1768, in New London, Chester County, Pennsylvania. Her grandfather, John Mackey, lived in New London township and was a member of the Constitutional Convention of July 15, 1776. 94" x 92"
THE BEST IN AMERICAN QUILTS
19
c. 1790
INDIGO BLUE RESIST QUILT Block printed on three panels of handspun linen and bound with an indigo resist printed tape. Found in Ohio. 98"x 92"
KATE AND JOEL KOPP 20
ERICA*HURRAH
766 MADISON AVENUE • NEW YORK. N.Y. 10021 • 212-535-1930
1795
CREWEL AND SILK EMBROIDERED CENTRAL MEDALLION PIECED QUILT Signed and dated "Mary Jones 1795' Found in Boston, Massachusetts. 96" x 94"
THE BEST IN AMERICAN QUILTS
21
1803
BED RUG Wool sewn with a running stitch on an olive green wool foundation. Cut pile. Made by Lucretia Rockwood Fairbanks, Plymouth, New Hampshire. Lucretia Rockwood Fairbanks was born July 25, 1775, and died January 29, 1817. She was the daughter of Timothy and Jemina Underwood Rockwood of Holliston, Massachusetts and married Reverend Drury Fairbanks on May 25, 1880, in Plymouth, New Hampshire. Initialed and dated "L.(?) F. 1803" Descended directly in the Fairbanks family. 100" x 99"
KATE AND JOEL KOPP 22
ERICA*HURRAH
766 MADISON AVENUE • NEW YORK, N.Y. 10021 • 212-535-1930
1806
BED RUG Wool sewn with a running stitch on a brown wool foundation. Uncut pile. Attributed to the Packard family of Jericho, Vermont. Initialed and dated "BNP 1806." A remarkably similar example made by Rachel Packard of Jericho, Vermont, dated 1805, is in the collection of The Henry Ford Museum, Dearborn, Michigan. 96" x 90"
THE BEST IN AMERICAN QUILTS
23
c. 1800
INDIGO GLAZED WORSTED WHOLE CLOTH QUILT Made in three panels. The reverse is made from two shades of lighter blue handspun wool. The quilting design is influenced by the style of 18th century bed rugs. New England.98" x 9d'
KATE AND JOEL KOPP
24
ERICA*HURRAH
766 MADISON AVENUE • NEW YORK, N.Y. 10021 • 212-535-1930
• go.;1°' /O4S%
c. 1830
STENCILED BED COVER Motifs including owls, songbirds, cornucopias filled with flowers and baskets of fruits are stenciled and painted on cotton. Cut for a four-poster bed. New York State. 1021/2" x 88"
THE BEST IN AMERICAN QUILTS
25
1842-43
BRODERIE PERSE APPLIQUE Signed and dated "Lily Corliss 1842" and "Lydia Corliss 1843." Probably Maryland. The applique technique used in this quilt, in which cut out chintz motifs are applied to the background fabric, is called broderie perse (translating from the French meaning Persian embroidery). This bed cover is unusual in that the motif in each block is made up of many different chintz elements, resulting in no two designs being alike. 104" x 96"
KATE AND JOEL KOPP 26
H
ERICA*
URRAH
766 MADISON AVENUE • NEW YORK, N.Y. 10021 • 212-535-1930
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Felix the Cat, Little Lulu, Nancy and Sluggo, Woody Woodpecker, Yogi Bear, The Flintstones, Quick Draw McGraw,and other cartoon characters. These rag dolls were hand made by a Texas mother for her children and combined in a quilt. 68" x 80": Parker County, Texas, c. 1960.
7
1050 Second Avenue, Gallery #57, New York, NY 10022 (212)838-2596
New York City's largest, most exciting selection of:•Antique Quilts•Coverlets•Paisley Shawls•Beacon/Pendleton Blankets •Marseilles Spreads•Amish Buggy Shawls•Hooked Rugs•Vintage Decorative Accessories MI American Folk Art•
George Washington Napoleon Bonaparte Tobacco silk premiums pieced quilt, 53" x 63"; New England: c. 1880.
Significant Figures in History:
Bill Traylor, Horse, 1939-1942, pencil, gouache on paper,1342 by 21112 inches. Auction estimate:$10,000-12,000.
Important Furniture,Folk Art,Folk Paintings, Silver, Export Porcelain and Prints Auction: Wednesday,January 25 through Saturday, January 27 at 10:15 am and 2 pm each day. Exhibition: Opens Saturdayjanuary 20. This auction will include a selection ofImportant Twentieth Century American Folk Art. Illustrated catalogue:$46,sale code 5968. To order with a credit card, call(800)44-SOTHEBYS. Outside the continental U.S., call (203)847-0465. Inquiries:Furniture,(212)606-7130;Folk Art and Paintings,(212)606-7225;Silver,(212)606-7160;Export Porcelain,(212)606-7180;Prints,(212)606-7117. Sotheby's,1334 York Avenue, New York, NY.10021.
SOTHEBY'S FOUNDED 1744
29 4:1) Sotheby's,Inc., 1989 John L. Marion,principal auctioneer, #524728
EPSTEIN/POWELL 22 Wooster St., New York,N.Y. 10013 By Appointment(212)226-7316 Jesse Aaron Rifka Angel David Butler William Dawson Charlie Dieter Mr. Eddy Antonio Esteves Howard Finster Victor Joseph Gatto(Estate) S.L.Jones Lawrence Lebduska Justin McCarthy Emma Lee Moss Inez Nathaniel Joe Polinski Old Ironsides Pry Nellie Mae Rowe Jack Savitsky Clarence Stringfield Mose Tolliver Floretta Warfel George Williams Luster Willis and others
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Victor Joseph Gatto
(Mon Canvas,24"x 32")
MARTHAJACKSON Specializing in 19th and Early 20th Century Quilts Exhibiting In: Diane Wendy Shows White Plains County Center White Plains, NY January 26-28, 1990 Italian American Center Stamford, CT February 16-18, 1990 By Appointment Riverside, Connecticut 06878 (203)637-2152
"Baskets" Crib Quilts 40' X 411 / 2", C. 1880's
30
Main Street Cellar, 120 Main Street New Canaan. CT 06840 (203)966-8348—Mon.-Sat. 10-5
STELLA RUBIN Fine Antique Quilts and Decorations -4W 12300 Glen Road Potomac, MD 20854 (Near Washington, D.C.)
By ap
(301) 948•4187
Wde ih AMERICAN FOLK AND OUTSIDER ART BY APPOINTMENT
834 B WESTMOUNT DRIVE LOS ANGELES CA 90069 213 . 657 . 6369
CLEMENTINE HUNTER.'COTTON PICKING' . HOUSE PAINT ON BOARD. 22"x30"
31
Suffragette Quilt, Circa 1912, Tuscarawas County, Ohio
SUSAtiL
rARRISri
ANTIQUE QUILTS• FOLK ART • AMERICAN INDIAN ART
390 BLEECKER ST., NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK 10014 (212) 645-5020
Ruth
Bigel
743 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10021 Telephone 212/734-3262
Antiques
Specializing in Canton Porcelain, Fine Painted American Country Furniture, Weathervanes. Monday through Saturday, 11 am to 5 pm
Wt\de it, AMERICAN FOLK AND OUTSIDER ART BY APPOINTMENT
834 B WESTMOUNT DRIVE LOS ANGELES CA 90069 213. 657. 6369
MATTIE LOU O'KELLEY . 'SNOWY DAY IN GEORGIA' . 1975 . OIL ON CANVAS . 28"x40"
I
t'r 33
Carruth Studio, Inc. 760 Warehouse Rd., Suite E Toledo, OH 43615 Phone (419) 382-7790
GEORGE CARRUTH HANDCARVED STONE OBJECTS Introducing the unique stonecarvings of American artist, George Carruth. Indiana limestone is the medium for these original handcarved images. Please phone or write for more information.
Limestone Vessels, Cat measures 6" x 14",Jester measures 71 / 2" x 18"
FOLK ART GALLERY Ship's figurehead from Brigantine Clifford 24" x 40"
1187 Lexington Avenue New York, N.Y. 10028 Between 80th and 81st Sts. (212) 628-5454 11-5 Monday thru Saturday 34
AMERICAN PRIMITIVE GALLERY THE PEACEABLE KINGDOM - ANIMALS IN AMERICAN FOLK ART -
Photo L Khornak
Sculpture and paintings of the ninetenth and twentieth centuries including works by Outsider artists.
January 6 - February 3 AMERICAN PRIMITIVE GALLERY 596 Broadway - Room 205 New York, NY 10012
AARNE ANTON Mon. - Fri. 10-6; Sat. 11-5 (212) 966-1530
THE MOKI SERAPE Navajo Serapes with thin, alternating blue and brown stripes were preferred as wearing blankets by members ofthe Hopi tribe."Moki"is a Navajo slang word for a Hopi. Between 184-o and 1880, Navajo Serapes with thin, alternating blue and brown stripes came to be known as"Moki Serapes;'or sometimes just as"Mokis." The nine blankets pictured on the opposite page were woven during that period. Lorenzo Hubbel,founder ofHubbel's Trading Post in Ganado,Arizona,was an avid collector of Moki Serapes during the late 188os and 189os. Many ofthe Moki Serapes collected by Hubbel were sold during the 1900s and 1910s to J. F. Huckel and Herman Schweizer, both of whom were acting as purchasing agents for the Fred Harvey Company. At one time, there were more than fifty Moki Serapes in the Fred Harvey Company Indian Arts Collection. Thirty-two ofthese Harvey Company Moki Serapes were resold to William Randolph Hearst during the 1920S, and are now in the collection ofthe Museum of Natural History at the University ofSouthern California in Los Angeles. In August of1990, Joshua Baer & Company will present the first major exhibition of Moki Serapes. In conjunction with the exhibition, Joshua Baer & Company will publish The Moki Serape, a fully illustrated text focusing on the art and the history of the Moki Serape. If you have a Moki Serape for sale, or if you own a Moki Serape which you feel should be included in the exhbition and the book,please send pictures to the address below,or call Joshua Baer at sos 988 — 8944.
JOSHUA BAER & COMPANY ClassicAmerican Indian Art II6V2 EAST PALACE AVENUE
SANTA FE
505 988 - 8944.
NEW MEXICO 87501
•
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Nine Moki Serapes(one is Zuni, the other eight are Navajo), ranging in datefrom 186o to 1885. Each ofthe Serapes is approximately so inches wide by 76 inches long. 37
MAIN STREET ANTIQUES and ART Colleen and Louis Picek Folk Art and Countrty Americana (319)643-2065 110 West Main, Box 340 West Branch, Iowa 52358
$air
On Interstate 80
Send a self-addressed stamped envelope for our monthly Folk Art and Americana price list
A few of our interesting old ice fishing decoys.
Rag Carpets sewn together for Area Rugs
Pie Galinat 230 wlOth St., n.y. , n.y. 10014 (212) 741 - 3259
38
THE
SAN FRANCISCO SHOW FOLK, ETHNIC & TRIBAL ARTS PRE-1940
iv41vAIVALWAvATAvAvAlivAvAvA, A••AA AA••AA•A• ALA £4 AALAIIAAAAAILLAAk IVAVAIA VATATAVATAVAVAVATATATi
Tee av444 R00/4 Getatily e%ote Aa Pq4 4..
LATIN AMERICAN & HAITIAN FOLK ART
Carved wood tlgure, Southern U.S. c. 1860, courtesy Ames Gallery, Berkeley, CA
Saturday, February 10, 11:00 a.m.-7:00 p.m. Sunday, February 11, 11:00 a.m.-5:00 p.m. The Concourse at Showplace Square Eighth at Brannan, San Francisco General Admission $5.00 Over 100 dealers exhibiting African, American Folk, American Indian, Antiques, Artifacts, Baskets, Beadwork, Canes, Carvings, Cowboy, Decoys, Eskimo, Featherwork, Furniture, Himalayan, Indian, Indonesian, Jewelry, Masks, Metal, Naive Art, Oceanic, Oriental, Paintings, Philippine, Pre-Columbian, Quilts, Rugs, Samplers, Spanish Colonial, Textiles, Tribal Asia, Trade Signs, Weapons, and Weathervanes.
PREVIEW OPENING Saturday, February 10, 9:00 a.m.-11:00 a.m. Benefits the San Francisco Craft and Folk Art Museum. Preview admission $20.00 per person, includes refreshments hosted by Antiques and Fine Art magazine.
POTTERY TEXTILES MASKS HEADDRESSES SCULPTURE BASKETS WOOD CARVINGS TABLEWARE MIRRORS, PICTURE FRAMES CANDLESTICKS TOYS, DOLLS JEWELRY MINIATURES CHRISTMAS DECORATIONS, NATIVITIES VOODOO FLAGS AMAZON ARTIFACTS DAY OF THE DEAD OBJECTS RELIGIOUS ITEMS RETABLOS REBOZOS MAJOLICA LACQUERWARE MILAGROS PAPEL PICADO JUDAS FIGURES AND MUCH MORE... 131 SPRING ST • NEW YORK, NY 10012 A
Managed by: Caskey-Lees, P.O. Box 1637, Topanga, California 90290 213-455-2886
(212)431-0144
11 1r . 11111.
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Focus on Alabama Folk Art
0 SR 5 I( 1 , I 7..,.4 ; . 7;177•191 ,Ift%'tn. hi rt r• ,c. DOWM kti s e/V.IVR4 • sr itADLIS -T ' ',741 01 IH1 STILL WATERS H SOW,IS LEADEN sc. 04 !SWAPO
VE EWAN WKS FOR Hil ROTHIFOORESSWALK THRouo!“ , !1 11:4
A. rzn rpm I i fit! Mt SHADOW OF DiFtl"q° " 1 1111
We feature fine works by: Mose T., Jimmie Lee Sudduth, Lonnie Holley, Charlie & Annie Lucas, the late Juanita Rogers, and Rev. B.F. Perkins Gallery inquiries welcome
AlUViii d '.• Atm Evil. FoRItlYTrimi ' STAFF int Y '.. NT Ro D AND 11. PREPARtsIAT•at ii °KT nt • now PRESE•ic FoR1 01 iti Me 41: ' •t • ,..... ftlEiciit Iwo. ....IR LIT.thlinrIuHtilri' :i iirt:tosi. _. ,Jitt,../(T otiorEss xit ., ; .. DAIS yr.2.. pHALttilEI rol I ow ri t LowELL in. L t wit D roReviR-w=rs ei•m•-.0,:e...-4#;#-KtI.-...7A1 2
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Photographs of art available
SWEETGUM GALLERIES POST OFFICE BOX 5202 225 S. DECATUR STREET MONTGOMERY, ALABAMA 36103 (205) 834-5544
Fine antique quilts, hooked rugs, primitive and folk art, American paintings.
LUDY STRALJoS THE QUILT GALLERY 1611 Montana Avenue Santa Monica, Calif. 90403 213 393 1148 Amish Bars 1895-1900. Made by Fannie Black Stoltfoos, West End Township, Lancaster County, Penn.
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J.B. MURRY (1908-1988)
SANDRA BERRY A Contemporary American Artist at the
Barbara Schuller Gallery
Photo credit Stephen Myers
"Untitled," mixed media on paper, 28" x 22"
"Rushford" 1989 Redwood & Oilpaint Height:2'7" 345 Franklin, Buffalo New York 14202 716-852-1234
CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN OUTSIDER/FOLK ART Representing: David Butler Rev. Howard Finster Gerald Hawkes Clementine Hunter Rev. McKendree Long Sr. Gertrude Morgan and many other important Outsider artists
GASPERI GALLERY 320 JULIA STREET • NEW ORLEANS, LA 70130 (504) 524-9373
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MINIATURES NEWS AND EVENTS FROM AROUND THE COUNTRY
Etkititiois 4ousJup More than 100 works of 18 sculptors, painters, carvers and basket weavers will be on view in "0, Appalachia: Artists of the Southern Mountains" beginning December 2, 1989 and running through February 25, 1990 at the Huntington Museum of art, Park Hill, Huntington, WV,tel. 304/529-2701...
10: "Celebrating Cultural Diversity: Selections from the International Folk Art Collection;' focusing on Eastern Europe and Central American art objects, and "Into the Mainstream: Contemporary American Folk, Naive, and Outsider Art;' addressing some of the thorny issues surrounding
these terms. MiamiUniversity Art Museum,tel. 513/529-2232... "Hands On! Objects Crafted in Our Time;' the inaugural exhibition on view through May 1990 at the Museum's temporary home in the Wilshire/Fairfax store of the May Company, introduces their rapidly growing
permanent collection. Craft and Folk Art Museum, Los Angeles, CA,tel. 213/937-5544... The Newark Museum will feature "Janice Fenimore: Whimsical Wood Carvings and Whirligig?'in its new Contemporary Craft Gallery February 3-April 1. Tel. 201/596-6550...
The Miami University Art Museum is presenting concurrent exhibitions February 6-August
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Opossum and Her Cubs; Minnie Adkins.
Old Sturbridge Village is soliciting proposals for presentations at a symposium on Art, Popular Culture and Society in Rural New England, 1780-1850. The symposium will be held June 8-9,1992 at Sturbridge, MA,in conjunction with a new exhibition, "Meet Your Neighbors: Portraits, Painters, and Society in Rural New England': Proposals are due February 23, 1990. For inquiries,contact Caroline Sloat, Director of Publications, tel. 508/347-3362.
The Magician;Janice Fenimore.
elum, Polish Figures; Artists unknown; Poland; Circa 1930; Wood with polychrome painted decoration;Each figure approximately 50"H.;Elma Pratt International Folk Art Collection, Miami University Art Museum.
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Information on decorative and useful objects and their makers in the Washington City, Georgetown and Alexandria, VA, area is being sought as the subject of preliminary research for a future exhibition at the D.A.R. Museum in Washington, DC. Contact Wendy Kenerson, tel. 202/879-3241. The Clarion
U,
MINIATURES
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"Who'd A Thought It: Improvisation in African-American Quiltmaking;' an exhibition of 27 quilts by 20 AfricanAmerican seamstresses, explores their quiltmaking heritage from its origins to the present. Through January 28 at the American Craft Museum, New York City, tel. 212/956-3699...
the six New England States. Entry deadline for slides is February 16, 1990. For further information and entry form con-
tact New England Images III Contest, New England Quilters Guild, 256 Market Street, Lowell, MA 01852...
Star and Wheel; Arbie Williams; On view at the American Craft Museum.
"Humorous Patchwork;' an exhibition of 40 wall hangings stitched by quilters interpreting well-known patterns humorously, can be seen February 1March 18 at the New England Quilt Museum, Lowell, MA, tel. 508/452-4207... Curator Dr. Maude Southwell Wahlman has gathered a dazzling collection of quilts for the traveling exhibition. "Ten Afro-American Quilters:' The tour, which began in 1982, will stop through February 29 at the Miami Dade Public Library, Miami,FL,tel.407/275-2676... New England Images III announces a major juried competition of bed and wall quilts, miniatures and group quilts open to all quilters residing in Winter 1990
TWIi Wedding Quilt(Detail); Virginia; 2x 94"; Collection ofthe 1 1840-1850; 92/ Atlanta Historical Society.
4oeetiis4 Cia Dena Stewart, the well-known Florida folk artist, has been invited by UNICEF to be a Goodwill Ambassador and speak nationwide on their behalf. As UNICEF celebrates the fortieth anniversary of its greeting card this is a particularly poignant honor to be bestowed because it is the first time an
artist has been given this honor, let alone an American folk artist. Her greeting card design, "A Christmas Tree in the City:' was originally published in 1982 and has been reissued this year for the fourth year. A Christmas nee in the City;Dena Stewart.
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PORTRAIT OF MRS. ELIZA TOVVNSEND OF LOWELL, MASSACHUSETTS, BY RAY. AND S.A. SHUTE, 1832.
Watercolor and pencil on paper with applied metallic paper cut-outs. 24 x 20 inches. *Ted and dated on the reverse.
DAVID A. BUTIONSCI-1 30 EAST 76TH STREET, NEW YORK, NY 10021 212-439-6100
LETTER FROM THE DIRECTOR DR ROBERT BISHOP
Winter 1990
with the artists as well as a rich variety of miscellaneous documents ranging from newspaper clippings to letters from the artists themselves. The inventory of the collection, prepared by Edith Wise and the library staff, follows: Photographs Color prints: size 3 x 3W' 2x 5" 1 3/ 4 x 6" 5xr 8 x 12" Black-and-white prints: 314 x 5" 5 x 7" 8 x 10" 9 x 12" Photographic Negatives Color strips Black-and-white strips Photographic Transparencies Color and black-and-white; various sizes Photographic Slides Color slides Audiocassettes Miscellaneous Documents
11 1340 1032 7 3 153 80 296 1 924 191
Permanent Collection. In memory of his parents, Randy Siegel recently provided the funds to add three carvings by the southern artist, Charles Butler, to the Permanent Collection. Of special interest is the fact that the pieces were accompanied by the artist's handcarved-and-decorated work box containing his tools. If you have a wandering inclination, be sure to contact Beth Bergin, our Membership Director, about our Folk Art Explorers' Club. She plans an extensive offering of trips to visit private and public folk art collections and offers a challenging itinerary for the most venturesome. Join us in our celebration of America's great folk creativity.
24 598 30 193
Many of you have been generous contributors to the Museum and its
Left, hand-carved-and-decorated work box containing contemporary southern artist Charles Butler's tools. Right, two of Butler's carvings funded by Randy Siegel for the Permanent Collection.
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One great pleasure of serving as Director of the Museum of American Folk Art has been the opportunity to meet and become friends with an extraordinary array of fascinating, generous and challenging American folk. In the last issue of The Clarion we highlighted the many contributions of our former trustee and friend, the remarkable Esther Schwartz. I am saddened to report that another very important and very generous woman is no longer with us. Barbara Rubin Reynolds passed away at her home in Peacham, Vermont on July 30, 1989. Barbara and her husband Gregory, together with her son Leigh R. Weiner and his wife, Sharyn, have for many years contributed significantly to the Museum and its many programs. They provided funds for the acquisition of our"Great Flag" quilt made by Mary C. Baxter in Kearney, New Jersey,in 1898, and partial funds for the acquisition of the "Sacret Bibel" quilt stitched by Susan Arrowood of West Chester, Pennsylvania, circa 1895. They also offered substantial funding for several of the Museum's projects and significantly augmented the Endowment Fund for the Museum of American Folk Art/ Eva and Morris Feld Gallery at Lincoln Square. Chuck and Jan Rosenak, who are working with the Museum on the exhibition "The Cutting Edge: Contemporary American Folk Art" to be presented December 6, 1990 to February 17, 1991, have just given our library a resource of bibliographical and pictorial material relating to approximately 135 major folk artists of the twentieth century. A substantial portion of their gift is comprised of photographs and negatives taken of living artists by the Rosenaks. In addition, prints, photo enlargements, slides and an extensive inventory of transparencies are included. Augmenting the visual material is a number of audiocassettes of interviews
45
Fish Decoys A Native American Craft by Ben Apfelbaum
The recognition and study of fish decoys as a traditional American art form by anthropologists, folklorists or folk art historians is fairly recent. Even newer is the understanding thatthe form began with the Eskimos and Woodland Indians who used decoys, as the name suggests, as tools of the hunt. In this excerpt from the upcoming book Beneath the Ice: The Art of the Spearfishing Decoy, Native American carver and fisherman Ben Chosa, born on the Lac du Flambeau Reservation in Wisconsin, discusses his craft with Ben Apfelbaum. A tribal elder and an attorney, Chosa, age 61, is a man with a tremendous concern for the maintenance of tribal culture. He shares not only his personal memories, but also his rich knowledge and appreciation of his cultural past. • Ben Apfelbaum:I thought the best way to learn the art of the decoy, to see the ice, was to come to see you. Ben Chosa: Good. But you have to understand that the art, to me, is incidental. As far as the Ojibway spearfishing decoy is concerned, it was made to provide food for your family. That it was artistically pleasing to someone's eye was secondary. A perfect replica of a walleye,a perfect replica of a bass — if you want something like that, go to an artist, don't come to me.The decoy was first and foremost a tool of survival for the Ojibway. BA: But certain kinds of coloration, for 46
had a two man team. We sat down,and I remember him saying,"Here, well you pull the decoy!' I sat across from him; the sun was strong and pretty soon he was snoring, and I was pulling on that old decoy. And here comes a musky, looking huge to me — I imagine it was only fifteen, twenty pounds,actually. It came in there and I yelled, "Pa! Pa! there's a musky!" He says, "what, what?" "There's a musky here!" I cry. "Well spear it!" he says. I remember trying to take up the spear — heavy! I shouted,"I can't!" Pop jumped up, and he got 'im. It was our evening meal, you see. I don't know how old I was; I imagine 5,6,7. Ben Chosa examiningfish decoy.
example, may make them better tools. BC: They did use original dyes a long time ago, to color them. They also burned them, and used original plants for the dyes. They made their decoys red, green and everything else. A lot of people don't realize that they had these colors but they did. BA: Do you remember your first time ice fishing? BC: It was with my father. I don't know how old I was at the time but I do know that we walked, and I remember that when I got tired he put me on a sled. We
BA: Did he make his own decoys? BC: Yes, he did. He was one of the few that had iron spears. He had a threetined iron spear. I don't know where he got it. I used to go around the ice on skates in those days, watching things. We had teepees all over the lakes on the reservation. They were tall those teepees, maybe six foot tall, and they had the long spring spear sticking out of them, a fourteen or sixteen foot spear ...I used to go over there and watch Ed Christiansen in particular. I liked Old Man Ed him because he was good to me, you know. I'd stand out on the ice ... I wouldn't bother to spear ... and pretty soon I'd see that pole go up in the air, and down it would go, and then I'd walk over. He'd be standing there holding the spear."Hi ho Young Bear!" he'd say to me,"You come over to see the The Clarion
fish?" "Yeah!" "We117 he'd say, "you gotta wait awhile until I get him up here:' He'd pin him to the bottom, you see, holding him there until he died, and pretty soon up would come a 15-20 pound musky.
BC:Oh,I've been around making a few, each in a different stage of development.(Brings over decoys)
BA: Did you ever use the long spear?
BC: And sold? I actually don't know. I haven't sold many. Most of mine were kept for my own use, until very recently.
BC: No, I never did, even though I had the possibility to. About 50 years ago when I was a kid alot of the spearers were using the old flat teardrop decoy. Most of those were burnt to give them color. Billy Martin still makes them, along with some others. I think I'm going to make one, one of these days. They were using the teardrop decoy mostly, and most of the time they had buckskin fins and tail. They were really fast in the water, it was deadly on muskies. Some had yarn ... they were fashioned in such a way that they didn't need fms of metal. My father used both the teardrop and the regular kind, with tin fins and whatnot. BA: Any idea which of the two kinds came earlier? BC: Oh, the teardrop, definitely, because it didn't need the fins. In fact, I think generally that one of the reasons we didn't need as much action on a decoy in those days is because there were many, many more fish. And of course when you get a high population of fish in any given body of water, you're going to see more just naturally, but there's also afood factor there: there wasn't as much food, so they were easily attracted to anything that moved, and more apt to come in to the decoy. And I think that initially they just used a jigging type decoy. It was only gradually that they developed one that could go around in circles — the whole thing took several hundred years. It was fairly well developed by the time it was documented here in the late 1600s. BA: Very well developed, I would say. But this year you didn't make any? Winter 1990
BA: What's the first decoy you ever made?
BA: How will you finish this one? BC:This one? Plastic eyes,I'll paint the fins, and then I'll field test it, making a jigging stick for it. In fact mine are ready to be put into the lake. I field test everything. If they don't perform to my specifications I won't sell them. BA: These are beautiful. BC:They're variations of the sisco type, with the grey and the darker colors. BA: Do you ever incorporate innovations from manufactured decoys? BC: Never. I don't know what a manufactured decoy looks like. These are Ojibway decoys, they serve one purpose only. To lure a musky within range of a handheld spear. BA: Last winter how many fish did you get? BC:I didn't go out too much. Six times, maybe,and eight fish total. Which isn't much. I generally get 30 or 40 fish a season. To return to decoys, though, I wanted to say this: I don't do show decoys. There's a big difference between regular and show decoys, between Ojibway and show decoys. Show decoys are artistically pleasing to the individual, and that's it. They probably never hit the water, those decoys. BA: For many of those who like to look at them, the fact that they're real, that
they're working decoys, gives a special added edge to their appreciation. BC: Right. But what a person should really be looking for is the Ojibway working decoy. We were the ones who did it, you know. That one there, for example, worked great: I got bluegill, sucker, two siscos and a perch. Bk Why these fish with this decoy? BC: Why? Cause it's their food of course! You wouldn't put a piece of cake down there would you? (Laughs loudly). BA: True. Tell me how many people spear now? BC: Well, because of the work that Art [Kimball] has done, and other people, there's recently been an increase in activity. A lot of young fellows are going out and spearing. Six, seven years ago there were only 10 or 12, but now maybe 20 or 30 are spearing. People are still interested in it because it's fun,for one thing. BA: I know. Seeing the decoy, this painted bit of wood,put in the water and suddenly coming alive was a thrill. BC:Yes, but you have to understand that they don't always move in the water, they're not always made for that. The makers in Minnesota, for example... a lot of their decoys are made for that purpose, to hang in the water and not move. Sometimes they'd put along about five in there, all ofthem on reels, so in case a fish would come in and take one he wouldn't break a line or lose it. BA: Let's talk about coloring the fish again. I read in accounts of nineteenth century English travelers that the Ojibway decoys were mostly blue, dark blue. BC: Yes, dark blue, and alot of the fish were a greenish color. But you have to 47
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understand that the decoy, to work, has to be seen by a fish, which means from the bottom or from the side, not from the top. It has to look like something that he's used to eating. That's the key. And they used scent on the decoys. I do too but I use commercial scent.
back a week later and he put outfour big museum drawers filled with mostly plugs, some toggles, and some decorative fish carvings, but also some real Eskimo decoys.
Chosa goes to a cabinet, gets a decoy.
BA: No,they were simpler forms. There was a hole on top, and they were out of bone and antler, very interesting, with some beautiful decorative carving. This
BC: Now here's one I've had since the early forties. Notice that the gills are more lightly carved. That's typical of decoys earlier this century.
BC: Like these?
was all old nineteenth century stuff. I photographed them, and then said to my friend, "Now that you know what they are, I want to come and look at those of the Woodland Indians. I want Ojibway, the Cree collections!' He called me four days later to say sorry but he was unable to find even one. I said,"Look further, there's no question about it!' But he couldn't find any. I called the Lowie Museum in Berkeley, which is supposed to have the best
BA: This is such fascinating work, and yet when you see the decoys around in New York at the fancy galleries and whatnot, there is never any mention made of the fact that it is traditional Indian carving and that the tradition begins with the Eskimos or the Woodland Indians. BC: You know, last summer I got a call from the...1 think it was United States Native Arts and Crafts Board or something like that — an organization out of Washington, DC. They said they were very ashamed to inform me that they knew nothing about our fish decoys, and they wanted me to set up some kind ofa meeting so they could find out more about it. So I did. They took photographs of whatever decoys I had on hand at the time, and they said repeatedly that they were very ashamed. Well, they should be. This is a native American craft, of long standing. BA: It's funny, as soon as I started working on this project, I looked at an article that somebody had published years before — even before Art Kimball had published his book — in which it said that the decoy was originally an Eskimo craft. I went to the Museum of Natural History in New York and I said to the guy who's in charge of the collection that I'd like to look through the earliest Eskimo collections. "I want to look at the fish decoys!'"What?" he asked. "Okay," I said, "lures!' I went 48
The Clarion
collection of Eskimo materials around: Not a single Indian fish. BC: Isn't that something? BA: I went to the Heye Foundation, the Museum of the American Indian in New York; not a single decoy. The anthropologists collected and collected. And they have everything including the string the Ojibway used to clean their teeth in 1870.But not a fish.
BC: Not a single fish. BA: None. Maybe they didn't collect in the winter, but I think they did. BC: It could possibly be that they didn't collect in the winter, but it seems to me more likely that they would stay over and collect winter type artifacts. BA: The crafts board doesn't know anything about it, the anthropologists
don't know anything about it. Strange, don't you think? BC: Does it really surprise you? BA: Yes. And on the other hand, no. Ben Apfelbaum is a Ph.D. candidate at New York University. He was Curator of the exhibition "Tobacco Roads: The Popular Art of An American Pastime" at the City Gallery of New York under the aegis of the Museum of American Folk Art.
The Museum of American Folk Art will present"Beneath the Ice: The Art ofthe Fish Decoy"from February 15 to June 17, 1990,at the Eva and Morris Feld Gallery at Lincoln Square, Two Lincoln Square, Columbus Avenue and 66th Street. In conjunction with the exhibition, Beneath the Ice: The Art ofthe Spearfishing Decoy by Ben Apfelbaum, Eli Gottlieb, and Steven Michaan, will be published this spring by E.P. Dutton. The paperback book will be available through the Museum of American Folk Art Book and Gift Shop, livo Lincoln Square, New York, NY 10023. The price is $16.95 plus tax;for mail orders please add $4.00 for postage and handling.
Clockwisefrom upper left, Species unknown; Artist unknown; Minnesota; Circa 1 2"; Collection of Danielle Michaan. Species unknown; 1940; Painted wood; 8/ Andrew Trombley;Mt. Clemens, Michigan; Circa 1940;Glass eyes, painted wood; 9/ 1 2"; Collection ofSteven Michaan. Pike Store Sign; Oscar Peterson; Cadillac, Michigan; Carved eyes, painted wood, metalfins; 1920; 57'; Private collection. Pike: Oscar Peterson; Cadillac, Michigan; 1930; Partially painted wood, copper fins and eyes;9";Private collection. Species unknown;Artist unknown;Michigan; Date unknown; Painted wood, metalfins; 6"; Collection of North American Fish Decoy Partners. Species unknown; Artist unknown; Minnesota; Circa 1940; Painted wood, metalfins;3"; Collection ofSteven Michaan.
Winter 1990
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View of the Arctic Ocean at Sydnia Australia by Joseph E. Yoakum n.d.; Date unknown; Colored pencil, watercolor, ballpoint pen on paper: 12 .1: 18"; Courtesy ofJanet Fleisher Gallery.
When Joseph E. Yoakum was in his early seventies, he had a dream telling him that the Lord wanted him to draw.
He immediately began to do so, creating countless variations of majestic and powerful landscapes that transcend the
JOSEPH E.YOAKUM VISIONARY TRAVELER by Jacqueline M.Atkins 50
confines of paper and paint. He firmly believed that he could paint only in the manner in which God intended him: "What I don't get, God didn't intend me to have, and what I get is God's blessing:" What he did "get" was an extraordinary sense of the dramatic and an artistic self-confidence that expressed itself in emphatic and instinctively correct combinations of line and movement. Yoakum said he worked by means of "spiritual unfoldment:' Some take this to mean that his images were revealed to him as he drew rather than The Clarion
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that he started with a preconceived idea of what the piece would look like when it was complete; others suggest that it refers to the revelation of the essential spirit of the location portrayed in the work.3 Yoakum undoubtedly would have agreed with both points of view. He claimed to have a "photographically perfect memory" (although he often forgot people's names) and to draw places that he had seen in his travels as a circus handyman and rover; whether he did indeed see all that he drew is open to conjecture. Yoakum's landscapes are composed of strong convoluted lines somewhat reminiscent of topographic maps and filled in with a limited palette of pastels and, occasionally, watercolors. His work is complex and vivid, full of a striking energy; it constantly raises the question of what is real and what is imagined or composite. Yet, whether fact or fantasy, it binds and excites and gives a new perception to the meaning of landscapes. His work had a strong influence — sometimes conscious, sometimes unconscious — on a large group of Chicago artists, who still remember him today.' Yoakum's work, along with the work of other folk and outsider artists of the 1950s and 1960s, Martin Ramirez, for example,encouraged artists such as Jim Nutt, Gladys Nilsson, and others of the Chicago Imagists group to move in new directions with their work. Nutt notes that "Yoakum's work for me is fantastic....When you see someone like Ramirez or Rodia or Yoakum striding out on their own, it makes you feel more comfortable with doing that yourself" Although he had the look of an "old black man' as he sometimes called himself, and identified strongly with the black community, Yoakum referred to himself as a full-blooded "Nava-joe" Indian and claimed to have been born on a Navajo reservation in Arizona in 1886 or 1888.6 He was one of a dozen or more siblings; his parents were farmWinter 1990
ers, although he claimed his mother was an herbal "doctor" as well.' When Yoakum was still a baby, his family moved first to Kansas City, Missouri, and then to Walnut Grove, also in Missouri. According to his own account, he attended school for only a very few months and ran away from home when he was in his early teens to join a circus. He never indicated what happened to the rest of his family, or whether he had ever attempted to keep in touch with them in all his wanderings. His early years were spent as a general handyman for many ofthe large circuses of the time: first, the Adam Forepaugh Circus,then the Buffalo Bill Circus, next the Sells-Floto Circus, and, fmally, Ringling Brothers, where he graduated from handyman to personal valet to John Ringling. When he left the circus circuit, traveling seemed to have become a basic need — he continued to visit new places as a hobo-
stowaway. Yoakum once said that he had decided to see as many places in his lifetime as was possible. He claimed that by 1911 he had seen Europe, Russia, China, Australia, Canada, South and Central America, and Mexico. He told many people that he had seen every continent except Antarctica, and made up for this lack by producing a drawing, Mt Golleia on North Portion ofAntarctica in so west Pacific Ocean, of the one place he had not been. Yoakum served in the Army during World War I, stationed for part of the time in Clermont-Ferand, France ("I was with that bunch that drove von Hindenburgh back out of France"8). From the end of the War until the early 1960s Yoakum's whereabouts and activities are somewhat vague. He claimed to have been married twice and fathered five children; he mentioned living in Missouri, Florida, California, and Indiana and trying his hand at a number of diversejobs that ranged from
Mt Golleia on North Portion of Antarctica in so west Pacific Ocean by Joseph E. Yoakum; 3 4 x 19"; Dec 9 1970 (date stamp); Ballpoint pen, marker pen, chalk, and pencil on paper; 11/ Collection ofCynthia Carlson.
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The First Discovery of Flying saucer over Arizona in September 1944 by Joseph E.Yoakum;' Dec31970(date stamp);Colored pencil, ballpointpen, markerpen andpastel on paper;12x19"; Collection ofCynthia Carlson.
playing baseball to janitoring before settling in Chicago where, for a short time, Yoakum said he operated an ice cream parlor with his second wife. By the early 1960s he was "retired' living in a tiny and dingy storefront in Chicago's south side. Yoakum was supported by Social Security, a veteran's pension, and what he could make from his drawings, which he hung on a clothesline in the store window with a sign "4 Sale 25e9 By the mid-1960s he had been "discovered" and was attracting some attention as an artist; he gradually raised his prices, first to $1.50, then to $10.00, and later to even as high as $40.00. Although it was his work that first drew people to see Yoakum,along with "curiosity about a naive artist, and one of obviously great gifts who was living in our midse,"° it was Yoakum's personality that drew them back again and again. He was a great storyteller and interwove fact and fiction in varying proportions; his stories often dealt with 52
the content of his drawings, which were, he claimed, based on life experiences. There is no doubt that Yoakum's fertile imagination extended the geography of his experiences. He sometimes gave the impression of deliberately misleading his listeners about locations or events, and it was often difficult to tell whether or not Yoakum was serious. Once, when asked if he had ever been in a plane, as some of his drawings looked as though they were aerial views, Yoakum launched into a vivid description of being on a plane forced down in the Arizona desert by flying saucers, after which,he claimed, all the passengers "got off and took a train home, and I've never taken a plane since!" Several of Yoakum's drawings include flying saucers: The First Discouvety of Flying saucer over Arizona in September 1944. 121311970. Those that knew him say that although Yoakum was a very large person and physically somewhat intimidating (at least six feet tall, well over 200
pounds, and with thick fingers, he was sometimes described as "bearish"), he gave the impression of being a very gentle man. These same people occasionally expressed astonishment that someone of his size would make the intricate and delicate drawings that were so typical of his work." He was a dignified, proud, and reserved man, receiving visitors in a formal manner and using "Mr." or "Miss:' never first names. He lived alone and was a lonely person, and he took pleasure in his visitors, whose number increased as his fame grew. He could, however, exhibit signs of paranoia and distrust, which may have resulted partly from his ambiguous ethnic role (Indian or black) and from his experiences as a member ofa minority, whichever ethnic identification he chose.'2 He was very suspicious of some people, even if they had visited him regularly and bought many of his drawings; he was particularly suspicious of what they would do with his work — he saw it as far removed from usefulness and did not always seem to understand why people wanted it. At times, this distrust could become irrational: Cynthia Carlson, an artist who maintained a long and close relationship with Yoakum tells of the time that Yoakum was furious about his work being exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art in New York — all he understood was that "they took away four paintings and didn't pay for them:' He threatened to get U.S. marshals after the Museum if "they" didn't return or pay for his work.'3 Yoakum's living quarters were small, dingy, and spare: He lived and worked in his cramped and tiny shop — the space was depressing and dirty (Yoakum was quite poor, with little or no extra disposable income), yet the poverty of his physical surroundings belied the wealth of color and form of his work. When visitors came, Yoakum would choose from among the stacks and stacks of drawings placed on The Clarion
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paper he favored (his earliest work was on brown paper shopping bags) to the use of somewhat more durable paper for his work. His drawings were never very large — most are smaller than 18 to 24 inches. Yoakum worked almost exclusively with pencil, ballpoint and marker pens,
and pastels. In the late 1960s he began to use felt-tipped markers. Although they never replaced ballpoint pens for him, he was intrigued with the wider, soft strokes they produced, as well as the opportunity to use color in line. Their color, unfortunately, is highly fugitive, and the works done with these
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Florida mtn Range(near Demming New Mexico)by Joseph Yoakum;715-70;Red, black and blue ballpoint pen on paper. II x 8/ 1 2"; Courtesy ofHirschl & Adler Modern.
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shelves around the room and spread out work that was staggering in its intensity and vitality. It would leave the visitor awestruck in trying to comprehend and reconcile Yoakum's work with the man and his environment. Yoakum was an extraordinarily prolific worker. Although he only began to draw in the early 1960s, his output probably numbered in the thousands (he created one or two new drawings almost every day). Almost two-thirds of his life's work had been completed before his drawings began to gain any recognition by the broader world." When he became ill in 1971 and was taken first to a hospital and then to a nursing home, Yoakum spent several months without working. By late spring of 1972, he began to draw again, even though he had to spend most of his time in bed. He filled five sketchbooks with drawings in the next several months, although the quality of this work is quite variable and far from showing the consistency and coherence of the drawings done in earlier years. The amount of work done in this period that must have been both depressing and difficult for him gives some indication of the importance of his artwork to him. Yoakum died on Christmas Day, 1972. Yoakum created his work in virtual isolation both before and after his "discovery:' Even though numerous students and faculty from The Art Institute of Chicago and other places visited him frequently, he never asked to see their work nor, for that matter, even seemed interested in what they were doing. Yoakum made regular trips to the Institute to buy art supplies but seemed to have no sense of what else went on there and never, as far as anyone knew, made any attempt to view the exhibits there or elsewhere in Chicago. His style and technique remained true to his own vision, untainted by academic influence. The only influence his many expert visitors seemed to exert was to convince him to switch from the kindergarten-quality manila
in the copies. The Brenner Pass, for example, was one of his favorite subjects, and one that he copied many times. His art was immensely important to him; he drew because he had to, because it was an obsession. It was the making of the work, and not the work itself, that had the value for him. He once said that he had to make one or two drawings a day because "I'd go crazy if I didn't:"6 Because he had no grasp of his drawings as art, it was confusing to him why people wanted them:"He loved the fact that he got money for what he did, and he seemed to think that he was `putting one over on you' when you bought his work:"7 Yoakum also made plaster cast statues from dime-store ceramic kits. To him, his "sculptures;' as he called them, were equal in value to his drawings and were displayed just as prominently for sale in his shop.
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have tended to fade, unless special care has been taken of them. He had done some work with water colors, but he much preferred pastels, which he could burnish to a glowing sheen with tissues. "I paint in anything that will make a color. I don't care for oils, you have to be so particular with them. Pastels, you take a ball of bathroom tissue and polish so it looks like a water color:"5 Yoakum would occasionally sell an uncolored drawing and tell the purchaser"You put the color in:' Yoakum was never certain of what the meaning of his art was, nor did he seem to care. He had no sense of scholarship or tradition, and he did not connect with any concept of art. His copies were as valid and valuable to him as the originals. He often literally made carbon copies of his work, placing one sheet over another and tracing the design, although he might vary the colors
The Ever Hot Volcano Mtn near Lima Peru South America by Joseph E. Yoakum;Dec 12 1969(date stamp); Mixed media on paper;17/ 1 4x 23";Courtesy ofHirschl de Adler Modern.
Whether anyone ever bought them is not known. Yoakum's art represents a consistent vision stemming from his overwhelming interest in — perhaps preoccupation with — landscape. Even though he drew geologic formations, and repetitive patterns of earth, sea, sky, and vegetation, Michael Hall, a prominent author and collector, says, "I think he was less interested in the look of the earth than he was in the essence of nature as it is reflected in the forms of landscape...continuous energy flows in his drawings:"8 It was this infinite variation and possibility in landscape that fascinated and preoccupied Yoakum. His views were both panoramic and intimate — from a craggily dramatic broad mountain range giving an impression of the geologic thrusts and stresses of the ages to the petals of a delicately drawn single flower holding stage front against a turbulent background. Mountains seemed to capture his imagination to the greatest extent; they fold and wrinkle and curl; they are caught in the flow of time, still in the process of formation; they are grander, larger, more powerful than in life.' Other elements exert strong pulls as well — his clouds rove wildly through the skies, his waves writhe, his rivers rush, and his roads wind sinuously through the landscapes, with lives of their own. Yoakum's landscapes are not tranquil — the energy that they project is almost tangible — yet the sense of action that is engendered relates more to a positive sense of the restlessness of a life force anxious to be on with the business of living rather than the negative tormented restlessness that turns in on itself and leads to destruction. It is interesting to note, however, that in the midst of all this implied movement of earth, sky, and water, his trees are clumped in static clusters, usually tucked in little protected pockets of hill and vale as seen in Florida mtn Range near Demming, New Mexico. In those The Clarion
few instances when a lone tree is shown, it will dominate the entire drawing, partly because of its stillness and serenity. Mt patterson Knob in National mt park near Chattanooga Tennessee.111211970 is a good example of this. Much has been made of the anthropomorphic character of Yoakum's landscapes, of how some give the impression of large confrontational heads and faces. These images can often be detected in his work, for the rhythmic, flowing, and convoluted lines that are so central to Yoakum's drawings lend themselves to such interpretation. Yet, were they intended or accidental? Yoakum himself did not help to clarify the issue. When asked directly whether he had intended these images, he replied, "Well, if you think they are there, then they are'2° Carlson notes that Yoakum's lines and images produce a very sexual feeling that can be viewed by some as anthropomorphic. However, she does not think that Yoakum intended them to be read as such and was not consciously aware that they would be. Whitney Halstead, an art historian, makes an analogy to Chinese painting, in which landscape features are compared to "bone, muscle, flesh, and spirit!' Although Yoakum is most wellknown for his landscapes, he did do a very small number of portraits or other representations of people — probably less than five percent of his total output. These were,for the most part, drawings of well-known figures, often related to show business — Nat King Cole Roveing Comedian and Entertainer Age and Birthplace Not Sure 414-1964 and Josaphine Baker 2nd to Mahalia Jackson as Gospel Soprano Singer Feb 5 1966; or sports — Altheia Gibson Our Champion Tennis Star 1961 Dec 19 1963; or pictures of mythological figures — The only woman Ruler of assirea asia SE IGreat Assirea 310 B.C. 511611970. In drawing, as in life, Yoakum seemed to prefer women to Winter 1990
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The only woman Ruler of assirea asia SE/Great Assirea 310 B.C. by Joseph E. Yoakum; May 16, 1970 (date stamp); Pastels, marker pens, and pencil on paper. 12 x 19"; Collection of Cynthia Carlson.
Altheia Gibson Our Champion Tennis star 1961 by Joseph E. Yoakum;Dec 19 1963 (date stamp); Pen and pencil on paper; 12 x 9"; Courtesy of Whitney Halstead Collection at The ArtInstitute of Chicago.
men, as his portrait pieces include far more representations of women than men.22 Yoakum's portrait drawings tended
to be much simpler than his landscapes, and not much of an attempt seems to have been made to produce accurate resemblances. Silhouettes or outlined figures are characteristic, although some,such as The only woman Ruler of assirea, are shown full face and full length, and they are shown against little or no background, in contrast to the convoluted lines that seem to fill the space of his landscapes. Poses are stiff, hands are tiny, and modeling is lacking; there is none ofthe energy or movement that gives excitement to and characterizes his other work. In some cases, he may have even traced figures from advertisements as the basis for these portrait drawings. Yoakum was very reluctant to sell the few portrait drawings that he had done. Although they would be displayed with his other work in his shop, when asked for their price he would usually reply that they were not for sale and seemed uncomfortable in discussing them. If Yoakum's Indian heritage can be believed, one can speculate whether the dearth of people in his work was a vague carryover of a superstition found among many more primitive groups, including some American Indians — a taboo on portraying the human figure because producing a personal image takes the soul away from the subject. If such is the case, Yoakum may have rationalized that portrayal of famous personalities was acceptable because their souls had already been lost through the frequent reproductions of their faces in the media, and that mythical personages could be represented because they were not real and thus their souls were not at risk. The portraits are completely different from Yoakum's landscapes, as though two distinct sensibilities are represented. His landscapes are magical and project the quality of another world — they are his own inventions or visions, or recreations or composites of places where he had traveled or wished to have traveled; they transported him 55
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Back Where I Were Born 2/20-1888 A.D.;10/11-65;Pen and pencilon paper;12 x18"; Whitney Halstead Collection, The Art Institute ofChicago.
and carried him away; they were an obsession and a passion. The portraits, on the other hand, have the charm of work produced within the standard framework of primitive or naive conventions; there is no sense of the emotional investment apparent in the landscapes, and they seem much more mannered in their execution. Almost all of Yoakum's work carries some sort ofinscription — a title, a date, a signature, a "copyright" notice, or some other phrase such as "Not for sale" or "This is a modle [sic]:' He seemed compelled to title his work,and there are few exceptions to this rule.The titles are often long and extremely detailed, if not always accurate in spelling or description. Halstead believes that for Yoakum the titles added confirmation, reality, and even respectability to the work; there are so few without them that they become an integral part of the pieces.23 Perhaps Yoakum used titles to make his own 56
visions more concrete and accessible, or, in some cases, to provide a touch of more personal information — Back Where I Were Born 2/201888 A.D. The flow and grace of many of the titles go far beyond mere labeling and add a further touch of poetry to his already evocative work. The dates in Yoakum's work are more problematical. Sometimes these are handwritten in figures — the earliest dated pieces are from 1962, and it is generally assumed that this is the year Yoakum began drawing. After 1964 a cheap office date stamp is often used, and some drawings have no date at all. Nor can the dates always be taken literally as the date of production: Carlson remembers buying a drawing one day and commenting that it had no date on it; Yoakum promptly took his date stamp and added that day's date to the work.24 The date stamp was one indication of Yoakum's compulsion to make his work
seem "official:' although what he meant by this is not quite clear. Adding the copyright symbol(0)was another indication. Yoakum had no compunction about copying himself, but he was concerned about others copying his work. He had some simplistic understanding of how a copyright is obtained and he claimed to have copyrighted some of his work. He once said "You send $5.00 to Washington and they send you a copyright!' Yoakum frequently signed his work "by Joseph E. Yoakum" with a grand flourish, and he sometimes added "Chicago,Illinois"(with or without the zip code)and a complete street address. That signatures were not as important to him as titles is clear from the fact that far fewer drawings carry signatures. If he decided to sign a piece, how it was done was of concern. Yoakum would spend considerable time and thought in looking through the large variety of pens and pencils he always seemed to have in his pocket to find the right color, often settling on a bright blue because to him it represented a proper "business" color. Did Yoakum's drawings truly come about as a result of "spiritual unfoldment" from his travels, or from some other source? Yoakum himself said that the Bible was his biggest story book, and many of his drawings were of biblical locations. In addition to the Bible, Yoakum's quarters contained an assortment of travel books, a school atlas, Mary Baker Eddy's Science and Health, several cheap 'how to draw' books, and an old set of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. No one knows how often he used these — ifever — or whether they provided him with ideas for his work. According to Halstead, Yoakum never referred to these works, nor did anyone ask him whether they influenced him.25 If he was aware of their contents, he did not make that fact evident. His exacting titles have the ring of captions found in older versions of the Encyclopaedia The Clarion
and visited Yoakum regularly included Christina Ramberg, Ray Yoshita, and Roger Brown. These artists were introduced to Yoakum through the late Whitney Halstead, an art historian on the faculty of The Chicago Institute of Art who had met Yoakum in 1967 and was instrumental in helping to make his work more widely known. Halstead brought many of his institute students and colleagues to meet Yoakum in his home/studio on the south side of Chicago. 5. Meredith Romble and John Thrner,"Striding Out on Their Own: Folk Art and Northern California Artiste: The Clarion, 13:3(Summer 1988), p. 40. 6. Although Yoakum told some people that he had been born February 20, 1886, one of his drawings, done 11/11/65 is titled Back WhereI Were Born 2/201888 A.D. 7. This and many of the other facts relating to Yoakum's background are to be found in Whitney Halstead, "Joseph E. Yoakum': unpublished manuscript, Archives, Ryerson and Burnham Libraries, The Art Institute of Chicago, n.d., p. 5. 8. Norman Mark,"My Dreams are a Spiritual Unfoldmem: Chicago Daily News, Nov. 11, 1967. 9. Carlson, op, cit., March, 1988. 10. Halstead, op, cit., p.13. 11. Kelly, op. cit., p. 1. 12. It was clear that he did have some concerns along racial lines, as he was known to comment that some places were "better than others" in terms of prejudice, and he once told Whitney Halstead "It sure is nice of a young white fellow like you to come out and visit an old black man like me!'(Halstead, op. cit., p. 15) 13. Carlson, op. cit., May, 1988. 14. Kelly, op. cit., p. 2. 15. Herbert W. Hemphill, Jr., and Julia Weissman,
73.1 „Is
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Twentieth-Century American Folk Art and Artists (New York: E.P. Dutton, Inc., 1947), p. 176. 16. Halstead, op. cit., p. 24. 17. Carlson, op. cit.. May 1988. 18. Transmitters, op. cit., p.21. 19. Halstead likened Yoakum to some of the great Chinese painters of landscape:"To paint mountains, one must first know their spiritual forms!' From "The Mustard Seed Garden': in Mai Mai Sze, The Way of Chinese Painting: Its Ideas and Thchniques(New York: Vintage Books, 1959), p. 204,as quoted in Halstead, op, cit., p. 33. 20. Kelly, op, cit., p. 2. 21. Whitney Halstead, Joseph E. Yaokum (New York: Whitney Museum of American Art, 1972). 22. Carlson, op., cit.; Halstead, unpublished, op. cit., p.42. 23. Halstead, op. cit., p. 46-7. 24. Carlson, op, cit., May 1988. 25. Halstead, op. cit., p. 12. 26. Halstead, op. cit., pp. 2-3. Throughout this article, the spelling, wording, punctuation and capitalization are given as Yoakum used them on the drawings. Much of the material in this manuscript is based on Whitney Halstead's unpublished manuscript on Yoakum's life and work, now in the Archives, of the Ryerson and Burnham Libraries at The Art Institute of Chicago, and on interviews with Cynthia Carlson. Thanks go to Ms. Carlson, who graciously gave of her time for interviews and lent drawings and slides of Yoakum's work from her collection, to Ted Halkin, executor ofWhitney Halstead's estate, and to those at the Institute and Library who helped by giving access to Halstead's material.
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Britannica, and his undulating landscapes easily call to mind the pictures and contour maps found in many atlases. His youthful travels combined with what he saw in these books,as well as his own obsessive inner vision,could well have inspired the strong topological images and fantastic geological formations that give such force to his drawings. How much of Yoakum's life as it is known is fact and how much is fiction is difficult to sort out, since much of the information available was provided by Yoakum himself - and he did know how to tell a good story. Some events may have been colored by the distorted memories of age, others by a desire to provide an exotic and exciting tale. Perhaps Halstead has said it best: "Yoakum's life is essentially his own creation, like his drawings....I often had the feeling that what I heard and saw were in part myth, Yoakum's life as he would have wished to have lived itlarger and grander than reality....If mundane facts should ever deny to him his travels in this world... we would still have the Yoakum world laid before us in great detail, its rich and amazing imagery presented for our delectation...and acceptance!'26
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Jacqueline M. Atkins is a writer and publishing consultant. Her last book, Memories of Childhood, was writen in conjunction with the Museum's Great American Quilt Festival 2, and she is now working on a book on Spanish-American textiles, also for the Museum. She is currently a student in the Folk Art Institute. NOTES 1. Transmitters: The Isolate Artist in America (Philadelphia: Philadelphia College of Art, 1981). p.7. 2. Jane Livingston and John Beardsley, Black Folk Art in America 1930-1980 (Jackson, MS: University Press of Mississippi and the Center for the Study of Southern Culture of the Corcoran Gallery of Art, 1982), p.165. 3. John Oilman, "Preface,' Animistic Landscapes: Joseph Yoakum Drawings (Philadelphia: Janet Fleisher Gallery, 1989), p. 9. 4. Cynthia Carlson, personal communication, February 1988; Kathy Kelly, "Joseph E. Yoakum: An Interview with Jim Nutt': in Joseph E. Yoakum: A Survey of Drawings (Davis, CA: Union Memorial Art Gallery, University of California, 1988). In addition to Carlson and Nutt,other artists who knew
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by This of Moro Bay in San Luis Obispo County San Luis Obispo California. Drawing Joseph E. Yoakum 8/21-65 Chicago Illinois 60612 C 1965 Joseph E. Yoakum; Colored pencil, watercolor, and ballpoint pen on paper;12 x 18"; Courtesy ofJanet Fleisher Gallery.
The Quilt Legacy of Three album quilts created in the midnineteenth century in Elizabeth; New Jersey, suggest a newly-identified quilt style'from the Garden State. The three quilts, each part of a different museum collection, share common fabrics, colors, layout, and design characteristics — notably a large number of blocks, no borders or sashing, and a seemingly haphazard design arrangement. In addition to their overall aesthetic correspondence, the quilts are contextually linked and may be viewed as important social and cultural documents. Their common purposes — gifts to ministers and/or their wives — designs, and signatures reveal something of the life and interests of people within a community in the process of growth and industrialization. Research on the Elizabeth quilts began with a study of a friendship album quilt donated to the Museum of American Folk Art in 1980 by Phyllis Haders (the "Dunn" quilt). This article will focus on the Dunn quilt presented in 1852 to Mr. and Mrs. Dunn, probably Rev. and Mrs. Dunn, by the members of the Sewing Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church of Elizabeth Port. The quilt, possibly a regional New Jersey album quilt, will be examined technically and contextually. Two related quilts will also be examined. One was presented to the wife of Rev. Edwin Reinhart (January, 1852), and is in the collection of The Newark Museum, and the other, dedicated to Rev. Mrs. Waterbury, April 1, 1853, is in the collection of the American Museum in Britain, Bath, England. The Dunn quilt resembles some album quilts from New York State and is slightly reminiscent of Baltimore Album Quilts. It seems to be a conservative, local adaptation of the innovative Baltimore style which had evolved to its final stages by 1852. Baltimore Album Quilts were often made by Methodist women, who comprised an informal church society. Several Baltimore Album Quilts, like the Dunn quilt, were given to ministers 58
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Elizabeth, New Jersey upon leaving a congregation or as tokens of friendship. 4 x 100 inches, 1 The Dunn quilt, 99/ consists of 100 approximately square blocks. The needlework technique is primarily appliqué, with some quilting and a small amount of embroidery applied on a white muslin ground material. The quilt has no sashing or borders, and its predominant colors are red, green, blue, and gold. The cotton fabrics used in the quilt are plain-woven muslin, calico and chintz and the patterns include solids, tiny and bold florals, pin dots, stripes, checks, and figured cloth with birds and human figures. The printed fabrics were most likely roller printed cotton from England, France, or America. The paisleys may have come from any ofthose three countries, but some ofthe large florals look specifically English.' The Dunn quilt seems to be the work of many hands. The skillfulness of the construction varies from square to square, from crude (c10,d2) to masterful(f4). Each square has a signature in ink or, in a few of the more intricate squares, tiny embroidered cross-stitched lettering. Some names appear more than once,including that of Sarah Cameron, whose name appears six times. There is no proof that the signed names — women, some men and a few children' — represent the people who created the quilt blocks. Often, to support a fundraising effort, a person paid to have his or a family member's name placed on a block but did not actually construct the block. Quilting in rectangular or oval shapes forms a cartouche around the lettering. Most of the blocks have some small quilted motifs framing both the appliqué design and the corners of each Friendship Album Quilt; Sewing Society ofthe Methodist Episcopal Church; Elizabeth Port, New Jersey; 1852; Appliqued cotton, some embroidery; 991/4 x 100"; Collection ofthe Museum of American Folk Art, Gift of Phyllis Haders. (1980.1.1) Winter 1990
by Lee Kogan
block. There is a uniformity in the quilting design and stitchery, suggesting that one hand did the assembling of the blocks and all the quilting. The composition of the Dunn quilt is informal, underscored by the absence of borders or sashing. Yet, there is a surprising coordination of design, layout, and color. What at first seems to be a haphazard arrangement of a large number of blocks, appears on further examination to have been systematically laid out. The more skillfully constructed and symbolically significant squares are clustered near the center of the quilt. There is often a rhythmically balanced alternation of geometric and naturalistic floral renditions and other motifs. The prevailing themes and patterns are religious, patriotic and floral, consistent with interests in God, country and nature. Symbols of fraternal organizations are suggested and birds, as well as geometic patterns, are included. The designs are rendered in both stylized and naturalistic forms. The church is what brought the quilt makers together, so it is no surprise that a number of central blocks bear religious themes."God is Love"from the First Epistle of John 4:8 is inked on a block featuring a graphic representation of a church (f3), based, most likely, on the original edifice of the Methodist church attended by those who made the quilt.
Embroidered gold chain stitching and white chintz or satin weave pages embellish the sophisticated, red Bible quilt block(f4). Similar red Bibles were frequently appliquéd in Baltimore Album Quilts. A red Bible appears in the hand of the Methodist cleric, Bishop William McKendree, in a circa 1820 portrait attributed to the painter, John Paradise (1783-1833). Noah's ark(f6), simply conceived, is prominent in one of the center quilt blocks. The ark, one of the earliest Christian symbols, represents Christ, the Church and salvation. A baptismal font(e5)is crowned by a 59
descending dove, a symbol of the Holy Spirit, originating in the account of Jesus' baptism in Matthew 3:16. A wreath of rosebuds(f5,d9) may be interpreted as the crown of thorns, symbolically the mockery and humiliation that Jesus endured before his crucifixion. A narrative print cut whole from a piece of fabric, showing a turbanned man on a camel speaking to another, inspired its block designer to write, "Hossiath Winding His Way Through Turkey" (a9). Hoshaiah (present-day spelling), an obscure biblical character, assisted Nehemiah in rebuilding the walls that protected Jerusalem in 400 B.C. The remarkable feat was accomplished in fifty-one days. The stylized floral motifs (b6,b8,b10) were probably selected for their decorative qualities though they may also have religious significance. The inclusion of the triple tipped adaptation of the paisley motif may be interpreted as milkweed (a4,j6,j9) and may symbolize the spreading of the word "all over the worle6 Oak leaf designs (i7,c7) often selected by quilt makers as familiar environmental forms may, in this symbol-laden quilt, carry religious connotations as parts of venerated trees. The peacock motif (c2,i10) suggests immortality. A bird which looks like a goldfmch (f7) has double significance. It is important both as a bird indigenous to the northeastern United States and, because it eats thistles and thorns, as an allusion to the Passion of Christ. This quilt block creator's bond with nature — both plant and animal forms — is reflected in several blocks. One square (d10) has a faded inked, sepia drawing of a stag surrounded by a chintz flower decoration. The drawing seems to have been inspired by either a James Audubon print published in 1848 or by a fabric with a similar motif! One square (fl) of uncertain symbolic significance features an open hand with a hammer attached. A heart 60
Detail, Dunn Quilt. Important centrally positioned blocks bear religious themes which may be symbolically interpreted. The image ofthe church is, possibly, the only existing visual reference to the original 1852 edifice of the Fulton Street Methodist Episcopal Church ofElizabeth Port.
is appliquéd to one side. This is different from the "heart in hand" image common in folk art and frequently associated with the Odd Fellows fraternal organization. The suggestion that this design originated with the Odd Fellows organization is not supported by research. High ranking representatives of the Masonic, Odd Fellows, Mechanics and other fraternal organizations fail to recognize the hearthammer-hand symbol. However, John Kidd, whose name appears on the quilt block, may have been a member of the Odd Fellows Lodge in Elizabethport in 1852 and may have adapted the symbol to reflect the building of the church. The simplest explanation of the block is a literal one — that is, that Rev. Dunn either actually inspired or lovingly helped to build the Elizabethport Methodist Church. The Dunn quilt reflects the story of Elizabethport, which in turn, mirrors the growth ofindustrial American communities between the end of the Revolutionary War and the middle of the nineteenth century. Such history is especially significant because letters, diaries and account books from the area are scanty. It is also a token of the aftermath of America's great nineteenth century religious revival, the Second Great Awakening. The earliest Elizabethtown settlers were from Long Island and in the seventeenth century they moved into the waterfront area later known as Elizabethport. During the eighteenth century, many of the prosperous families moved from the port area to what is currently the center of town. After the War of 1812, Elizabethtown began a rapid development. The steamboat and the railroad stimulated industrial and population growth in the port area. Waterfront activity and ferry service to Staten Island and Manhattan were a boon to local business. In 1835, Edward Kellogg, a wealthy New York businessman,designed a real estate project and laid out the "New Manufacturing Town of Elizabeth The Clarion
Porr9He purchased a large tract ofland which included the unoccupied land around the Elizabethport waterfront, and planned to develop it. Kellogg's group sold small, narrow building lots at a reasonable price. The workers he attracted became the labor force for Elizabethtown's early industries: Lumber and coal yards, a train repair depot, an iron works, brick and match factories, a rope manufacturer and a straw bonnet and hat business. Within ten years of the advent of the railroad, the population of Elizabethport grew to over 80020 Social change was rapid. Mortality rates were high, the population was mobile, and a continuous influx of workers came from New England, New York, Pennsylvania, and foreign countries. Until 1850, the population was largely English, Irish and German. The church provided stability and social integration. Centrally located parent churches of several Protestant denominations offered spiritual revival as well as social cohesiveness to fledgling congregations in all parts of the city. The Dunn quilt is part of the Elizabeth Methodist church history. Methodism had roots in Elizabethtown in the last quarter of the eighteenth century. People were attracted to the denomination because it was doctrinally participatory and it deemphasized ritual in favor of vigorous gospel preaching and congregational singing. It was also fairly democratic. Women who taught and did fund raising played a substantial role in the church. The Methodist church was organized on a circuit system with an itinerant ministry appointed by a Conference Bishop. The itinerant pastor was thought of as a missionary, but he did not necessarily leave the local area. It was once thought that Rev. and Mrs. Dunn,to whom the quilt was dedicated, were missionaries to the South Pacific, but no documents could be found to substantiate the claim that they left the United States at any time.' Winter 1990
Photograph of the Patton Street Methodist Episcopal Church. The original building was enlarged and rebuilt in 1859.
Newark Methodist Conference reports, old histories, and contemporary newspapers placed the church at the corner of Fulton and Third Street, the present site of St. Adalbert's (R.C.) Church.' On October 23, 1851, at 3 p.m., a cornerstone was laid for a new church, the Fulton Street M.E. Church of Elizabethport.'Rev. Lewis Dunn, pastor of the parent Water Street M.E. Church in the center of Elizabethtown, came to speak July 4, 1852, the first Sunday service after the new church dedication:" at that time, Rev. Dunn baptized ten to twelve children!'One quilt square (f3), is, to date, probably the sole representation of the original edifice of the Fulton Street Church, which housed the congregation for seven years (1852-1859). A later photograph shows an enlarged, remodeled building, completed in 1859. Rev. Dunn was a deserving recipient of the young congregation's approbation. While Pastor of the older Water Street Methodist Church, he became interested in the small congregation, which first met at "Rechibite" Hall and later in a lecture room in a nearby Presbyterian Church." Interest in erecting a new building
was sparked. Lots were acquired and a church building was constructed and completed in 1852.' Twenty people — the seventeen women and three men who made up the congregation — attended the dedication.' Those whose names appear as signatures on the Dunn quilt may have been among the original members. Rev. Dunn's devotion to both God and his ministry was ample. In 1859, he was asked to lay the cornerstone of the newly-enlarged Fulton Street Church:9 and in the 1880s, near the end of his long, active years ofservice, he became the Fulton Street Church Pastor.' While he was not the first pastor of Elizabethport's M.E. Church, Rev. L.R. Dunn most likely provided the impetus needed for the building of the church. It is not at all surprising that in 1852, the congregants of the newly formed M.E. Fulton Street Church stitched and presented him and his wife with a large appliquÊd quilt as a token of their esteem. The quilt may have been presented at the time of the church's dedication. Many of the people whose names appear on the blocks lived in an area adjacent to Fulton and Third Streets, ' within a block or two of the church.2 Few, if any, owned their own homes." Some were from England or Ireland, others were from New England, Pennsylvania or New York. The men were laborers or artisans, such as rope and bonnet makers, molders, carpenters, machinists, and iron workers. A grocer named Samuel Huntsman, whose family is well represented on the quilt, later became a building mover." Ann Spear, who contributed a masterful quilt block (e5), was identified in 1860 as the head of a household(probably a widow), and supported three children by operating a family fancy goods store In January, 1852", perhaps months before the Dunn quilt was completed, the members of the First Presbyterian church and congregation of Elizabethport stitched and presented a quilt to Hannah Reinhart, the wife of their 61
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esteemed minister, Rev. Edwin Reinhart." The revered "Father Reinhart': who was called to pastor in 1847, remained with the congregation — in a new church later called Greystone Church — until the 1870s. The Presbyterian Church on Marshall Street between Second and Third Streets was situated a few blocks from the Methodist Church at Fulton and Third Streets. One might assume that the Marshall Street Presbyterian Church members kindly allowed Rev. Dunn to deliver some of his early lectures to Methodist believers before the Elizabethport Methodists had their own building.27 3 4 inches The Reinhart quilt, 102/ square, has 121 blocks, and, like the Dunn quilt, no sashing or borders. Each block is inked or cross-stitched with the maker's, or a family, name or initial. The Dunn and Reinhart quilts and a third — dedicated to a Rev. Mrs. Waterbury — have some identical design patterns and fabrics and several shared makers' names. The three quilts also share religious, patriotic and floral themes and geometric motifs. The Waterbury quilt was probably created by members of a young congregation, the First Baptist Church, on Union near Morris Streets,' in the center of Elizabethtown, approximately one mile from the other two churches. It was made by friends and presented to Rev. Mrs. Waterbury, April 1, 1853. According to James Lynch, Director of the Library of the American Baptist Historical Society, the pastor of the First Baptist Church 1851-1855 was John H. Waterbury. He was highly esteemed, an "earnest, prayerful, faithful minister!' He was active in a church building program which was terminated by his illness and eventual death on January 25, 1855.' Mrs. Waterbury Album Quilt; Possibly members of the First Baptist Church, Elizabethtown, New Jersey; 1853; Appliquéd cotton, some embroidery; 95x84"; Collection of The American Museum in Britain, Gift ofMrs. Hassel Smith. Winter 1990
Detail, Dunn quilt. This unusual printed cotton fabric(Dunn a9, Waterbury c3) was an important clue to linking the Dunn and Waterbury quilts.
The quilt dedicatee, Rev. Mrs. Waterbury was probably Rev. John H. Waterbury's wife, Catharine K. Waterbury.' Mrs. Waterbury may have been related by marriage to Susan Jarvis Waterbury," who lived near Fulton Street and was married to Charles A. Waterbury, a lubricating oil manufacturer." Both S.J. Waterbury and C.H. Waterbury were signers of squares in the Reinhart quilt. Further research is warranted; possibly the Elizabethport Waterburys and Rev. Mrs. Waterbury were related. The absence of a church quilt block in the Waterbury quilt is probably because in 1853 the congregation did not have its own church and met in a converted schoolhouse. The First Baptist Church was not built until 1858. A striking link between the Dunn and Waterbury quilts is the pattern of the turbanned man on a camel which appears in both quilts. An important, centrally-positioned, skillfully executed book square was, in each ofthe three quilts, signed by Sarah J. Davis, who also signed a second square in the Dunn quilt (f6). Four squares in the Reinhart quilt are associated with her and her family. It seems that she created the squares in which her name appears;her blocks are among the more intricate and almost all are marked by carefully embroidered cross-stitched lettering.
Evidence suggests that Mrs. Davis directed the construction of the three quilts. She may have designed some of the blocks to be used with homemade squares, explaining the identical pattern, design, and fabric of some of the blocks in all three quilts. The name Sarah Jane Davis is found in the first Register of the Marshall Street Presbyterian Church of Elizabethport. Sarah Jane Davis and George Davis, her machinist husband,' were admitted to the Presbyterian Church on October 2, 1854, one and one half years after all three quilts were completed. The earliest Elizabethport Presbyterian Church Register reveals names contained in the Reinhart, Dunn and Waterbury quilts. Sarah Cameron, Elias Smith, Ann Spear, and the Davises are found in more than one of these church quilts. Some of the congregants may have moved from church to church, or may have belonged to or lent their support to more than one church. The similar motivation, concept, fabric and design of these three quilts suggests that the quilt creators and signators knew each other or shared ideas. Sarah J. Davis or individual block makers may have purchased fabric from the same store on First Street, Elizabethtown. Because Elizabethtown was a port city, a large variety of interesting domestic and imported English and French fabrics was available. If a desired fabric was not available in the local dry goods store, the quilt contributors could have visited Job Magie's dry goods store on Broad Street in central Elizabethtown. During 1852, he advertised weekly in the New Jersey Journal. On February 3, 1852, his very detailed ad included among the fabrics offered, "very cheap dress goods" ... "Irish poplins"..."French and Scottish ginghams"..."and the greatest variety of prints in any one store in New Jersey, including French, English, and Merrimack (American) prints and other styles. Magie advertised goods of"first 63
quality and fast color at 6d. a yard'? The three quilts are significant cultural artifacts of a growing industrial community. The proximity of the three congregations whose members were involved in the creation of the quilts, the short time span in which they were made, the mutual purposes and cooperative efforts of the creators and other contributors, make the Elizabethtown quilts important documents. The striking interrelationships among all the participants, the use of similar design and fabric and the cohesive, aesthetically pleasing regional style which evolved, make the links between the Elizabethtown quilts of the 1850s an exciting new discovery. Lee Kogan is Senior Research Fellow and Assistant Director of the Folk Art Institute at the
Museum of American Folk Art. She is a Fellow of the Folk Art Institute and completing the Museum's graduate program in Folk Art Studies at New York University. NOTES 1. Prior to 1855, Elizabeth was known as ElizabethTown township or Elizabeth borough. 2. Conversation with Ulysses G. Dietz, Curator of Decorative Arts, The Newark Museum, July 1987, followed by a letter, July 31, 1987, essentially confirms the author's theory about three Elizabethtown quilts. 3. Through research, Reverend Dunn was identified as Lewis R. Dunn, born April 6, 1822, married Sarah Catherine McCamley June 14, 1843, died August 6, 1898. Sarah McCamley Dunn was born April 9, 1825, died November 15, 1914. 4. Gillian Moss, Assistant Curator of Textiles, the Cooper Hewitt/Smithsonian Museum, personal interview, Fall, 1987. 5. Seventh Census of the United States. 1850. New Jersey, Essex County, Elizabethtown Township,60. Census names support statement that some inked names on quilt blocks are the names ofchildren. See Huntsman, Family No. 953. 6. Fred Graham, Seminarian, Drew University, per-
Detail, Reinhart Quilt. 1852; AppliquĂŠd cotton, some embroidery; 102/ 3 4 "square; Collection of The Newark Museum, Gift ofMr. and Mrs. James Tanis, 1984.
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sonal interview, February, 1987. 7. James Audubon, The Columbian Black Tailed Deer, Plate CVI, Drawn from nature, J.W. Audubon, Lth'd and painted and colored by J.T. Bowen, Philadelphia, 1848. 8. Reverend Mrs. Waterbury quilt, 1853(g3) 9. Historic Elizabeth 1664-1932 (Elizabeth, NJ: Elizabeth Daily Journal, 1932)p. 42. 10. Theodore Thayer, As We Were (Elizabeth, New Jersey: Grassman Publishing Co. Inc.) p. 249. 11. In the 1850s and 1860s all of Rev. Dunn's annual ministerial and committee appointments were outlined. Study ofthe Annual Minutes ofthe Methodist Episcopal Conference, an encyclopedia entry, issues of the Christian Advocate, and a lengthy newspaper obituary do not mention any activity in the South Pacific or any other place outside the United States in which Rev. Dunn was a participant. 12. The location and history of the Elizabethport M.E. Church was not readily available because for the past fifty years, the local Methodist churches have been merging, making it difficult to trace sources. 13. New Jersey Journal, October 28, 1851. 14. New Jersey Journal, June 29, 1852. The church was dedicated Wednesday, June 30, 1852. The announcement appeared June 29, 1852. 15. City ofElizabeth Illustrated (Elizabeth New Jersey: Fli7abeth Daily Journal, 1889) p. 92. 16. Elizabeth Illustrated, p. 92. 17. Elizabeth Illustrated, p. 92. 18. Elizabeth Illustrated, p. 92. 19. Elizabeth Illustrated, p. 92-93. 20. Minutes of the Methodist Episcopal Conference, (Newark, New Jersey 1888-1890); Cook and Hall's Elizabeth City Directory, 1888-1890 (Elizabeth: Cook and Hall), pp. 111, 121. 21. Seventh Census of the United States. 1850. New Jersey. Essex County. Elizabethtown Township, pp. 58-61. 22. Ernest L. Meyer, 1856 City ofElizabeth, map(New York: Demcke and Keil lithographers) Names of property owners in the vicinity of churches do not match names of quilt signators, yet census locations are in the vicinity of the churches. 23. Boyd's Elizabeth City Directory of Elizabeth, Rahway and Plainfield 1868 (Elizabeth: Andrew Boyd and Harry Boyd)p. 165. 24. US Census. Elizabethtown 1850, p. 58. Boyd, 1868, p. 226. 25. Date and presentation information marked on quilt block featuring arose wreath. 26. Data verified in early town histories. Information in biography card file, New Jersey Historical Society, identifies Rev. Reinhart's wife as Hannah Halsted Mills, daughter of Thaddeus and Mary Tillinghast (Halsted)Mills bi 6/11/1807, mar. 5/20/1842 to Rev. Edwin H. Reinhart of Elizabeth. 27. Elizabeth Illustrated, p. 92. 28. Rev. Edwin A. Hatfield, History ofElizabeth, N.J. (New York: Carleton and Lanahan, 1868) p. 683. 29. W. Woodford Clayton, ed. History of Union and Middlwsex Counties New Jersey (Philadelphia: Everts and Peel 1882) p. 236. 30. New Jersey Journal, January 30, 1855. 31. US Census 1850. Township of Livingston, p. 99. Name was misspelled in CensusIndex and read John H. Waterbury. 32. US Census. 1850. Elizabethtown, p. 059. 33. US Census. 1860. Elizabethtown, p. 388. Also Boyd's Elizabeth City Directory 1868, p. 242. 34. US Census. 1860. Eliabethtown, p. 388.
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A striking conversation piece of John and Elisabeth Knickerbacker signed by the early nineteenth century artist Gerrit Schipper was sold to a descendant at a country auction in Litchfield, Connecticut a few years ago. Remarkable 2"), 1 for a pastel in its large size(22 x 26/ the conversation piece' added importance to the contribution of this Dutchborn artist and aroused curiousity about Schipper's background. Despite the fact that his name seemed to surface often, little had been written about him. According to his son's autobiography, Schipper destroyed all of his personal papers before he died. Even the site of his grave in London was in an area that was cut up for streets in that city's development. By examining Schipper's work and piecing together family memorabilia, a fragment of a travel diary and advertisements he placed from 1802 to 1808, it is possible to bring this talented artist into clearer focus. Gerrit Schipper was born in Krommenie, a small village near Amsterdam on September 13, 1775 to Hendrick Schipper, a prosperous sailmaker and Gerritje de With. His father intended that his son eventually enter the family business. Leaving home at an early age to study in Brussels, Gerrit Schipper ultimately reached Paris at the time of the French Revolution, and was forced to stay through the Reign of Terror. How he fared in that chaotic city is lost in the mists of time. Schipper fled France, lived for a time in Russia and returned to Amsterdam. Here, with Napoleon dominating his country, Schipper headed for America. When he landed in Philadelphia, he was unable to speak English.' An advertisement in the Mercantile Advertiser of New York City, May 18, 18023,signaled his arrival as an artist in the United States. Typically, he would Winter 1990
Self Portrait; 1808; Watercolor on ivory; 25/e x 2W; Wallace Collection.
NEW LIGHT ON GERRIT SCHIPPER THE PAINTER by Jeanne Riger
take up residence with a prominent family on the main street of a town and advertise in the leading newspaper that he took profile likenesses in crayon (pastel). In the beginning, he charged six dollars a painting with glass and frame. If the portrait was not satisfactory, no payment was expected. Sometimes he did as many as six paintings of the same person until the client was pleased.' His signature, when it did appear, might be found on the front or back, top or bottom of his work. Many paintings were unsigned. According to his advertisements, a sitting would take three-quarters of an hour and he worked from nine in the morning until two in the afternoon. Schipper urged potential customers to see samples of recently completed paintings before hiring him. As Schipper made his way up and down the eastern seaboard touching base in important towns, painting pastels and miniatures of prominent families, he found that Americans, bent on upward mobility, were eager for portraits as loving mementos and as family records. In a fine home amid beautiful furnishings, a portrait, or more rarely a conversation piece, was the capstone of material success. Artists who catered to this strong demand fanned out through the countryside often producing inept and ugly paintings. "There were no firm lines of distinction between academic and nonacademic,or folk, painting during the early years....'" There is no evidence that Schipper received any formal training in painting, although he may have studied art when a young boy in Paris. An indefatigable traveler, he undoubtedly came in contact with itinerants and local artists. One of his Massachusetts advertisements is directly above that of John Brewster. Schipper was in the Albany area where Ezra Ames painted. Like other limners, 65
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Schipper improvised' and his style developed as he became more experienced. There is a vast difference between the Knickerbacker Conversation Piece (1805) and the sketch of his son completed in 1824. A community was lucky indeed if the itinerant painter was from Europe, had some direct contact with fine art through paintings, prints or fellow artists and had innate talent as well. Saint-Memin,James Sharples and Gerrit Schipper can be included in this group. Pastelists working in America were rare at the time Schipper was painting. The known exceptions are Ruth Bascom, James Sharples and William S. Doyle. John Singleton Copley, a fine pastelist, was then in Europe. Schipper, however, was very productive in this media. The Inventory of American Painting of the National Museum of American Art lists twenty-three of Schipper's pastels. Five additional paintings are mentioned in the Catalog ofAmerican Portraits. The Frick Art Reference Library includes still others. Further, the Frick Art Reference Library has now recorded several pastels originally thought to be by James Sharples, as painted by Gerrit Schipper, because Sharples was out of the country from 1801 to 1808 when they were completed. Several pastels previously attributed to William S. Doyle have now been recorded by the Frick Art Reference Library as having been painted by Schipper on the basis of style. In addition, an ivory miniature selfportrait and a portrait miniature of Hendrick Schipper, his father, in pen and ink on vellum, have been located. There is also a crayon sketch of his son Nicholas Lockwood Schipper at age fourteen. All three of these pieces are done in full face,' and none have yet been catalogued. Further, a pastel pro66
John Dorr, Jr., Age 3-4 years; 1803; Pastel on paper; 8/ 1 4"; Private 1 2 x 7/ collection.
file miniature portrait of John Don, Jr. was auctioned in New York at Sotheby's in January, 1989. This, too, is uncatalogued. All totaled, over sixty works painted by Gerrit Schipper while in the United States are now known. Schipper was challenged to produce portraits so brimming with life they seem to transcend the passage of time. Sketching quickly, he focused on the faces, usually in profile. His treatment of the eyes and mouths was superb. Most of his paintings were very small in the style of miniatures.'The sitters face both left and right. The typical Schipper background was a feigned oval with a lighter area behind the subject's head. He used gray or green spandrels and rectangular frames. Almost all his paintings show the head and upper torso. While other artists of his time used standard props to indicate their client's interests and station in life, Schipper limited himself to portraying their personalities through facial expressions. Usually the clothing is dark and formal with a white collar, stock or
fichu setting off the face. The hair, with curls or tendrils drawn back and tied in a ribbon or peeking out under a cap, is always done with meticulous care. So too,the sleeve details of the women and the buttons of the men's jackets were sketched with a deft touch. Schipper's style attracted prominent clients. After a brief stay in Charleston, South Carolina,'he arrived in Boston in October, 1803, renting the "elegant drawing room of Mr. Wakefield in Milk Street:"° He postponed a planned departure for New York because of the demand for his work. In the spring of 1804,he was in Salem advertising in the Gazette. In the Massachusetts Spy, he described himself as an "eminent painter from Germany:" who would soon depart for Worcester. In Worcester, he stayed with Isaiah Thomas, Jr., the son of the historian and founder of the American Antiquarian Society. Here he produced three portraits of Isaiah Thomas, Sr., each slightly different. He also painted other members of the family — Mrs. Mary Fowle Thomas; Mary Weld Thomas Isaiah's wife; and Hannah Weld, the sister of Mary Weld; and of course his host, Isaiah Thomas, Jr. These portraits are in the collection of the American Antiquarian Society in Worcester, Massachusetts. A second pastel of Hannah Weld is held by a private collector. The Thomas family was well known in the Boston area and brought Schipper other commissions. From Massachusetts, according to notes in the Frick Art Reference Library, Schipper went to London for a year where he painted miniatures. These pieces have not been located thus far. In the spring of 1805, Schipper came back to the United States and lived at the ancestral home of the Knickerbacker family in Schaghticoke, Rensselaer County, New York, located The Clarion
WORCESTER MASSACHUSETTS 1803
John and Elizabeth Knickerbacker; April 20, 1805;Pastel on vellum;Private collection.
about twenty-five miles northeast of Albany.12 Called upon to portray the scion of this remarkable family long known for its wealth, military and government leadership, Gerrit Schipper painted the Conversation Piece of John Knickerbacker and his wife Elisabeth. The Winter 1990
portrait hung in the Knickerbacker Mansion until the Litchfield auction, November 20, 1982. It was purchased by William Kelly Simpson, a great, great, great, grandson of the couple and now hangs in a place of honor in his home. The Knickerbacker Family in Amer-
ica originated with Herman Jansen Knickerbacker of Friesland, Holland. A military hero and aristocrat, he settled in Schaghticoke about 1674, after obtaining a large tract of land from the City of Albany and from the Indians. Here the family hofsted or mansion was built. A twenty-five room Dutch style 67
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brick and timber building with a steep pyramid roof, the home had an impressive main hall, reception and drawing rooms, library, dining room, fine bed chambers, historic fireplace tiled with Biblical scenes, and a huge cellar extending under the entire building. Here there were slave quarters used during the winter and as security against French or Indian attack." The Dutch hospitality of Schaghticoke was legendary. Johannes, the younger, or John, the sitter in the Conversation Piece was a colonel in the state militia and a member of the state legislature. His son, Herman, was a close friend of Washington Irving's and it is probable that Irving wrote part of Diedrich Knickerbocker's History of New York while staying in the Knickerbacker mansion." Using his friend's family name as pseudonym, Irving changed the spelling to Knickerbocker, reputedly so that "... uneducated downstate folk would pronounce the name in its proper Dutch way:"5 In his painting of John and Elisabeth Knickerbacker, Schipper signed his name in spindly handwriting in the upper left hand comer. The inscription reads"John Knickerbacker and his wife Elisabeth taken the 20th day of April, 1805 in their 54th year of their age by Gerrit Schipper' The two figures, somberly dressed, sit smiling serenely on either side of a red table upon which lies a book and a small notebook. The light comes from the front illuminating their faces, and their figures cast a dark shadow on the wall. With a small, crudely drawn hand, Elisabeth holds some sewing in her lap. She is wearing a lace cap under a black bonnet, a black shawl and a voluminous black dress. Her husband sits with one leg smartly crossed to reveal his white stockings and the silver buckles on his knee breeches. His coat 68
Jonathan Walter Edwards;1805;Pastel on paper;63/4x 5"; Yale University Art Gallery;Bequest of Eugene Phelps Edwards. Elizabeth Tryon Edwards; 1805; Pastel on paper;63/4 x 5"; Yale University Art Gallery; Bequest ofEugene Phelps Edwards.
and high crowned hat are also black relieved by a white stock. A few tendrils of hair fall beneath the hat. The proportions of his arms and torso are awkward but do not detract from the portrait. Schipper was experienced in portraying older people to their best advantage. The panels in the wall behind the Knickerbackers are outlined faintly, and this is the only indication of the grandeur of the mansion.16 The simplicity of the portrait speaks for both the artist and his subjects. Shortly after completing the Knickerbacker Conversation Piece, Gerrit Schipper traveled through the Connecticut Valley and painted two fine portraits of Jonathan Walter Edwards, son of Jonathan Edwards, the younger, leading theologian, and his wife, Elizabeth Tryon Edwards. Mr. Edwards' portrait is signed on the reverse: "Jonathan Walter Edwards/Aug. A.D. 1805/Anno Aetatis 33. Schipper pinxt:' Elizabeth Tryon's is signed: "Anno aetatis 27:' These portraits portray a
young couple in the bloom of youth. In addition to the Knickerbackers, Gerrit Schipper painted other families of Dutch descent such as Albert Adriance and his wife Hannah Platt Adriance of Fishkill, New York. Albert was descended from Martin and Adraen Ryerszen who had come from Amsterdam to Breuckelen and were the patriarchs of the Adriance, Martens and Ryerson families.'' Gerrit Schipper returned to New York City in 1806, where he painted Francis Lewis, Jr., the son of one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. Schipper's signature appears in the lower left hand corner." Schipper also did six pastels each of George Warner and his wife Magdalen Walgrove Warner, owners of a farm on the Bowery. Schipper painted them when they were quite elderly; however, at sixty-one, Magdalen Warner was still a plump, pleasant-looking woman.In the portrait, she appears in a dark coat lightened with a soft white fichu and The Clarion
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topped by a white lacy bow-tied cap typical of the period. A bit of her vivid blue gown is revealed, adding interest. An examination of the portrait firsthand reveals Schipper's mastery of facial modeling and natural flesh tones. The profile is signed and dated below: "G. Schipper, Pine Street, No. 6 —1806:' On October 27, 1806, when he was thirty-one, Gerrit Schipper married Elizabeth Burt, descendant of a prominent Massachusetts family, in Amsterdam, New York, as recorded in the Dutch Reformed Church Book. Richard Hyer, great grandson of the artist, who has written the accepted memoir of Schipper, claims that Schipper and his wife emigrated to London shortly after their marriage.' However, recent findings show that Schipper remained in the United States and expanded his work in an attempt to support his new family. With a versatility common to itinerant artists, Schipper framed and embellished embroideries. Glee Krueger's book, New England Samplers to 1840, mentioned that Ruth Patten, who maintained a needlework school for young ladies, wrote to a former student, Susan J. Winsor, that her needlework, completed prior to her leaving, was ready and "...the frame is done and waits only for Schipper's arrival72° Another example of Schipper's expanded enterprise was found in a striking advertisement in the Connecticut Courant,21 where Schipper announced that he was setting up a drawing school in Hartford. Thompson Harlow, Director Emeritus of the Connecticut Historical Society, revealed in a letter dated February 17, 1988 that he is preparing an article on Schipper's work while in Hartford. This should enrich our knowledge of this phase of Schipper's career. The young artist, unfortunately, was bucking the times in trying to prosper Winter 1990
Magdalen Walgrove Warner;1806;Pas4"; Collection of 1 tel on paper; 9/8 x 7/ New-York Historical Society.
in mercantile New England in 1807. Caught in the trade war between England and France,the region's prosperity declined, especially after Jefferson issued his embargo in the summer of 1807. This stopped the export of American goods and prohibited all ships from clearing American ports. Farm commodities thus began to accumulate at the docks and prices declined. Adelia, the Schippers' first child, was born in Troy, New York, in 1808 and Schipper and his wife pulled up stakes and headed for Canada in a final attempt to succeed on this side of the Atlantic Ocean. An advertisement October 31, 1808, in the Montreal Gazette announced that G. Schipper, who had recently arrived in the city, took likenesses in pastel and watercolor and did miniatures on ivory. He expanded his hours until three o'clock. Montreal at this time offered a more appreciative and larger clientele than Toronto.22 Schipper did succeed in obtaining a commission to paint the
most prominent man in Montreal, Sir James Henry Craig, the Governor-inChief of British North America since 1807. Craig, though suffering from chronic dropsy, had plunged into the political fray that sharply divided Canada. A skillful and stubborn man,Craig managed to attract the support of many and numerous prints portraying him found a loyal market." The pastel profile by Schipper is now in the McCord Museum of Canadian History in Montreal. A similar picture, dated 1809, is also in the Literature and Historical Society in Quebec. Eight additional pastels in the McCord Collection are also considered to have been painted by Schipper.' Unfortunately, Schipper became involved in a public dispute over the pirating of his work, and in May, 1809, Schipper left Montreal for Quebec. In April, 1810, advertisements appeared in the Montreal Gazette and the Gazette de Quebec placed by John Trumbull who was selling engravings of the portraits of Sir James Henry Craig, by Schipper,for one guinea in a gilt frame. By May of 1810, directly below the Trumbull advertisements in the Montreal Gazette and the Gazette de Quebec, Schipper placed advertisements in which he pointed out that the Trumbull work "is a copy of a copy:'He disavowed any participation in the Trumbull project. Instead, Schipper offered engravings based on his painting to be done in color by one of the finest mezzotint engravers in London." A week later, an advertisement appeared in the Gazette de Quebec in which Schipper thanked the people of Quebec for their patronage, extended his hours from morning until four in the afternoon and announced that he would ' leave Quebec June 4th, 1810.2 The Dictionary of British Miniature Painters, printed in London, in 1810, 69
Ult-S
MONTREAL CANADA 1808
lists a Mr. George Schipper of Holland who maintained a shop, the Sign of the Three Beggars. Here at last, Schipper was a success, materially. He lived with his growing family of four children on the same street as the family of Charles Dickens, and was able to send his son Nicholas Lockwood Schipper to an expensive secondary school. When Schipper returned to Holland for the first time in seventeen years to visit his father, an excerpt from his diary in the winter of 1818 records Schipper's taste for fine wines, the theater, choice books, prints and maps. He finally had achieved comfortable status in pursuing his talent as a painter. Gerrit Schipper emerges as a dynamic figure who surmounted political turmoil and economic uncertainty to make an important contribution to portraiture in the United States during its formative period. He captured a generation of Americans before the advent of the daguerrotype. As more Schipper portraits come to light and the known body of his work increases, it will be possible to give Schipper proper credit for the remarkable work he did. Jeanne Riger, a former teacher, is presently a researcher at the Museum of American Folk Art and a Docent at the Eva and Morris Feld Gallery at Lincoln Square. A graduate of the Folk Art Institute, she began studying Gerrit Schipper in a class taught by the late Joyce Hill. NOTES 1. "The conversation piece in pictorial art may be broadly defined as a representation of two or more persons, either a family or a related group ...portrayed informally amid their own surroundings...either visibly sharing a mutual interest or jointly participating in some polite social pastime:' Nina Fletcher Little, "The Conversation Piece in American Folk Art7 Antiques Magazine, November, 1968, p. 56. 2. Nicholas Lockwood Schipper, Autobiography, Wallace Collection. Patricia Wallace kindly furnished the author access to the collection. 3. Mercantile Advertiser, New York City, May 18, 1802. 4. Paintings of Isaiah Thomas, Sr., (3) at American
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Sir James Henry Craig; Circa 1808; Pastel on paper; Collection of McCord Museum ofCanadian History.
Antiquarian Society, Worcester, Massachusetts; Painting No. 6 of Magdalen Warner at New York Historical Society. 5. Donald R. Walters, Carolyn J. Weekley, "Introduction;' American Folk Portraits, Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Center Series I, Beatrix T. Rumford,editor, Boston, 1981, p. 21. 6. Joyce Hill, "New England Itinerant Portraitists' Itinerancy in New England and New York, Dublin Seminars for New England Folklife, Peter Benes, editor, p. 151. 7. Wallace Collection. 8. Hill, op cit, p. 159. Walters, Weekley, op cit, p. 29, 30. The prices for profile miniatures were the cheapest of all. Painting on ivory required more expertise and they were most expensive. The ivory might be lightly scored with closely spaced parallel lines and color added. Schipper advertised miniatures on ivory as he grew more experienced. His self portrait, in 1808, was on ivory. 9. Times, Charleston, South Carolina, April 14, 1803. 10. Columbia Centinel and Massachusetts Federalist, Boston, October 26, 1803; November 26, 1803. The November ad was a clue as to the identity ofthe artist who painted John Dorr, Jr. A penciled inscription on the back mentioned a Mr. Shepper [sic]. Also the style is unmistakably Schipper's. Ebenezer Dorr; the boy's grandfather, who brought him to be painted by Schipper, and is mentioned in the inscription, was a leather dresser in Boston who had carried the news of the intended march of the British to Lexington in 1775, riding to Roxbury on a slowly jogging horse dressed to look like a farmer to dispel suspicion. Longfellow overlooked him in focusing on Revere.
John Dorr, Jr. was one of nineteen children and grew up to be a merchant. For the Dorr genealogy; Thomas Bellows Peck, The Bellows Genealogy, 1898, p. 279. 11. Spy, Salem, Massachusetts, August 1, 1804. 12. Charles Viele,"The Knickerbockers of Upstate New York: 17 Halve Maen, vol. XLVII, no. 3, Holland Society of New York, New York City, October, 1972, p. 5-17. Schaghticoke owes its name to an Algonquian Indian word meaning "meeting of the waters:' A circular fertile valley where the Hoosick and Tomhaimock Rivers came together it was disrupted by tides of battle between the French,Indians, Dutch and British. The famous Witenagemot Oak was planted 100 yards from the Knickerbacker Mansion, to commemorate a peace treaty there. During the Revolutionary War, the exhausted troops from the Battle of Saratoga rested at Schaghticoke. Johannes Knickerbacker, the elder had been severely wounded in that battle. 13. Egbert L. Viele,"The Knickerbockers of New York 11vo Centuries Ago7 Harpers New Monthly Magazine, vol. UV,no. 3, 1876, p. 33-43. 14. 'bid, p. 41. 15. Helen Louise Knickerbacker Simpson Seggerman, "Family History and an Estate Sale7 Maine Antique Digest, February, 1983, p. 30ff. John and Elisabeth Knickerbacker had four sons and seven daughters. His will is in the manuscript room of the New York Historical Society. His wife Elizabeth Winne Knickerbacker signed her name with the "z" in Elizabeth. Schipper used the Dutch spelling. 16. Viele, Egbert,op cit, p. 42. In Harpers the conversation piece is pictured. However, liberties have been taken with it. Embellishments include an elaborate clock, sideboard, and carpet in the background. 17. Ryerszen Genealogy. 18. Magdalen Walgrove Warner, New York Historical Society Collection. 19. Richard Hyer, "Gerrit Schipper, Miniaturist and Crayon Portraitist' The New York Genealogical and Biographical Record, vol. DOOCIII, no. 2, April, 1952, p. 70-72. 20. Glee Krueger, New England Samplers to 1840, Sturbridge, Mass.: Old Sturbridge Village, 1978, p. 29. 21. Connecticut Courant, Hartford, March 18,25, April 1, 1807. Connecticut Historical Society owns eight Schipper pastels and are promised more. They have been catalogued. 22. Gerard Morriset, La Peinture traditionnelle au Canadafrancais, Ottawa, 1960, passim. 23. Dictionary ofCanadian Biography, p. 207-211. 24. Letter from C.E.W. Graham, Registrar, McCord Museum of Canadian History, August 31, 1989. Pastels of John Ogilvy, Lt. Col. Alexander Clerk, Archbald Norman McLeod, Sir lames Henry, Hon. John Richardson, Beniah Gibb, Beniah Gibb, Jr., Peter McFarlane are held by the Museum and recorded as possibly by Gerrit Schipper. 25. Montreal Gazette, April 2, 1810, May 7, 1810, Gazette de Quebec, March 29, 1810, May 7, 1810. 26. Gazette de Quebec. May 17, 1810. The staff of the American Antiquarian Society were most helpful in making their Canadian newspaper files available.
The Clarion
"One of America's greatest self-taught artists." LOU O'KE.L.4. Folk Artist
INTR^DUCTION By ROBERT R151-10E
?a,"When I saw the remarkable, finely detailed canvases and highly individualized 'dot pictures,' astonishment must have flushed my face, for here was a true American primitive — self-taught, an exquisite recorder of time and place, and, most compelling of all, an artist capable of rich detail and a variety of design and texture indicating a unique vision." Robert Bishop from the Introduction MAITIE LOU O'KELLEY: FOLK ARTIST $40.00, 96 PP., 80 COLOR, 12 BLACK-AND-WHITE ILLS. AVAILABLE AT BOOKSTORES To ORDER, CALL 1-800-343-9204, OR WRITE TO BULFINCH PRESS, 34 BEACON ST., BOSTON, MA 02108, ATTN: LC
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Winter 1990
71
BOOK REVIEWS
FOLKLIFE AND MUSEUMS: SELECTED READINGS Edited by Patricia Hall and Charlie Seemann 194 pages,48 black—and—white illustrations Published by The American Association for State and Local History, Nashville, TN,1987 $12.95 softcover Folklife studies in America, the holistic study of traditional culture which includes material folk culture study, descends from the nineteenth century British and European folklife movement. Thinkers of this movement, during the wake of industrialization, fostered the spread of regional ethnological research in rural villages and developed the open-air or outdoor museum concept as a means of presenting and preserving artifacts and structures collected in the field. Only within the past twenty years has folklife in general and material folk culture in particular been incorporated into the larger American discipline of folklore, a field reserved previously for the verbal arts. During this time, folklife was also at work in American museums. In history museums, folklife took the form of "living history" presentations, or reenactments of everyday life in the past. In some fine art museums, folklife manifested itself as contextual photographs and furnishings surrounding traditional folk art objects. In folk art museums,folklife offered curators a way to enter the communities represented by their folk art collections and discover the meaning the objects had for the people who made them. Folklife and Museums: Selected Readings, a collection of fourteen essays, original and previously published, a bibliography and a forward, addresses the ways that folklife has been and can be incorporated into museum policy—making, exhibitions, collection activities and educational programs. The contributing authors constitute an impressive group of folklorists, historians and practitioners, all of whom have worked with folklife in museums: Alan 72
Jabbour, Louis C. Jones, Candace T. Matelic,Robert Baron,Howard Wight Marshall, Willard B. Moore, Charlie Seemann, Jo Farb Hernandez, Patricia Hall, James Deetz, M. Jane Young, John Michael Vlach, Edward L. Hawes, Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, Yvonne Lange and Jay Anderson. Editors Hall and Seemann chose these authors and their articles to "discuss a wide range of theoretical issues and practical concerns important to museums incorporating folk culture into their programming': Though the experiences of the contributors and the types of museums they represent differ, the overriding argument throughout these essays is for a democratic account of material culture, and for an attention to objects made for and used by ordinary rather than elite individuals. Advocating folklife as a conceptual approach to museum programming rather than just as a collections category, the contributors recommend a contextual regard for objects, whereby objects are selected and studied as reflections of cultural values held by the makers and their traditional groups rather than as the personal aesthetics of curators. Although the editors do not group the articles into any thematic sequence,they are best considered according to museum type. Eight of the essays address the relationship of folklife and history museums. For example, Howard Wight Marshall, in his seminal article "Folklife and the Rise of American Folk Museums': argues for a revisionist view of the past, for the representation of majority cultures rather than elite individuals in museums, and for folklife, based on the regional and ethnological model used in European folk museums, as a means toward that end. James Deetz, writing from his extensive experience at Plimoth Plantation, suggests that unless we reach beyond our own cultural conditioning and consider folk artifacts in terms of the period and circumstances of their use, we may be misled into believing that our ancestors lived exactly the way we do. Deetz points to such sophisticated interpretive activities as realistic
role—playing rather than repetitive demonstrations to offer visitors a sense of another time. John Michael Vlach argues that because folk objects belong to a class of objects that represent large, usually conservative, social groups, they stretch over a longer time span than one-of-a-kind items of "so-called straight history: which represent isolated, non-representative, elite individuals. Folk objects, Vlach continues, are indispensble for any authentic historical analysis and are integral to the workings ofa history museum. Edward Hawes presents the most politically articulate article in terms of the very real difficulties of dealing with a variety of museum constituencies, including financial supporters, whose interests may be very far from educational or historical sensitivities. The place of folklife in anthropology, folk art and fine art museums is represented by one article each in this reader. M. Jane Young, in "The Value in Things: Folklore and the Anthropological Museum Exhibit' warns that not all societies have an interest in preserving old things the way art museums do and that anthropological museum exhibits should concentrate more on the meaning a particular object has for the people who made and used it than on displaying an exotic object on a dramatic pedestal. Young also makes the very important point that exhibitions are in part interpretations shaped by interpreters; not only should all events surrounding an object be represented in an exhibition, but the multiple interpretations of the event as well. Yvonne Lange, in her article on folklorists working in museums, describes two community projects at the Museum of International Folk Art involved with reviving tradition by a trained field—worker. Fine art museums display objects other than those made in a Western tradition, but they often feel the need to justify doing so. Jo Farb Hernandez, a trained folklorist who directs the Monterey Peninsula Museum of Art, takes a very practical approach to this problem and argues that folk art and folklife exhibitions may provide an important marketing tool for a fine art institution. In her The Clarion
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article, "Folk Art in the Fine Art Museum': Hernandez suggests ignoring precise definitions of folk art versus fine art and concentrating on how an exhibition of traditional material culture, if treated sensitively, could introduce a seemingly unfamiliar art form to the local community, while possibly adding community members to the museum constituency as well. Robert Baron, in his overview "Folklife and the American Museum': describes the many benefits a folkloristic perspective can bring to the museum situation. He mentions the pioneering efforts of John Cotton Dana to present immigrant traditions at the Newark Museum in the early part ofthis century, and Holger Cahill's landmark exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art, "Art of the Common Man in America, 1750-1900:' Baron reminds us that the formal discipline offolklife may be new to American folklore and museums, but a historical precedent for the place of traditional art in American museums which spans over fifty years. Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, in her article "American Jewish Life: Ethnographic Approaches to Collections, Presentation and Interpretation in Museums' explores how a particular expressive form, American Jewish material culture, has been approached very differently by history museums, folk art museums and ethnographers. Particularly, she provides a lucid distinction between a folk art historical approach to material culture and an ethnographic approach. Folklife and Museums:Selected Readings offers some useful discussions about the way folklife can enrich museum exhibitions, collections and programs. Since the notion of contextual studies in folklore is now over twenty years old, contextual concerns are quickly gaining momentum, particularly in fine art and folk art museums. Only now,it is notjust the academic subject matter and approach that are being challenged but the pragmatics and politics of mounting displays. Recently, museum professionals have rallied around "multiculturalism' a conceptual museum movement which recommends Winter 1990
that exhibitions, both ethnographic and aesthetic, be looked at as reflections of the cultural values and biases held by exhibition creators. Steven D. Lavine, a spokesperson for this movement, quotes Ducan Cameron and describes two distinct museum stances, the traditional one as temple and a newer one as forum. As temple, the museum functions"...as an objective model against which to compare individual perceptions': As forum, the museum functions as a place for"confrontation, experimentation and debate' According to Lavine, few serious museum practitioners today would claim that a museum can be anything but a forum. Museum curators continue to rely on their eye, taste and experience for deciding what to collect and exhibit, but even in this context, they often assert that theirs is only one of many possible points of view.' In the last few years, major art museums have added non-Western traditions and American minority and ethnic art to their collection and exhibition schedules. Responses to these efforts have been mixed, but they have certainly opened the floor for debate. The current traveling exhibition, Hispanic Art in America: Thirty Contemporary Painters and Sculptors, curated by Jane Livingston, of the Corcoran Gallery, and John Beardsley, is an aesthetic assessment by fine art historians of the works of artists of a particular ethnic group. Though cultural historians, folklorists and some Hispanic art professionals have criticized this show for its lack of concern for the social arena front which this work derives and for its hegemonic stance, more than a few of the artists included in the exhibition felt honored to have been selected for their artistic skills. In Paris, Jean-Hubert Martin, Director of the Musee National d'Art Modeme, recently mounted another controversial exhibition, "Magiciens de la Terre': a group of fifty Western and fifty non-Western works representing the spirituality in art. Though Hubert worked directly with anthropologists and ethnographers when making his selection of non-Western works for the show, his premise that this would be a
truly international — global — art exhibition was challenged by such important concerns as decontextualization of the art, the relationship between "center" and "margin':the hegemony of museum institutions and neocolonialism. Although Hubert himself argued that, given the art museum context, it was impossible to mount a truly "unacculturated" exhibition, he also argued that the issue of context was problematic for Western as well as non-Western art.' All ofthe essays in Folklife and Museums address the problem of how folklife and a contextual approach to objects and programs can serve museums. However, if this approach is to be fully effective, the context of museums needs further exploration. Although we may celebrate the fact that the museum as an institution is undergoing change from a temple stance to a forum stance, where different approaches and art may be tried, whatever the stance is, the museum commands respect not only from fine artists and elite audiences but from traditional artists as well. The museum's stamp of legitimacy, the opportunity it provides for exposure and its potential, especially for folklorists, as a laboratory for ongoing historical research, such as in experimental archaeology and living history presentations, are just a few of the reasons why it is a power to be considered. The essays in Folkhfe and Museums: Selected Readings show that like museums and like fine art, folklife studies is a power to be reckoned with. Where,however, many of the articles are prescriptive for the future rather than descriptive of the past, the presence offolklife in museums has accelerated at rapid speed. Yvonne Lange's account of the benefits a folklorist might bring to the Museum of International Folk Art relates to that museum's exhibition "Behind the Mask in Mexico': based on fieldwork by curators and anthropologists who visited Mexico, documented existing masked dances and commissioned the local maskmakers to make masks and costumes for the museum exhibition.3 Many new relationships are being fostered between folklife and museums. To emphasize the 73
BOOK REVIEWS
richness and the development of these activities, the articles in Folklife and Museums: Selected Readings would have been most useful if placed in a historical frame. Still, the editors' selection of articles and authors was keen and this is a wonderful reader for folklorists and museologists who want to get to know and understand each other better. — Laurie Beth Kalb NOTES I. Steven D. Lavine, "Museums and Multiculturalism: Who Is in Control': Museum News, vol. 68,no. 2,March/April 1989:P. 39. 2. Benjamin H. D. Buchloch,"The Whole Earth Show: An Interview With Jean-Hubert Martin': Arr in America, vol. 77,no. 5, May 1989: pp. 150-159, 211, 213. 3. The catalogue accompanying this exhibition is discussed on page 75 of this issue of The Clarion. Laurie Beth Kalb is curator at the Craft and Folk Art Museum in Los Angeles and a Ph.D. Candidate in Folklore and Folklife at the University of Pennsylvania. She has worked for the Museum of International Folk Art and the Millicent Rogers Museum in New Mexico and the Office of Folklife Programs of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC.
AMERICAN PRIMITIVE: DISCOVERIES IN FOLK SCULPTURE By Roger Ricco and Frank Maresca with Julia Weissman 290 pages, 275 color photographs, 175 black-and-white photographs Published by Alfred A. Knopf, New York, NY,1988 $75.00 hardcover As a sign of the times, American Primitive arrives on booksellers' shelves as the first postmodern folk art book. Like their postmodern architect counterparts, authors Roger Ricco and Frank Maresca, and essayist Julia Weissman, create a work collaged with history but which views history less as a system of ideas and meanings than as a menu of stylistic references to be evocatively recycled in a new world of synthetic experience. This book is both 74
timely and profound for it brings to print some new folk art ideas and the aesthetic frames that are shaping contemporary collecting trends and exhibitions. The success of American Primitive is assured. With its hip appearance, the book fits neatly into a history of folk art books in which authors have insisted that photographic reproductions of objects can be a substantive content and in which mythopoetic photo captions suffice as interpretative text for a readership concerned primarily with the visual aspects offolk art. In a survey of collector books on American folk sculpture, a pattern emerges with the first printing of Lipman's American Folk Art in Wood, Metal and Stone (1948) and in Christensen's Index of American Design (1950). The tradition continues in Hemphill and Weissman's Twentieth Century American Folk Art and Artists from 1974 and in Bishop's American Folk Sculpture from the same year. American Primitive updates and redirects this history to survey a dazzling array of several hundred newly collected or recently discovered works of American folk sculpture that Ricco and Maresca feel challenge and hold their own with the acknowledged masterworks presented in the earlier volumes. As a photographic enterprise, American Primitive is a landmark. Frank Maresca, well-known for his fashion photography, presents dramatic and rich photo images of objects imaginatively lit and superbly isolated against colored seamless backdrops. Maresca seeks to photographically imbue
Baby With Ball Sign; Artist unknown; Millbrook, New York;Mid-twentieth century;Painted wood;15 x 27';Private collection.
his subjects with the evocative power of artifacts similarly presented in publications focused on other forms of primitive art. His photos successfully argue that American folk made objects can hold their own with African, pre—Columbian,Eskimo and other work from more traditionally celebrated genres of tribal and exotic art. High resolution smart photos do, however, have their problematic side. In a postmodern world, they often cut too quickly toward issues of marketing and conversely away from problems of meaning and interpretation. Reduced to a silhouette, a back-lit object is only partially described and hence is only partially understandable. Simultaneously enhanced and obscured,the object appropriates rather than engenders meaning for itself. As a consequence, large seductive photos of "rare and unusual" objects are ubiquitous in today's art marketplace and the glossy auction catalogues featuring them can now be found used as texts and placed side by side with other references in collectors' libraries. The "look"that photography brings to American Primitive becomes a patina of connection linking both the book and the art it features to a commodity shell game in which aesthetics, history and even culture are endlessly displaced in illusions and sleights of hand. In its printed text, American Primitive is also a postmodern exercise in appropriation. Weissman's introduction and her several short chapter essays convey a tone of scholarship and inquiry. Bits offormaljargon are collaged over biographic sketches which,in turn, prompt various speculations on what it is that is peculiar to the art made by America's self-taught primitive artists. But, like Maresca's photographs, Weissman's notes only backlight a subject. Her observations are general in character and lead her occasionally to very questionable conclusions. Why, for instance, does she applaud the artistry of face jug makers as being "all the more remarkable for being in a medium that is difficult to work with" when clay has been a uniquely preferred sculpture medium through history precisely because it is easy The Clarion
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in sculpture. He is a longtime collector offolk and isolate art and has written and spoken extensively on American folk art since 1970. In 1988, UMI Research Press published a compilation of Hall's lectures and writings, Stereoscopic Perspective: Reflections on American Fine and Folk Art.
to work with? Such arguable conjecture is finally less an academic endeavor than it is a conceit of style intended to enhance not the information in a book but rather its overall Supplementing this feel, we find a barrage of very creatively edited captions appended to the photos in this book. Throughout, they are an amalgam of art lore, amateur sociology, dealer yarns and folk world fantacies. Skinny large-scale articulated figures are often billed as "scarecrows" while a carved hand affixed to a plaque with a spring and a hinge becomes "an early 20th century paper towel holder" and a set offorged andirons gain distinction because they were "made as a gift for a man who sang in a barbershop quarter The attributions in American Primitive are liberally peppered with "probably', "presumably' "evidently" and "is thought to have been ..." Perhaps misinformation in the captions is less a matter of error than a positive necessity by which postmodernism signals its rejection of an earlier era's belief in truth to materials. Curiously, it is a premodern writer and a very modern artist who have given us the best lenses through which we might view and understand American Primitive. Alexis de Toqueville, traveling through the United States a century and a half ago, wrote a journal that has become a classic American social critique. In his musings, he questions how the arts, as he knew them, would be affected by the process of democratization, the process being depicted around him in the work of such folk artists as Arruni Phillips, Eunice Pinney, Erastus Field and the Bard brothers. Toqueville wondered whether the American passion for democracy would not sooner or later find itself at odds with the condition oftaste and consensus he believed to be critical to the idea of art. Almost a century later, the artist Marcel Duchamp hung a urinal on an art gallery wall and declared it to be a fountain. In so doing, he partially resolved Toqueville's ambivalence about democratic taste. Art,after Duchamp, increasingly addressed itself to issues of the will and intent of the artist but these same Winter 1990
BEHIND THE MASK IN MEXICO Edited by Janet Brody Esser 351 pages, color and black—and—white photographs, maps Published by the Museum of New Mexico Press, Santa Fe, NM,1988 $45.00 hardcover; $29.95 softcover
Unfinished Doll Head; Calvin Black; Wood, 1 2"; Collection of traces of black paint; Height12/ Frank Maresca. concerns granted a permission that enables all individuals in a democracy to "see" art, judge art and esteem art by whatever measure their own understandings might dictate. Thus,the American temper generated the ahistorical, astylistic mandate of postmodernism and, of course, the permissions that empower the book being discussed here. American Primitive has given us a folk art study that conforms to the postmodern model. Ricco and Maresca decontextualize and recontextualize at will. They assert their individual understandings and values in both the written and photographic texts oftheir book. The book itself finds a sympathetic resonance in a collector world that seeks out "user-friendly" information. Selling briskly, American Primitive moves forward to become part of a growing folk art bibliography in which it will certainly stand as a most interesting and remarkable commentary on American art collectors and their evolving ideas of their primitive art. — MichaelD.Hall Michael D. Hall is Resident Sculptor at the Cranbrook Academy of Art in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, where he directs the graduate program
The Museum of International Folk Art in Santa Fe, New Mexico, already had a collection of 650 Mexican masks when, in 1986, it undertook an international project to research the current status of maskmaking in Mexico. The people whose pieces which now comprise the Museum's collection had different needs and interests than those of the institution in which these works eventually came to reside. Scant data about name of maker, date, and place of origin had been preserved with the artifacts by the donors of these pieces, limiting their usefulness to present-day scholars. The intention of the research project was twofold — first, to study the function of masks within the context of the Mexican festival; second, to document differences among these festivals as they are celebrated in various villages. Marfa Teresa Pomar, Director of the Museo Nacional de Artes e Industrias Populares in Mexico City, one of the advisors on the project, is credited with having suggested a case study approach in six Mexican villages,to be visited at various points in the ritual cycle. The villages eventually chosen were San Lorenzo (Michoacan), Acatlan (Puebla), Zitlala (Guerrero), Papalotla(Tlaxcala), Rio Fuerte (Sinaloa), and Suchiapa (Chiapas). Behind the Mask in Mexico, edited by Janet Brody Esser, senior consultant on the project, not only presents the findings, but also serves as the catalogue to the resulting exhibition, on view at the Museum of International Folk Art from June 1988 to September 1990. 75
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Behind the Mask in Mexico contains a foreword by the Director of the Museum of International Folk Art, Charlene Cerny, as well as fourteen articles by ten specialists who represent a wide range of academic orientations. Among the contributors are art historians Marsha C. Bol, Betty Ann Brown, and Cecelia Klein; anthropologists N. Ross Crumrine(from British Columbia, Canada), James Dow,and Ted J.J. Leyenaar (from the Netherlands); folklorist James S. Griffith; and scholar, collector, and photographer Ruth D. Lechuga(from Mexico). Several articles were particularly interesting and merit further discussion. In "Tlaloc Masks as Insignia of Office in the Mexica-Aztec Hierarchy': Cecelia Klein asserts that certain figures in Aztec carvings and illustrated codices, long thought to represent deities, actually depict priests or highly placed individuals wearing festival masks. Her essay provides historical perspective within the last several centuries for the masks which are made today. Marsha C. Bol's "Mexican Masked Festivals at the lthrn of the Century, as Witnessed by Frederick Starr" compares the findings of Starr, chairman of The University of Chicago anthropology department, who visited Mexico in 1894 to those of the researchers who documented a masked dance in Chiapas in 1987. Bol discovered that, despite the passing of nearly a century, not much has changed in the traditional culture of this region. "Holy Week in Los Patos, Sinaloa" is a sensitive piece by James S. Griffith which combines material from two field trips taken in 1968 and 1970. Griffith acknowledges that he is an outsider to the culture he is studying and reminds the reader that his photographs, therefore, represent a nonnative perspective. Nonetheless, to protect the individuals with whom he did his work from any possible post-publication repercussions, he intentionally provides the village with an inexact location and pseudonymous name. The remaining essays are well documented and make extensive use of drawings and ethnographic photographs, stimulating 76
the scholar as well as the general reader. A number of articles stress the fact that the face mask is but a single element in the festival complex and attempt to balance it with the other elements of the maskwearer's apparel. The mask-wearer, in turn, is related to the other members of the community who play a part in the traditional festival: the mask-maker, the little girls who put flowers on the altar, the musicians, the women who prepare the food, and the men who keep order while the festival is in progress. The scholarly portion of the book is followed by "Catalogue': a collection of six primarily photographic essays which capture individual moments in the ritual calendar in a number of research sites. In this section, as well, are several studio shots which show a complete costume as it would be worn in a festival. These images are positioned next to photographs which show the costume disassembled — boots, gloves, hat,ribbons, silk flowers, mask,scarf, glass beads, belts, blouse, and skirts — enabling the reader to study the costume's components. An extensive glossary, bibliography, index, and list of contributors follows "Catalogue"and concludes the volume.The
reader should be able to gain a fair understanding and broadened appreciation of the diversity of images, issues, and concepts related to the term "Mexican mask'? Ofquestionable merit, however,are some design decisions made in the layout of the book. The notes, which readers are accustomed to finding at the end ofan essay or at the end of a volume, are in this case printed in columns alongside the text, in somewhat reduced type size. At first this arrangement is convenient: this is a heavy book, footnotes are numerous, and flipping back and forth continuously between the body of a text to endnotes would have been both cumbersome and tedious. In two essays, though, the reader is momentarily confused. In one instance, all notes are located at the end of the text in accordance with usual convention; in the other, lengthy notes spill over from one page to the next, with the result that the text and explanatory notes are still located on different pages. Another confusing situation occurs as "Catalogue" follows immediately after the ending words of the final essay. The reader has the mistaken impression that the photographs somehow relate to the preceding article. A blank page separating the article from the photographs would have sufficed to mark the transition from one section to the next. These few issues of layout and design are minor. The important issues are the accomplishments achieved by the Museum of International Folk Art. The Museum began with a collection which elicited more questions than answers and turned this into the impetus for a wide-ranging and in-depth international research project. Behind the Mask in Mexico — the research report as well as the exhibition catalogue — provides sound data on maslcmaking in Mexico in the 1980s upon which future scholars will be able to build. It is a volume of which the Museum of International Folk Art can be very proud. — Egle Victoria ygas Egle Victoria ygas is Curator ofEducation at the Museum of American Folk Art. The Clarion
BOOK REVIEWS
SPANISH-AMERICAN BLANICETRY: ITS RELATIONSHIP TO ABORIGINAL WEAVING IN THE SOUTHWEST By H. P. Mera 81 pages, 24 color illustrations Published by The School of American Research Press Sante Fe, NM,1987 $14.95 softcover This is the pioneer book on the subject of Spanish-American blanketry written forty years ago by H. P. Mera the scholar who first distinguished Spanish-American blanketry from Navajo blanketry. The manuscript has been a reference for students of Spanish-American weaving for years, and has been noted in several important publications on Southwest arts. The School of American Research is to be congratulated for finally publishing this beautiful and important book. TWenty-four full-page color plates illustrate the most important known blankets, each facing specific information about that blanket. More important perhaps is the historic text(25 pages) preceding the color plates, for it documents the history of two Southwestern loom styles, the Pueblo and the Spanish, and their influence on weaving styles. This book is about Rio Grande blankets made in the nineteenth century by SpanishAmericans living along the Rio Grande River in what is now New Mexico and southern Colorado. Although the first Spanish colonists arrived in 1598 with Juan de Onate, they brought no loom parts or weaving tools. But,as Kate Kent points out in her important introduction, by 1638 numerous woven textiles were made on treadle looms (flat, horizontal, harness looms)for trade to Mexico. Mera notes that the Spanish introduced sheep and wool for weaving, whereas earlier textiles were made of cotton or other vegetable fibers. The Spanish colonists enslaved the Pueblo Indians and forced them to weave large quantities of textiles on their own,and presumably, Spanish looms,for barter. This Winter 1990
led to a revolution in 1680, and the Spanish colonist fled for twelve years. Pueblo weaving began to die out, but by 1706 the Navajo had adapted the indigenous vertical loom and were known to be weaving, having learned from Pueblo refugees. The Spanish-Americans however, were unhappy with the quality of textiles available in the eighteenth century, and thus by 1807 they had contracted a Mexican master weaver and his brother to come to Sante Fe and teach weaving to young men. This led to an evolution in design, from strip blankets to ones with ornate designs, and the borrowing ofideas for patterns from the Navajo. Spanish-American blankets, like Navajo blankets, are "weft-faced" — none of the warp, the vertical core of the textile, shows. Since the original Spanish colonial loom was narrow and produced a textile of only twenty-four inches in width, blankets were made either by sewing two widths together, as was done by early African-American weavers in the United States South,or by an ingenious method of using two warps, one above the other. The latter method permits both pieces to be woven at the same time without fear of a mismatched design or mismatched dyes. Both techniques are illustrated in the color photos in the book. The earliest Spanish-American blankets
Spanish - American Blanketry
feature horizontal stripes. This was true for Navajo blankets of the early nineteenth century also. About 1850, a new, more complex style appears in Spanish-American blankets and is attributed to influences from various centers of Mexican weaving. Mera credits the availability of a three-ply yarn from Saxony, available between 1850 and 1870, as one reason for more complex lozenge-shaped designs in these blankets which he calls"psuedo-Mexican'This yarn was also used in Navajo textiles which Mera feels reached their peak in the 1850s and 1860s. The third style of Spanish-American blanket, made after 1870,shows a mixing of the earlier stripe designs with Mexican and Navajo ideas. Mera writes on the Navajo influence on Spanish-American blankets at this time,"Examples are known where only the details oftechnique and coloration serve to distinguish them from Navajo work'? vameros, a fourth style, indigenous to the valleys of southern Taos County, New Mexico, flourished in the 1880s and featured an eight-pointed star. Yet another style, a coarse outdoor blanket made with simple stripes, began in the 1870s, and a final style was the chimayo blanket, named after the town, and made to satisfy the tourist market. This blanket was made with four-ply machine spun yarns, not the hand spun yarns used for the traditional blankets. Interestingly enough, as Kate Kent notes in her introduction, Spanish-American blanketry did not die out as Mera expected, but experienced a revival around 1970. This is an excellent book, to be recommended to all students of Spanish-American weaving. I learned a lot from it, having been familiar with Navajo weaving, but unaware ofthe distinct history ofthe Spanish-American blanket which is decidedly Spanish.
— Maude sorahweil wahiman Maude Southwell Wahlman, Ph.D., is Professor and Chairperson of the Art Department at the University of Central Florida, Orlando. She writes on African-American folk arts, particularly textiles, and two of her recent articles have appeared in The Clarion, Vol., 14, No.2 and Vol. 14, No. 3. 77
DEVELOPMENTS JOHLEEN D. NESTER
ENDOWMENT GIFT FROM SEVERAL JAPANESE DONORS The generous support of many members, corporations, foundations, and government funding agencies in the past year has allowed the Museum to establish an endowment fund for the presentation of exhibitions and educational programs at the Eva and Morris Feld Gallery at Lincoln Square in the future. I am pleased to announce a very generous donation from a group of four Japanese donors which indicates the growing international interest in, and support of, the Museum. The gift, totalling $100,000 to name the Atrium at Lincoln Square, has been given by three corporations, Asahi Shimbun, Chinon, and Kodansha, Ltd., and the well-respected naive painter, Taiji Harada, as a demonstration ofthe Japanese peoples' appreciation of folk art. The Museum has a long history of presenting folk art to Japanese audiences. For more than ten years, the Museum has been organizing exhibitions to travel to museums and galleries in Japan. A licensing agreement, signed with Takashimaya Department Stores in 1984, allows for the production of folk art-inspired home furnishings which are available in seventeen stores throughout Japan. Royalties from this program support Museum operations. Implementation of these programs over the years has introduced the Japanese people to American folk art and the Museum. As a result, many Japanese travellers to New York make a
Tomoko Okabe and Kazuo Yoshida, Assistant to the Director ofCultural Affairs, Asahi Shimbun. 78
special point of visiting the Lincoln Square gallery and Museum Shops. This generous gift to the endowment fund demonstrates a major commitment to the presentation of Museum programs in the future and indicates great understanding and appreciation of American folk art. The acknowledgement plaque in the Atrium, which recognizes the contribution,reads"We, Japanese, love folk arts too:' We at the Museum of American Folk Art are especially grateful! MULTI-FACETED SUPPORT FROM COUNTRY HOME速 MAGAZINE As reported in the past, the Museum is extremely fortunate to have a broad base of donors making generous contributions which support exhibitions, educational programs, publications, general operations and the Lincoln Square endowment fund. Often, donors provide in-kind gifts such as printing, advertising, and supplies in addition to outright grants. Country Home is a perfect example of this type of multifaceted corporate sponsor. Through its Cultural Events Support Program, Country Home has made a grant to support the educational programming for the current exhibition, "America Eats: Folk Art and Food!' In addition, the magazine has produced a poster which contains information about the exhibition, lecture series, and members' opening on the reverse. An article about "America Eats: Folk Art and Food" in Country Home greatly assisted in reaching a wide audience.
Tetsuya Chikushi and Taiji Harada.
And, Country Home provides support for general operations through a generous corporate membership gift. The goals of the magazine and its philosophy of generously supporting the arts help to further the Museum's mission to increase the public's understanding offolk art. Country Home is a very special and much-appreciated friend of the Museum of American Folk Art. ENCORE AWARD FOR BEN & JERRY'S HOMEMADE The Arts and Business Council, a national organization dedicated to the promotion of working partnerships between arts institutions and corporations, has awarded an Encore Award to Ben & Jerry's Homemade in recognition of the many generous contributions the company has made to the Museum during the past year. This prestigious award is given each year to five corporations which have demonstrated significant support of the arts. Jerry Greenfield, co-founder of Ben & Jerry's, accepted the award at the twenty-fifth anniversary celebration for the Arts and Business Council on October 26, 1989. Coincidentally, the second annual night at the Big Apple Circus, one of the contributions for which Ben & Jerry's was recognized, took place that same evening. The Museum greatly appreciates its unique relationship with Ben & Jerry's and is delighted that the Arts and Business Council has also acknowledged this important partnership.
Jerry Greenfield accepting the Encore Award on behalfofBen and Jerry's Homemade. The Clarion
MUSEUM OF AMERICAN FOLK ART BOARD OF TRUSTEES Exective Committee Ralph Esmerian President Frances Sirota Martinson, Esq. Executive Vice President Lucy C. Danziger Vice President George E Shaskan, Jr. Treasurer Mrs. Dixon Wecter Secretary Karen D. Cohen Judith A. Jedlicka Theodore L. Kesselman Susan Klein Kathryn Steinberg
Members Mabel H. Brandon Florence Brody Peter M. Ciccone Daniel Cowin Barbara Johnson, Esq. William I. Leffler George H. Meyer Cyril I. Nelson Cynthia V.A. Schaffner William Schneck Ronald K. Shelp Bonnie Strauss
Maureen Taylor Robert N. Wilson Honorary Trustee Eva Feld Trustees Emeriti Adele Earnest Cordelia Hamilton Herbert W. Hemphill, Jr. Louis C. Jones Margery G. Kahn Alice M. Kaplan Jean Lipman
DEVELOPMENT ADVISORY COMMITTEE Judith A. Jedlicka Theodore L. Kesselman Co-Chairmen Lewis Alpaugh Hoechst Celanese Corporation Gordon Bowman Corporate Creative Programs Frank Brenner Hartmarx Corporation
John Mack Carter Good Housekeeping Paul Chusid Squibb Corporation Jerry Kaplan Better Homes and Gardens Allan Kaufman Long Distance North
Francine Lynch Chase Manhattan Bank, N.A. Rachel Newman Country Living Thomas 'Roland Country Home Barbara Wright New York Telephone
INTERNATIONAL ADVISORY COUNCIL Frances Sirota Martinson, Esq. Mrs. Dixon Wecter Co-Chairmen
Paul Anbinder William Arnett Frank & June Barsalona Mary Black Susan Blumstein Judi Boisson Gray Boone Robert & Katherine Booth Barbara & Edwin Braman Milton Brechner Raymond Brousseau Edward J. Brown Charles Burden Tracy Cate Margaret Cavigga Edward Lee Cave Joyce Cowin Richard & Peggy Danziger David Davies Marian DeWitt Davida Deutsch Charlotte Dinger Raymond & Susan Egan Winter 1990
Margo Ernst Howard Fertig Ted & Joanne Foulk Jacqueline Fowler Ken & Brenda Fritz Ronald Gard Robert S. Gelbard Dr. Kurt A. Gitter Merle & Barbara Glick Howard M. Graff Bonnie Grossman Michael & Julie Hall Lewis I. Haber Elaine Heifetz Terry Heled Josef & Vera Jelinek Joan Johnson Eloise Julius Isobel & Harvey Kahn Allen Katz James Keene Mark Kennedy Arthur & Sibyl Kern William Ketchum Susan Kraus Wendy Lavitt Marilyn Lubetkin Robert & Betty Marcus
Paul Martinson Steven Michaan Michael & Marilyn Mennello Alan Moss Kathleen S. Nester Helen Neufeld Henry Niemann Paul Oppenheimer Dr. Burton W.Pearl Patricia Penn Leo & Dorothy Rabkin Harriet Polier Robbins Charles & Jan Rosenak Joseph J. Rosenberg Le Rowell Randy Siegel Sibyl Simon Susan Simon Ann Marie Slaughter Sanford L. Smith R. Scudder Smith Richard Solar Hume Steyer Jane Supino Edward Tishelman Tony & Anne Vanderwarker John Weeden G. Marc Whitehead 79
CURRENT MAJOR DONORS
The Museum of American Folk Art greatly appreciates the generous support of the following friends: $20,000 and above Amster, Rothstein & Ebenstein Asahi Shimbun Bear, Steams & Co., Inc. Ben & Jerry's Homemade,Inc. Bidermann Industries Judi Boisson Marilyn & Milton Brechner Chinon, Ltd. Cosmair Inc. Mr. & Mrs. Frederick M. Danziger Dillard's Mrs. Eva Feld Estate of Morris Feld Genesco Inc. Hartmarx Corporation William Randolph Hearst Foundation The Hot Sox Co., Inc. IBM Corporation Klear-Knit, Inc. Kodansha, Ltd. Mr. & Mrs. Ralph Lauren Jean & Howard Lipman R.H. Macy & Co., Inc. Mahoney Cohen & Co. Manifaro Inc. Joseph Martinson Memorial Fund The May Stores Foundation, Inc. National Endowment for the Arts New York State Council on the Arts Optique Du Monde Ltd. Oxford Industries, Inc. PaineWebber Group Inc. Philip Morris Companies Polo Ralph Lauren Corporation Leo & Dorothy Rabkin Restaurant Associates Industries, Inc. Seibu Corporation of America Herbert and Nell Singer Foundation, Inc. Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom J.P. Stevens & Co., Inc. United Technologies Corporation Warnaco Inc. Warner Communications Mrs. Dixon Wecter Wells, Rich, Greene, Inc. Whisper Knits, Inc. The Xerox Foundation $10,000-$19,999 Estate of Mary Allis American Express Company Amicus Foundation Lily Cates Coats & Clark, Inc. Mr. & Mrs. Peter Cohen Country Home Cowen & Company The Joyce & Daniel Cowin Foundation Inc. 80
Culbro Corporation Adele Earnest Fairfield Processing Corporation/Poly-fil Daniel and Jessie Lie Farber Walter and Josephine Ford Fund Taiji Harada The Peter S. Kalikow Fund,Inc. Shirley and Theodore L. Kesselman Kohlberg Kravis & Roberts Foundation Naomi Leff & Associates, Inc. Manufacturers Hanover Trust Masco Corporation Kathleen S. Nester New York Telephone Reliance Group Holdings Republic National Bank of New York Revlon Group Inc. Derrald Ruttenberg Schlumberger Foundation, Inc. David Schwartz Foundation, Inc. Samuel Schwartz Mrs. Gertrude Schweitzer and Family Mr. & Mrs. George F. Shaskan, Jr. Shearson Lehman Hutton Peter and Linda Solomon Foundation Springs Industries Mr. & Mrs. Robert Steinberg Barbara and Thomas W. Strauss Fund Wathne Ltd. Weiss Peck & Greer Wilke Farr & Gallagher Robert N.& Anne Wright Wilson $4,000-$9,999 American Stock Exchange The Bernhill Fund Bristol-Myers Fund Mr. & Mrs. Martin Brody The David and Dorothy Carpenter Foundation 'Racy Roy & Barbara Wahl Cate Chase Manhattan Bank, N.A. Mr. & Mrs. Edgar M. Cullman Mr. & Mrs. Richard Danziger David Davies Department of Cultural Affairs, City of New York Jacqueline Fowler Colonel Alexander W. Gentleman Richard Goodyear Hoechst Celanese Corporation Barbara Johnson, Esq. Margery and Harry Kahn Philanthropic Fund Kornreich Insurance Services Mr.& Mrs. Robert Klein Wendy & Mel Lavitt Metropolitan Life Foundation George H. Meyer Steven Michaan Annette Reed Arthur Ross Foundation The Salomon Foundation Squibb Corporation The State Education Department, Division of
Library Development, New York State Mr. & Mrs. Stanley Tananbaum John Weeden Norman & Rosita Winston Foundation $2,000-$3,999 American Folk Art Society American Savings Bank Berry Hill Galleries Inc. The Mary Duke Biddle Foundation Mr. & Mrs. Thomas Block Capital Cities/ABC The Coach Dairy Goat Farm Country Living Mr. & Mrs. Joseph F Cullman 3rd Exxon Corporation Mr. & Mrs. Alvin Einbender Cordelia Hamilton Justus Heijmans Foundation Johnson & Johnson Knapp Communications Corporation Mr. & Mrs. Richard LeFrak Mr. & Mrs. Daniel W. Lufkin Marsh & McLennan Companies Christopher & Linda Mayer McGraw-Hill, Inc. Morgan Stanley & Co.,Incorporated The New York Times Company Foundation, Inc. Ortho Pharmaceutical Corporation Laura H. Petito Foundation The Reader's Digest Association, Inc. Betsey Schaeffer Robert T. & Cynthia V.A. Schaffner S.H. & Helen Scheuer Mr. & Mrs. Derek V. Schuster Joel & Susan Simon Mr. & Mrs. Austin Super Mr. & Mrs. Richard T. Taylor Time Inc. Triangle Foundation V.I.P. Fabrics Adrienne Vittadini Inc. David & Jane Walentas $1,000-$1,999 B. Altman & Co. William Arnett Brooke Astor The Bachmann Foundation Didi & David Barrett Mr. & Mrs. Frank Barsalona Stephen Bell Mr. & Mrs. Albert Bellas Edward Vermont Blanchard & M. Anne Hill Bozell Inc. Mr. & Mrs. Edwin Braman Mabel H. Brandon Edward J. Brown Ian G.M. & Marian M. Brownlie Morris B. and Edith S. Cartin Family Foundation Edward Lee Cave Liz Claibome Foundation The Clarion
STEPHEN HUNECK R.ED. 1 ST JOHNSBURY, VT 05819 BY APPOINTMENT 802-748-5593
01(
81
"The Corporate Structure", carved and painted Secretary Desk by Vermont artist Stephen Huneck, 7' 3" high, 3' 8"wide and l' 8" deep. Inquires invited.
GP CURRENT MAJOR DONORS
Consolidated Edison Company of New York The Cowles Charitable Trust Crane Co. Richard K. Descherer Mr. & Mrs. Alvin Deutsch Mr. & Mrs. Donald DeWitt Gerald & Marie DiMann째 The Marion and Ben Duffy Foundation Echo Foundation Ellin E Ente Virginia S. Esmerian John L. Ernst Faith Golding Foundation Inc. Mr. & Mrs. Stuart Feld Mr. & Mrs. Thomas Ferguson Janey Fire & John Kalymnios M. Anthony Fisher Susan & Eugene Flamm The Franklin Mint George Friedman Mr. & Mrs. Richard S. Fold, Jr. Generra Sportswear Co.,Inc. Emanuel Gerard The Howard Gilman Foundation Selma & Sam Goldwitz Renee Graubert Mr. & Mrs. Martin D. Gruss Mr. & Mrs. Charles Gwathmey Terry & Simca Heled The Betty L. Hess Rind Hirschl & Adler Galleries Alice & Ronald Hoffman Stanley Jaffee Productions Mt & Mrs. Yee Roy Jear Judith A. Jedlicka Joan & Victor L. Johnson William K. Joseph Isobel & Harvey Kahn Kallir, Philips, Ross, Inc. Mr. & Mrs. Leslie Kaplan The Karp Foundation The Kihi Lee & Ed Kogan Mr. & Mrs. Arie L. Kopelman Susan Kudlow Mr. & Mrs. Jeffrey Lane Estee Lauder Inc. Mr. & Mrs. Ronald Lauder Estate of Mary B. Ledwith William & Susan Leffler John A. Levin Co.,Inc. Dorothy & John Levy James & Frances Lieu Mr. & Mrs. Arthur Liman Macmillan, Inc. Robert & Betty Marcus Foundation, Inc. Mr. & Mrs. James H. Manges Marstrand Foundation Helen R. Mayer & Harold C. Mayer Foundation Marjorie W. McConnell Meryl & Robert Meltzer Michael & Marilyn Mennello Robert & Joyce Menschel Foundation 82
Benson Motechin, C.P.A., P.C. National Westminster Bank USA The Natori Company New York Council for the Humanities Mr. & Mrs. Donald E. Newhouse Mattie Lou O'Kelley Paul Oppenheimer Mr. & Mrs. Edward Pantzer Penn Conn Limited Mr. & Mrs. Mark Perlbinder Mr. & Mrs. Roger Phillips Mr. & Mrs. William Potter Ramac Corporation Cathy Rasmussen Arm-Marie Reilly Paige Rense Marguerite Riordan Mrs. John D. Rockefeller III Alyce & Roger Rose Willa & Joseph Rosenberg Mr. & Mrs. Jon Rotenstreich Schlaifer Nance Foundation Mr. & Mrs. William Schneck R.D. Schonfeld & Co.,Inc. Mr. & Mrs. Richard Sears Randy Siegel Rev. & Mrs. Alfred R. Shands III George Sheinberg Ronald K. Shelp Mrs. Vera W. Simmons Philip & Mildred Simon Mrs. A. Simone Mr. & Mrs. Richard L. Solar Mr. & Mrs. Elie Soussa Mr. & Mrs. Sanford L. Smith Sterling Drug Inc. Paul Stuart Mt & Mrs. Michael L. Tarnopol Phyllis & Irving Tepper That Patchwork Place Tiffany & Co. Tishman Speyer Properties Anne D. Utescher H. van Ameringen Foundation Tony & Anne Vanderwarker Veronis, Suhler & Associates Elizabeth & Irwin Warren Weil, Gotshal & Manges Foundation Mt & Mrs. Ronald Weintraub Mr. & Mrs. Ronald Whitman Weiss Wertheim Schroder & Co. Mt & Mrs. John H. Winkler Mr. & Mrs. Jon Wurtzburger $500-$999 APCO Corporation Didier Aaron Robin Albin Helen & Paul Anbinder Anthony Annese Louis Bachman Nancy Bachrach David C. Batten
Roger S. Berlind Jeffrey & Mary Bijur Eleanor Dell Billet Robert & Katherine Booth Michael 0. Braun Carolyn & Kenneth Brody Nan Bush Inc. Mr. & Mrs. Ward Carey Colwill/McGee, Inc. Confluence Edward & Nancy Coplon Judy Angelo Cowen Edgar M. Cullman, Jr. The Dammann Fund, Inc. Andre & Sarah de Coizart Oscar de la Renta Mr. & Mrs. James DeSilva, Jr. Deborah Dunn Mr. & Mrs. James A. Edmonds, Jr. Richard C. & Susan B. Ernst Foundation Mr. & Mrs. Howard Fertig Janet Fleisher Gallery Timothy C. Forbes Estelle E. Friedman Kenneth & Brenda Fritz Riki Gail Interiors Peter Gee Katharine S. Gilbert Mr. & Mrs. William L. Gladstone Gomez Associates Mr.& Mrs. Baron J. Gordon Robert M. Greenberg Dr. & Mrs. Stanley Greenberg Grey Advertising, Inc. Connie Guglielmo The Charles U. Harris Living 11-ust Denison H. Hatch Craig M. Hatkoff Stephen Hill Holiday Inn of Auburn Raymond E. Holland David Horowitz Mr. & Mrs. David S. Howe Mr. & Mrs. Thomas C. Israel Cathy M. Kaplan Mary Kettaneh Mr. & Mrs. Jonathan King Jana K. Klauer Joel & Kate Kopp Elaine Koster Helene-Diane Kravis Janet Langlois Dalia Leeds Mr. & Mrs. Peter Levy Mr. & Mrs. Richard M. Livingston Helen E. & Robert B. Luchars Manderley Antiques Hemline Mariaux Robin & William Mayer Mr. & Mrs. D. Eric McKechnie Gael Mendelsohn Christie Ferer Millard Pierson K. Miller The Clarion
QUEST
FOR
FIRE
The hometown source for
Bill Traylor Mose Tolliver Works also available by Rev. Howard Finster, Jimmie Lee Sudduth, Brother B.F. Perkins
Leon Loard Gallery of Fine Arts 2781 Zelda Road, Montgomery, Alabama Nationwide 1-800-235-6273 Within Alabama 1-800-345-0538
8407 WEST THIRD STREET•LOS ANGELES. CA 90048•213 658-5969 JEWELRY•CERAMICS e GLASS•FURNITURE•FOLK ART
-4 1 CURRENT MAJOR DONORS
Mr. & Mrs. Richard Netter Mr. & Mrs. Arthur O'Day Geraldine M. Parker Dr. Burton W. Pearl Mr. & Mrs. Lawrence B. Pike Priory Partners Mr. & Mrs. Stanley M. Riker Betty Ring Mr. & Mrs. David Ritter Dorothy Roberts Trevor C. Roberts Joanna S. Rose Chuck & Jan Rosenalc Richard Sabino Saks Fifth Avenue Mary Frances Saunders Skidmore Owings & Merrill Smith Gallery SONY Corporation of America David E Stein Robert C. & Patricia A. Stempel Sterling Sound Texaco Philanthropic Foundation, Inc. Winter 1990
Marco P. Walker Washburn Gallery Bruce Weber Anne G. Wesson Mr.& Mrs. John R. Young Marcia & John Zweig
The Museum is grateful to the Co. Chairwomen of its Special Events Committee for the significant support received through the Museum's major fund raising events chaired by them. Karen D. Cohen Cynthia V.A. Schaffner
The Museum also thanks the following donors for their recent gifts to the Permanent Collection, Library and Education Collection: Aarne Anton: American Primitive Gallery
Dianne P. Avlon Robert Bishop Mary D. Brornham Margaret Cavigga Dr. Kurt(jitter and Alice Yelen Lillian and Jerry Grossman in memory of Joyce Hill Jolie Kelter and Michael Malce Mateo Lettunich and Karl Springer Howard and Jean Lipman in memory of Joyce Hill George H. Meyer Mary C. Newlin Jack Savitsky Mrs. Gertrude Schweitzer Sarah Snook Kumiko Sudo The Tartt Gallery; Washington, D.C. Elizabeth and Irwin Warren in memory of Joyce Hill Elizabeth Wecter Malcah Zeldis; dedicated to the memory of my father Morris Brightman
83
Country Heritage MARKETS American Crafts by Traditional Folk Artists
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Pre-registration and Information: P.O. Box 389• Carlisle, PA 17013 •(717) 249-9404 Call for Market Times • Open to the Trade Only
MARIE FOX The Sewing Lesson • Acrylic on Canvas 24" x 20"
NEWBURY FINE ARTS 133 Newbury Street Boston, MA 02116 617.536-0210
Richard Wright Telford Folk Artist
"KAT MAN DU" Oil on Panel Originals Limited Edition Prints Painted Furniture Commissions
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Richard W. Telford The Chapel 250 Ship Pond Road Plymouth, MA 02360 Tel: 508-224-7578
85
OUR INCREASED MEMBERSHIP CONTRIBUTIONS JULY-SEPTEMBER 1989
We wish to thank the following members for their increased membership contributions and for their expression of confidence in the Museum: Judy Alender, Cayucos, CA A. Annese, Westfield, NJ Mrs. R.G., Ashbaugh, Jr., Edwardsburg, MI Barbara Balik, Sherman Oaks, CA Allen D. Bragdon, S. Yarmouth, MA L. Winifred Cleverger, New York, NY Stephen H. Cooper, New York, NY Mrs. Robert Dickinson, Chagrin Falls, OH
Marsha Dubrow, Upper Montclair, NJ Deborah Dunn, New York, NY Edwin F. Gamble, Brunswick, ME Robert & Alene Gelbard, Miami, FL Robert M. Greenberg, New York, NY Stephen Hill, New Canaan,CT M. Anne Hill, New York, NY Ladl F. Johnson, Chicago,IL Mr. & Mrs. Richard Kanter, Rydal, PA Jonathan & Jacqueline King,Ridgewood, NJ ME & Mrs. Harvey Mackay,Excelsior, MN Mrs. Patti Macleod, Beverly Hills, CA Paula Marks, Darien, CT
Mr. & Mrs. Jon Masters, New York, NY Mr. & Mrs. Michael Mennello, Winter Park,FL David & Chris Owsley, New York, NY Jeff Pressman, Del Mar, CA Chuck & Jan Rosenak, Tesuque, NM Mrs. Alan Sagner, S. Orange, NJ Morgan J. Sincock, Flourtown, PA Mr. & Mrs. Herbert Singer, New York, NY Dian G. Smith, New York, NY Peter H. Tillou, Litchfield, CT MaryAnn & Raymond Warakomski, South River, NJ Harold & Judith Weissman, New York, NY
OUR GROWING MEMBERSHIP JULY-SEPTEMBER 1989
The Museum trustees and staff extend a special welcome to new members:
Robert Adler, New York, NY Sian L. Alexander, Van Nuys, CA Ellen Anderman, W. Hempstead, NY Douglas Anderson, Hazleton, PA Catherine B. Andreycak, Bronxville, NY Caren Anton, Lafayette, CA Ann D. Ashley, Knoxville, TN Judith Auereach, Hartsdale, NY
Mrs. Wallace Barrett, Rumson, NJ Rosemary Bathurst, Ann Arbor, MI Lynda Beal, Midland, TX Diane Beedie, Downers Grove,IL Augusta M. Benjamin, Greensboro, NC Mrs. Anthony Berns, New York, NY Cathy Bernstein, Stamford, CT Ron Beuzenburg, New York, NY Barbara H. Black, Brooklyn, NY Hazel Blackman, Bronx, NY Leonore Blitz, New York, NY Jenny Beth Bloom, Lancaster, PA Fon Boardman, Jr., New York, NY Gail Bobowick, New York, NY Maggie Boedecker, Raleigh, NC Liruda Bosniak, W. Long Branch, NJ Jane L. Bowne,Perkinsville, VT Nancy Boyd, Houston, TX 86
Gertrude Bram, Washington, DC Deborah Brearley, Victoria, Australia Sharon Brophy, New York, NY Suzanne Warren Brown, Arkansas City, KS Madeline A. Brown, Hamden, CT Bryn Mawr College Library, Bryn Mawr,PA B.J. Buchenauer, Telford, PA Kaaren Buffington & family, Arcata, CA David Burger, New York, NY Jane Burgoyne, New York, NY Harriet Burnett, New York, NY
Miles & Lillian Cahn,Pine Plains, NY Pat Cairns Studio, Vancouver, Canada Robert & Michele Cappiello, San Francisco, CA Iris Cannel, New York, NY Suzanne M. Carton, Florham Park, NJ Joel Charkow,Pleasantville, NY Richard A. Chase, M.D., New York, NY G.R. Clifford, Long Valley, NJ Eleanore C. Collins, Bronx, NY James H. Collins, Aspen,CO W.G. Conway, New York, NY Roberta Bell Cook, Berkeley, CA Mark B. Coplan, Columbia, SC Mollie Corcoran, Des Plaines, IL Mrs. Kay Corinth, New York, NY Sharron Zenith Come, Winnipeg, Canada Mary Cosseue & family, New York, NY Joan Craftways, Richmond, CA Richard Crawford, Pasadena, CA Pamela A. Cross, London, England
Kristine E. Dahm, W. Nyack, NY Robin L. Dale, Brewster, NY Mitchell Darch, Chicago, IL Caretta G. Davis, Ridgefield, CT Jill Davis, Birmingham, MI L. Decker, Miller Place, NY Cheryl Dempsey, Weston, MA Jennifer Dennehy,Santa Fe, NM Designer's Touch Ltd., Ozone Park, NY Karen C. Dorsett, Memphis,TN Georgia A. Doyle, New York, NY Joan R. Drummond, New York, NY Jill M. Dube, Brooklyn, NY Ruth Dube, New York, NY Ann T. Duncan, Sayville, NY Carol Dunklau, Lincoln, NE
Marjorie A. Edens, Jacksonville, OR Katherine & Alan Edison, Chicago, IL Eric Ellenbogen, New York, NY Gordon Engel, Woodstown, NJ Nancy England, Cambridge, MA M. Erbes, Dunwoody,GA Susan Everett, Edmonds, WA
William Fagaly, New Orleans, LA Reggie E. Fairchild, New York, NY Susan Fantle, Brooklyn, NY Suzy Farbman, Huntington Woods, MI Mrs. James A. Fanner, Bethel, CT K.I. Felderman, Moreland Hills, OH Franklin Feldman & family, New York, NY The Clarion
..r7M
OUR GROWING MEMBERSHIP
Cynthia Fellman, Kew Gardens, NY John Finley, New Orleans, LA Joanne M.Flora, Jersey City, NJ Maribeth Flynn, Brooklyn, NY Nancy E. Fornoff, Lancaster, PA Barbara E. Fortini, North Bergen, NJ Ann Fowler, Springfield, VA Estelle A. Fox, New York, NY Josephine Frankel, Phoenix, AZ Mrs. Lawrence Friedman, Chappaqua, NY
Dr. Thomas J. Gardner, New York, NY Wertie L. Garvin, Baton Rouge,LA Dawn A. Giegerich, Astoria, NY Hilary Glantz, New York, NY Sandy Glassel, Frankston, Australia Jeanette M. Glover, Westbury, NY Gerson Goldberg, Westbury, NY Adele Golden, Glenside, PA Stephen Goodyear, M.D., Charlottesville, VA Bobby Gosh, Brookfield, VT Mariana Grant, Salem, OH Linda Gray, New York, NY Harriet Griffin Fine Arts, Inc., New York, NY Cyndi Gruber, New York, NY Connie Guglielmo, New York, NY
Audrey Hannum, Lancaster, PA Margaret C. Hatcher, Miami, FL Carol Hauser, New York, NY Pamela Hawkins, Flushing, NY Frederick H. Hayward, Wilmington, DE Marsel A. Heise!, New York, NY Adrienne Herman, Rancho Palos Verdes, CA John M. Hill, Bronx, NY Kenneth E. Hill, Rancho Santa Fe, CA Sarah Hilton, Sea Bright, NJ Elizabeth L. Hirsch, LaGrange, AK Herbert Hirsh, New York, NY Ronald & Priscilla Hoffman, New York, NY Juanita Holland, New York, NY Ann Marie Hollis, Lake Bluff, IL Dr. & Mrs. Marc J. Horman, Doylestown,PA Minna Horowitz, New York, NY Nancy B. Howell, Novato, CA Hope Freeman Hudner, Little Compton, RI Albert L. Hunecke, Jr., Atlanta, GA Kay Hunzinger, Phoenix, AZ Phillip Huscher, Chicago,IL Marlene G. Hynes, New York, NY
Susan K.leromnimon,Piscataway, NJ Keiko Imaguire, New York, NY Allison R. Isherwood, Fair Haven, NJ
Marion Johnston, Valley Stream, NY David McCall Johnston, Franklin, MI Mrs. J.D. Jung, Scottsdale, AZ Winter 1990
Joan B. Jusick, New York, NY
Mary Hunt Kahlenberg, Santa Fe, NM Mark I. Kalish, Brooklyn, NY Erni Kamiya, New York, NY Bob & Marianne Kapoun,Santa Fe, NM Roland Karlen, New York, NY Nan S. Keenan, New York, NY Garzetta Kemen,Geneva, Switzerland Lucille Khomak, New York, NY Frances Klein, New York, NY Shelia Kies, New York, NY L. Barry Knittel, Westport, CT Carla Knobloch, Atlanta, GA Barbara Benson Kohn, New York, NY Ray Kowalski, Cleveland Hts., OH Wanda Krause, Horton, MI Wendy Kreeger, Larchmont, NY Mary Kubake, Rochester, MI Mr. & Mrs. Steven Kurtz, New York, NY
Matthew Laine & family, Dix Hills, NY Dr. Patricia R. Lanier, New York, NY Eleanor Levie, Darien, CT Rya Levitt, Toronto, Canada Ellison Lieberman, Woodstock, VT Robert R. Lindh, N. Huntingdon,PA Loretta A. Lundberg, Brooklyn, NY Robin Lyle, Los Angeles, CA
Jane Machuga, Baltimore, MD Susan Martin, W. Hartford, CT Avis Jane Mason, Aurora, OH Maxine Maxwell, New York, NY Harris May, Greenwich, CT Clare P. McAdams,Winter Haven, FL Patty McCormick, Corona del Mar, CA A. Veronica McDonnell, Rancho Palos Verdes, CA Dr. Carol L. McElroy,Foster City, CA Juice McHalsky, Oconomowoc, WI Joan Mclntee, New York, NY Byron H. McKinney, Scarsdale, NY Margaret G. McLaughlin, Melrose Park, PA Dr. Joanne C. McMillan, Lakeview, CT Sandra McPherson, Davis,CA Nava McUmber, New York, NY Selma Mead, Arlington, VA Corinne A. Meikle, Sayre,PA Alice E. Mering,Towson, MD Walter E. Messner, New York, NY Andrea Mildenberger, Northport, NY Joan Mintz, New York, NY Iris Mones, Bayside, NY Anne M. Monks, Kirkland, WA M.R. Moore, Salt Lake City, UT Mary Ann Moore, Sanibel, FL Deborah R. Morris, East Lansing, MI Karen Munroe, New York, NY
Craig Murray, Richmond, England Leslie Muth, Houston, TX
Mariko Nakao, Forest Hills, NY Riitta M. Narhi, Helsinki, Finland Ann Bodle Nash, La Conner, WA Paula Neal, Tulsa, OK Ruth K. Nelson,'fillsa, OK Dan Nelson, Easton, CT Michael J. Neve, Fontwell, England Jo A. Newbanks, Charlotte, NC David J. Nolan, New Hope,PA
Patsy O'Connell, St. Louis, MO Barbra O'Shaughnessy, W. Cornwall, CT Susan E. Oostdyk, Green Pond, NJ Veronica Orlosky, New York, NY Beth A. Osborne, New York, NY
Mr. & Mrs. Richard S. Paul, Fairfield, CT Sara E. Penn, New York, NY Charles B. Perry, Jr., Atlanta, GA Ruth H. Peterkin, New York, NY Evelyn A. Petschek, Hartsdale, NY Suzanne Pfisteer, Sandy Creek, NY Howard Pflanzer, New York, NY Stefano Pipemo, Roma,Italy Deborah Purse, Bayport, NY
Marie T. Raperto, Flushing, NY Rebecca Rasmussen, New York, NY Patricia Ann Ready, Essex Jct., VT Diane C. Reager, Los Angeles, CA Marilyn Reardon, Seattle, WA Mr. Sc. Mrs. David Ritter, New York, NY Mrs. Thoma D. Robertson, Staten Island, NY Carol A. Robertson, Glendale, CA Lisa Robinson, Washington, DC Barbara Rogers, San Francisco, CA Elinor Rogosin, New York, NY Sophie P. Rosner, Englewood, NJ Mrs. Mary Ross, Linthicum, MD Chicca Ruffini, New York, NY Mrs. Esterly Rutman, New York, NY
Cecillia Salber, Brooklyn, NY Lincoln Sander, Redding, CT Lyn Sandow, Easton, CT James & Kathy Saunders, Houston, TX Kathleen C. Saxe, Sioux City, IA Anne Schleider, Santa Fe, NM Lisa Schneck, New York, NY Carol Schneider, Cliffside Park, NJ Irene Schneider, New York, NY Brad Schofield, Oalcton, VA Ann & Sol Schrieber, Brooklyn, NY Roseann Schuab, New York, NY 87
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Renee Schulman, Croton-on-Hudson, NY Margery Schunk, Westhampton Beach, NY C. Diane Scott, New York, NY Joseph B. Shaffer, Herndon,PA Nancy L.A. Sheble, Chevy Chase, MD Jane E. Sheffield, New York, NY Elaine L. Sheppe, New York, NY David J. Sheskin, Bethel, CT Joan Siegel, New York, NY Barbara Simon, Brooklyn, NY Patricia J.S. Simpson, Brooklyn, NY Amy Singer, New York, NY Patricia D. Siska, New York, NY Jennifer Smith, Southport, CT Harry Smith Jr., New York, NY Steve Smock, Chicago, IL Josephine Sperry, Incline Village, NV Sally Spillane, Lakeville, CT Lynne Spriggs, New York, NY Louise Stafford, Northridge, CA Carole Ann Stahl, Encino, CA Patricia Stancil, Marietta, GA William R. Steimel, Canal Fulton, OH Gerald A. Stilwell, Coral Gables, FL Esta-Lee Stone, Westwood, MA 88
Leta Sullins, Fremont, IN Diane Sutherland, Vestal, NY Carolyn Lloyd Swain, Gloucester, VA
Valerie Takai, New York, NY Zelda Tanenbaum, Bayside, NY Myrna Tatar, San Francisco, CA Paul S. Tauber, Washington, DC J.B. Taylor, New York, NY Maud Thiery, Bgobogent, Belgium Sandra J. Thlick, Los Angeles, CA Barbara N. Thompson, Hastings-on-Hudson, NY Helen Trent, Floral Park, NY Patricia limas, Flemington, NJ Crystal B. Minter, Pittsburgh, PA
Carol A. Van Sickle, Toledo, OH Andrew Vansickle, Cincinnati, OH Ms. Marie Vassallo, New York, NY Sherry Kafka Wagner, Cambridge, MA
Anne M. Wall, Rockville Centre, NY Claudia K. Wallis, Pelham, NY Jane Walsh, West Vancouver, Canada Beth-Ann Heit Warmflash, Kendall Park, NJ Sarah E. Warner, Fenton, MI Peter Warwick, Middletown, NJ Charles Webber, Houston, TX Judith S. Weinberg, New York, NY Weinstein family, Long Beach, NY Sheila J. Welch, New York, NY Jill W. Welsh, University Heights, OH R.L. Wenstrup, New Richmond, OH Michael C. Wesenberg, Ann Arbor, MI Jeanne C. West, Wilton, CT Alice M. Wester, Denver, CO Richard S. Whaley, New York, NY Roseanne Wheler, Toronto, Canada Mrs. Seymour Wiener, New York, NY Mrs. M. Wiesenfeld, New York, NY Helen Wiley, Salt Lake City, UT L. Clayton Willis, Arlington, VA John Wilmerding, Princeton, NJ Mrs. Robert E. Wiser, Oklahoma City, OK James L. Wisler, Pleasanton, KS Norman Wolff, St. Louis, MO
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Claire Murrays's art is beauty. It is a reflection of memories, the blend of the traditional and the contemporary, the vibrance of color and the warmth of home. Hand hooked rugs, kits and hand appliqued quilts. Call or write for our catalog, $5, refundable on first purchase. NANTUCKET COLLECTION,P.O. BOX 2489, DEPT. C, NANTUCKET, MA 02584 1-800-323-9276•Info: 1-603-543-0137
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MUSEUM NEWS COMPILED BY WILLA S. ROSENBERG
FEBRUARY GALLERY OPENINGS "Beneath the Ice: The Art of the Fish Decoy:' an exhibition including approximately 200 objects representing this ancient yet recently rediscovered folk art form, is scheduled to open at the Museum of American Folk Art/Eva and Morris Feld Gallery at Lincoln Square, Columbus Avenue and 66th Street, New York City, on February 15, 1990 and run through June 17, 1990. Ben Apfelbaum, Guest Curator, has surveyed American fish decoys to present the finest examples from different regions and periods. Edu-
cational programming planned in conjunction with this exhibition is made possible with public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts. "Face to Face: M.W. Hopkins and Noah North:' an exhibition organized by the Museum of Our National Heritage and traveling to the Museum of American Folk Art,explores the relationship between the two men and other nineteenth century folk painters of New York, Connecticut and Ohio. It will also open February 15, 1990 and runs through April 15, 1990.
SECOND ANNUAL NIGHT AT THE BIG APPLE CIRCUS Ben & Jerry's Homemade sponsored the opening night performance of the Big Apple Circus' 1989/90 New York season, October 26, 1989, as a benefit for the Museum. Jerry Greenfield, co-founder of Ben & Jerry's, joined Robert Bishop, Director of the Museum, to welcome
more than 1500 friends of the Museum, including some 950 New York City school children, to this year's spectacular show, "Grandma Goes West': Afterwards, Museum friends joined the circus performers in the ring for ice cream.
FOLK ART INSTITUTE Registration is now open for the Spring session of the Folk Art Institute, which begins January 22, 1990. The schedule, already announced, highlights courses in American Folk Painting, American Folk Sculpture, International Folk Art, and "The Dealer Speaks:' a course funded by The Friends Committee and featuring observations of outstanding dealers in American Folk Art with regard to their own personal credos, marketing philosophy and special interests. For fully matriculated students of the Institute, the tuition is $75 a credit. Auditors are welcome on a space available basis. In addition, course offerings include hands-on craft and heritage courses — graining, marbelizing, rug hooking, scene painting on panels or boxes, stencilling and a fractur workshop. Separate instructional and mate-
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Beverly Riesberg participates in the rug hooking class. rials fees apply. Classes will be held at the Folk Art Institute, Museum of American Folk Art, 61 West 62nd Street, New York, NY 10023; telephone 212/977-7170. Please direct inquiries to this address.
Best Vest judges dressed in their Judge's Choice vests (from left) Abbie Small, Dr. Robert Bishop, Elizabeth V. Warren, Cathy Rasmussen, Alice J. Hoffman and Mary Ziegler.
BEST VEST CONTEST The Museum of American Folk Art Quilt Connection sponsored "The Quest for the Very Best Vest:' Patterns donated by Simplicity Patterns were sent to Quilt Connection members with instructions to make a vest in the crazy quilt style. The contest entries were judged on September 2, 1989 by a panel ofjudges: Dr. Robert Bishop, Director of the Museum; Abbie Small, Crafts Manager, Simplicity Patterns; Cathy Rasmussen, Director, Great American Quilt Festival; Elizabeth V. Warren, Curator of the Museum, Mary Ziegler, seamstress; Alice J. Hoffman, Director of Art Services of the Museum. The winners, representing 16 states and four foreign countries, are: Linda Aiken, Phoenix, AZ; Donna Albert, Lancaster, PA; JoAnne Annis, Ontario, Canada; Barbara Barber, Westerly, RI; Cynthia Curtright, Laramie, WY; Patty Elwin Davis, Ithaca, NY; Susan R. DuLaney, Albuquerque, NM; Ellen Anne Eddy, Evanston, IL; B.J. Elvgren, Pittsburgh, PA; Marge Gilbert, Glendale, CA; Dorothy Herberg, Rogue River, OR; Mary Ann Hemdon, Houston, TX; Linda Hogan, Rockport, MA; Yvonne Khin, Rocky Ridge, MD; Therese Lauze, Paris, France; Gloria Leoniak, Brielle, NY; Constancia Lynes, Savannah, GA; Christine Manzo, United Arab Emirates; Laverne Noble Mathews, Orange, TX; Jean Perry, Bayport, NY; Liesbeth Spaans- Prins, The Netherlands; Deborah Sarabia, Las Cruces, NM; Eileen Squitiro, New Milton, WV; Muriel Stein, Brooklyn, NY; Marie Wilson, Brooklyn, NY; Rosann Wood, Germantown, TN; Christine Deitchley, South Bend, IN. The quilted vests are worn by the docents in the Museum of American Folk Art/ Eva and Morris Feld Gallery at Lincoln Square. As Dr. Bishop said these vests "create visible and immediately recognizable symbols of the Museum's presence in the community, its commitment to quality, and our 'investment' in the future:'
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MUSEUM NEWS
FALL ANTIQUES SHOW The eleventh annual Fall Antiques Show at the Pier opened at Pier 92 on October 18, 1989 with a gala Santa Fe style preview evening benefiting the Museum. William E. Channing and Morning Star Gallery organized "Echoes of the Spirit: A Tribute to Santa Fe;' and Joshua Baer organized "Twelve Classics of Antique American Indian Art;' two special exhibitions featured at the show. D.Y. Begay conducted a demonstration of Native American blanket weaving. Phyllis George Brown served as Honorary Chairman of the evening. National Chairman was David Davies; Marvin Slaves was Corporate Chairman and Elaine Horwitch was Santa Fe Chairman. Museum Trustees Karen D. Cohen and Cynthia V.A. Schaffner were Co-Chairmen. The Walking Tour Chairmen were Dr. Robert Bishop, Director of the Museum and Helaine Fendelman. The Museum wishes to thank the following for their generous contributions towards the success of the evening: Sanford L. Smith, producer of the Fall Antiques Show, Chicken by George/Geo. A. Hormel Co., Crown Publishing, David Ziff Cooking, Inc., JTJ Industries Inc. and Scali, McCabe, Slaves, Inc. Director of Museum Shops, Marie DiManno, Sally O'Day and Rita Pollitt and Membership Director, Beth Bergin, Chris Capp i ello, Sherrie Broughton, Amy Bergin and Barbara Schmidt made a significant contribution to the Museum by working diligently throughout the show.
Clockwise from left: Paul Simon admiring antique pieces;Governor John Brown ofKentucky and his wife, Phyllis George Brown, Honorary Chairman of the evening, join Museum DirectorRobertBishop and Honorary 7histee Eva Feld; Karen Karp shares aftstive moment with Trustees Bonnie Strauss and Karen D. Cohen.
Clockwise: Director Robert Bishop pauses with Trustee Cyril I. Nelson during the Show; International Advisory Council members Dorothy and Leo Rabkin examine quilt in dealer's booth; National Chairman David Davies with Helen Smith, Jack Weeden and Scudder Smith.
Left: Kathleen Sullivan, Elaine Horwitch, Santa Fe Chairman, and Phyllis George Brown, Honorary Chairman ofthe Fall Antiques Show.
Winter 1990
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MUSEUM NEWS
ACCESS TO ART "Access to Art: Bringing Folk Art Closer" was received with much public enthusiasm during its exhibition run, September 21November 26, 1989, at the Museum of American Folk Art/Eva and Morris Feld Gallery at Lincoln Square. Docents, who received special training organized by the Curator, Irma Shore, gave guided tours to more than sixty-five groups with a variety of interests, ages and abilities, so visitors could achieve the full benefit of touching and learning about the objects. An important component of the exhibition, the Xerox/Kurzweil Personal Reader, was donated to the Museum by The Xerox
Big Apple Circus Ringmaster Paul Binder and Irma Shore, Director ofAccess to Art®.
Foundation. This new technology is available to assist individuals with visual impairments and learning disabilities and translates printed text into simulated speech. An additional Xerox/Kurzweil Personal Reader is now located in the Museum Library and both are available to the public by appointment. Irma Shore, Director of Access to Art®, was instrumental in assisting the Big Apple Circus invite a wide range of organizations from the visually impaired community to its special "Circus of the Senses" perfOrmance on November 16, 1989.
MUSEUM EXHIBITIONS An exhibition of Double Wedding Ring Quilts was on view at the 80 Washington Square East Gallery at New York University from October 17-November 9,1989. Museum Director, Dr. Robert Bishop, is the author of The Romance of Double Wedding Ring Quilts published by E.P. Dutton in association with the Museum.
Explorers entering San Francisco de Assisi Chapel. EXPLORERS' CLUB TRIP Forty Folk Art Explorers sampled the many delights of Santa Fe and Taos November 8-12, 1989. The very busy schedule included visits to museums,art galleries, homes of folk art collectors, beautiful southwestern churches, local craftsmen, popular restaurants and shops. Due to the popularity of this trip, a second Santa Fe trip is scheduled for April 4-8, 1990. While this trip will be partially filled from the waiting list from the Fall trip, there are still limited spaces available. For further information, please contact the Membership Office, telephone 212/977-7170.
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• The Museum lent fifteen pieces by Mattee Radoslovich from its collection to the Jersey City Museum for the exhibition "Two Arks, A Palace, Some Robots, and Mr. Freedom's Fabulous Fifty Acres" which was on view September 15November 25, 1989.
FRIENDS COMMITTEE Folk Art Closer" and "Always in Time: Music in American Folk Art;' the Friends Committee graciously prepared and served a delicious array of hors d'oeuvres and desserts. The Friends Committee has also organized and financed a Folk Art Institute course for the Spring 1990 term, "The Dealer Speaks," featuring fourteen prominent dealers' talks on their various areas of expertise. Please contact Howard Fertig,President `g• of the Friends Committee, telephone Florence and Howard Fertig, President ofthe 201/992-9247(evenings)or the Museum Friends Committee,join DarylFerber,Secre- Membership Office, 212/977-7170, for tary, Center, in preparation for the opening information about joining the Friends Committee and their endeavors. exhibition festivities.
This special group of volunteers works diligently to aid the growth and welfare of the Museum by participating in both specific events and daily activities. For the July opening of "Stitched from the Soul: Slave Quilts from the Ante-Bellum South' and the September openings of the exhibitions "Access to Art: Bringing
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American Folk Art Sidney Gecker
We offer an extremely varied selection offine American folk art. We specialize in fine, decorated slipware, particularly from Pennsylvania and the Shenandoah Valley. Also weathervanes,eighteenth and nineteenth century oil paintings, watercolors and miniatures.Tole,chalkware, woodcarvings and painted furniture. Come and visit us. You will be pleased with the quality of our collection.
226 West 21st Street New York, N.Y. 10011
(212)929-8769 Appointment suggested AmmiPhillips GirlinRcdDress Museum ofAmerican FolkArt
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One of the museum's best loved paintings has been reproduced in a limited quantity, with great care, as an impressive 27 x 39" poster. It's guaranteed to add charm and warmth to your home or office. Use the coupon to order. Posters will be sent in a tube, promptly, with the postage paid. 0
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MUSEUM NEWS
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NEW
Top: Johleen Nester, Director of Development, and Suzanne Gyorgy, Administrator, PaineWebber Art Gallery, share a moment during opening reception for "The Road to Heaven is Paved by Good Works: The Art of Reverend Howard Finster." Below: Reverend Howard Finster signs posters as Lee Kogan looks on.
GALLERY NEWS
A grand total of 5,786 New York State quilts made prior to 1940 have been photographed, registered and documented during forty-five public Quilt Days held in thirty-one counties throughout the state during the last year and a half. Efforts to secure as comprehensive an archive as possible by soliciting national and state museums, historical associations, quilt dealers and
known quilt collectors are continuing. Please contact Phyllis Tepper, Director, New York Quilt Project, Museum of American Folk Art,61 West 62nd Street, New York, NY 10023, telephone 212/977-7170.
MUSEUM'S TRAVELING EXHIBITIONS Plan to visit the following Museum of American Folk Art Exhibitions when they travel to your area during the coming months:
December 11, 1989-February 6, 1990 The Pennsylvania German Hex Sign: A Photo Panel Exhibition Center Gallery of Bucknell University Lewisburg. Pennsylvania 717/524-3792
On September 26, 1989, Reverend Howard Finster made a special appearance at the Museum of American Folk Art/ Eva and Morris Feld Gallery at Lincoln Square to autograph posters of the exhibition, "The Road to Heaven is Paved by Good Works: The Art of Reverend Howard Finster" which runs through January 5, 1990 at the PaineWebber Art Gallery. This exhibition was organized by John Turner, presented by the Museum of American Folk Art and sponsored by PaineWebber Group Inc.
January 8-March 5, 1990 Access to Art: Bringing Folk Art Closer Hunter Museum of Art Chattanooga, Tennessee 615/267-0968
Many thanks to Michael George of Louloudia, The Flower Service Store,for the flower displays that grace the desk at the Eva and Morris Feld Gallery at Lincoln Square.
January 14-March 11, 1990 Life in the New World: Selections from the Permanent Collection of the Museum of American Folk Art Hunter Museum of Art Chattanooga, Tennessee 615/267-0968
Patron members were treated to a special preview party on December 8, 1989. William Woys Weaver, Curator of "American Eats: Folk Art and Food:' and Roger Ricco and Frank Maresca, Curators of "Discoveries in Folk Sculpture" led tours of their exhibitions and afterwards signed copies of their new books.
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YORK QUILT PROJECT
December 24, 1989-February 17, 1990 American Wildfowl Decoys: An Art of Deception Gibbes Art Gallery Charlestown, South Carolina 803/722-2706
January 18-March 15, 1990 Memories of Childhood: The Great American Quilt Festival 2 The Butler Institute of American Art Youngstown, Ohio 216/743-1711 January 29-April 23, 1990 Stitched from the Soul: Slave Quilts from the Ante-Bellum South
Huntsville Museum of Art Huntsville, Alabama 205/535-4350 February 11-April 8,1990 Amish Quilts from the Collection of the Museum of American Folk Art St. Louis County Department of Parks and Recreation Clayton, Missouri 314/889-2863 March 18-May 12, 1990 American Wildfowl Decoys: An Art of Deception Folk Art Center Ashville, North Carolina 704/298-7928 April 2-May 14, 1990 The Pennsylvania German Hex Sign: A Photo Panel Exhbition Schuylkill County Council for the Arts Pottsville, Pennsylvania 717/622-2788 April 2-May 28, 1990 Access to Art: Bringing Folk Art Closer Museum of Arts and History Port Huron, Michigan 313/982-0891 April 5-May 31, 1990 Memories of Childhood: The Great American Quilt Festival 2 Whatcom Museum of History and Art Bellingham, Washington 206/676-6981 April 8-June 3, 1990 Life in the New World: Selections from the Permanent Collection of the Museum of American Folk Art Columbia Museum of Art Columbia, South Carolina 803/799-2810
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INDEX TO ADVERTISERS
Aardvark Publications, Inc. 71 America Hurrah 17,18,19,20,21,22,23,24,25,26,27 American Primitive Gallery 35 Ames Gallery of American Folk Art 12 Authentic Designs 95 Joshua Baer & Company 36,37 Barrister's Gallery 95 Sandra Berry 41 Ruth Bigel Antiques 33 Robert Cargo Folk Art Gallery 8 Caskey Lees Shows 39 Carruth Studio, Inc. 34 Cavin Morris, Inc. 16 Christie's 15 Collectable Old Decoys 95 Country Heritage Markets 84 Leslie Eisenberg Folk Art Gallery 34 Epstein/Powell 30 Laura Fisher 28
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Janet Fleisher Gallery 9 Pie Galinat 38 Galerie Americana 89 Gasperi Folk Art Gallery 41 Sidney Gecker American Folk Art 93 Grass Roots Gallery 39 Anton Haardt Studio Gallery 89 John C. Hill 95 Peter Hill, Inc. 5 Hirschl & Adler Folk Inside Back Cover Stephen Huneck 81 Martha Jackson 30 Jay Johnson 96 Kelter-Malce 2,3 June Lambert Antiques 14 Little Brown & Company 71 Leon Loard Gallery of Fine Arts 83 Main Street Antiques 38 Steve Miller 1 Morning Star Gallery Inside Front Cover The Nantucket Collection 89
Newbury Fine Arts New Stone Age Outside-in Susan Parrish The Poster Gallery International The Quilt Gallery Quilts of America Robert Reeves Roger R. Ricco/Frank Maresca Stella Rubin John Keith Russell David A. Schorsch Sotheby's Sweetgum Galleries The Tarn Gallery Richard Wright Telford Viking Press Eldred Wheeler of Houston Thos. K. Woodard Yankee Doodle Dandy
84 83 31,33 32 93 40 6,7 13 4 31 Back Cover 44 29
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