John Sherwood Anderson, Self Portrait, 1938. Oil on canvas. Graphic Arts Collection. GA 2006.02619. Written on the back of the frame “J.S. Anderson (1908-1995), Self Portrait. Son of Sherwood. Purchased by E.A. [Elmer Adler] 1938 at 54 Washington Mews, New York.”

In December 1926, writer Sherwood Anderson (1876-1941) and his wife Elizabeth took two of their three children, John (1908–1995), and Marion (aka Mimi, 1911–1996), to Paris. “Within a few days . . . Elizabeth entered Mimi in a private French girls school, and Sherwood placed John in a pension to pick up French and, at Gertrude Stein’s suggestion, in the Académie Julian to study painting. The Andersons joyfully attended the Christmas party Gertrude had invited them to . . . .” While both parents left Paris soon after, it was arranged that Mimi was to stay on at her school until June 1, John at the Académie until September 1.

“John . . . who had expected to find Stein someone ‘arty with a long cigarette holder,’ had seen her several times and was much impressed by her ‘horse sense.’ After the older Andersons had left, John called on her frequently and became one of her favorites. She noted that upon his parents’ leaving he at once changed from ‘an awkward shy boy’ to an assured, handsome young man; decades later he would think of his whole stay in Paris as a young art student as ‘a golden time.’” (Walter B. Rideout, Sherwood Anderson: a Writer in America, v.1 (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2006.)

Sherwood married his fourth wife Eleanor Copenhaver in 1933. The couple lived, on and off, at the exclusive the home of Mary Emmett (Mrs. Burton Emmett) at 54 Washington Mews in Greenwich Village. This painting was purchased by E.A. (presumably Elmer Adler) during the period they were at this address. In 1939, the writer came to Princeton to deliver a Spencer Trask Lecture entitled “Man and His Imagination.” He is quoted as saying, “The use of the imagination on a grand scale can lead to disastrous results. Every good storyteller is a born inventor, but when he lets his invention run away with him he destroys his story.” Daily Princetonian 64, no. 124 (20 October 1939). Elmer Adler brought Anderson’s painting to Princeton the next fall.

W. Robert LaVine (died 1981), Design for the Union Soldier’s costume in Maggie Flynn, ca. 1968. Ink and watercolor. Graphic Arts Collection shell ff.

The musical Maggie Flynn opened at the ANTA Playhouse in New York City on October 23, 1968 and ran for a total of 82 performances. It is one of three Broadway musicals with costumes by LaVine. The show’s book, music, and lyrics were written by Hugo Peretti and Luigi Creatore.

Besides designs for Broadway, LaVine also worked in movies, television, and high fashion. Shortly before his death in 1980, he published In a Glamorous Fashion: the Fabulous Years of Hollywood Costume Design (New York: Scribner, 1980). Firestone TT507 .L36

Peter Rice (born 1928) designed the costumes for Les deux pigeons (The Two Pigeons) in 1961. This allegorical ballet was based on the fable of Jean de La Fontaine (1621-1695) was first performed at the Paris Opéra in October 1886. Frederick Ashton later created a new ballet to the same music, danced by the South African National Ballet.

Macbeth, Scene V, Act V “Hang out our banners on the outward walls. / The cry is still “They come!” Our castle’s strength / Will laugh a siege to scorn; here let them lie / Till famine and the ague eat them up: / Were they not forced with those that should be ours, / We might have met them dareful, beard to beard, / And beat them backward home.”

Unfortunately, the bottom of this set design for a production of Macbeth has been cut off, leaving the sketch without the artist identified.

Thomas Hill (1829-1908), Looking up Yosemite Valley, California (or Yosemite Valley from Inspiration Point), 1889? Oil on canvas. Gift of J. Monroe Thorington, Class of 1915.

Label pasted to the verso [above] and inscription on the canvas [below]

We are fortunate to have five paintings and two prints by the British-born artist Thomas Hill (1829-1908). Because of our ongoing renovation, three of Hill’s paintings were recently moved back into storage. Here are the images so they won’t disappear entirely.

Hill’s studio, on the grounds of the Wawona Hotel, is now a National Park Service visitor center. The NPS has posted a good overview of the artist and his Yosemite paintings at: http://www.nps.gov/yose/historyculture/thomas-hill.htm

In 1872, Thomas Hill moved back to San Francisco with his wife Charlotte Hawkes and their nine children. Here, amid the beauty and grandeur of the California landscape, he thrived and became an important part of the growing California art scene. During the late 1870s, Hill became increasingly popular as a landscape painter, particularly of Yosemite subjects. After a sketching tour in the spring of 1879, he returned with over 30 oil sketches, quickly turning several into larger paintings.

Hill’s Studio in Wawona, in a community near Yosemite’s Mariposa Grove of Giant Sequoias, was finished by January 1884. In the 1880s, he separated from his wife, and spent less time in San Francisco and Oakland.

Increasingly, he found happiness and success in Yosemite. By 1886, Hill settled at Wawona and, when not traveling, spent summers there and winters in nearby Raymond. Hill’s work at Wawona was prolific and modestly profitable—in three years he sold 163 paintings. He seemed to enjoy the relaxed lifestyle and easy popularity as Wawona’s resident artist. As with many artists, his fortunes fluctuated with the erratic art market. After 1880, Hill’s popularity declined and it became increasingly difficult for him to sell paintings. Although Hill suffered a stroke in 1896, he continued to paint, but his sales slowed and his travels were limited. As late as 1906, it was reported that he was “still at work and his easel is set up at a very early hour each morning.” Thomas Hill died on June 30, 1908, in Raymond, California.

Thomas Hill (1829-1908), Nevada Fall, Yosemite Valley, 1889. Thorington Alpine Views Collection. Gift of J. Monroe Thorington, Class of 1915.

Thomas Hill (1829-1908), Vernal Falls, Yosemite, 1889. Oil on canvas. Thorington Alpine Views Collection. Gift of J. Monroe Thorington, Class of 1915. Signed and dated: “T. Hill // 1889”.

Following the art program designed by architect Frederick Fisher, 2013 Gold Medal recipient by the Los Angeles Chapter of the American Institute of Architects, several new paintings have been added to the walls of Firestone Library. Painting and sculpture is now on view from the Princeton University Art Museum, Princeton Campus Collections, and Firestone’s Rare Books and Special Collections.
Sidney Goodman (American, born 1936), Lawn Practice, 1971. Oil on canvas. Princeton University Art Museum. Gift of Liza and Michael Moses 2007-151

William Kienbusch (American 1914-1980), To the Ocean, Outer Sand Island, 1957. Oil on canvas. Princeton University Art Museum. Gift of James H. Beal, Class of 1920 and Mrs. Beal; y1962-5

Welcome back to portraits of James McCosh, Samuel Cox, and James Madison, freshly glazed.

Junius Brutus Stearns (1810–1885) painted over a dozen fishing scenes, including Elliott and his Friends (1857). The nearly life size canvas depicts his colleague, portrait painter Charles Loring Elliott (1812-1868) at the left; the humorist Frederic S. Cozzens (1818-1869) on the right; and Lewis Gaylord Clark (1808-1873), editor and publisher of The Knickerbocker, standing in the center.

Whether or not the three men actually spent time together fishing is unknown but they were certainly all friends. Elliott made at least 11 portraits of Clark and of his wife before being celebrated with an extended biography in Clark’s magazine.

In the year before he posed for Elliott and his Friends, Cozzens published “The Sparrowgrass Papers, or Living in the Country” in The Knickerbocker. The story tells the humorous adventures of Mr. Sparrowgrass when he moves his family out of the city and experiences the joys of fishing (among other activities).

“…the slow and sleepy village presents a contrast, which, upon the whole, can scarcely be considered as favorable to the latter. Plumbers are very slow in the country; carpenters are not swift; locksmiths seldom take time by the forelock; the painter will go off fishing; the grocer on a pic-nic; the shoemaker to the menagerie.”– The Sparrowgrass Papers, 1856.

Our donor, Carl Otto Kretzschmar von Kienbusch, Class of 1906 (1884-1976) was an avid fisherman who gave the library Cozzens’ book at the same time he donated Stearns’ painting. Each June, he spent a month fishing for salmon on the rivers of eastern Canada. Even after he went blind in 1966, Kienbusch continued to fish with the help of a guide.

Junius Brutus Stearns (1810-1885), Elliott and his Friends, 1857. Oil on canvas. Gift of Otto von Kienbusch, Class of 1906.

Frederic S. Cozzens (1818-1869), The Sparrowgrass Papers, or, Living in the Country (New York: Derby & Jackson; Cincinnati : H.W. Derby, 1856). Graphic Arts Collection (GAX) Hamilton 644 and Rare Books: Otto von Kienbusch Angling Collection (ExKi) PS1449.C64 xS6

Ivan Gregorewitch Olinsky (1878-1962), Robert Cresswell, 1897-1943, no date [ca. 1943]. Oil on canvas. Graphic Arts Collection

When Lieutenant Colonel Robert Cresswell, Class of 1919, died on a mission for the Office of Strategic Services during World War II, the Princeton University Library chose the Friends’ Room in the Graphic Arts Division of Firestone Library as a memorial to him. The room was chosen because it was largely through Cresswell’s imagination and skilled effort that the graphic arts collection, together with Elmer Adler, came to Princeton in 1940.

As a member of the class of 1919, Cresswell’s undergraduate education was interrupted by service during World War I, returning to campus to graduate in 1920. He joined the New York Tribune, later the New York Herald-Tribune, as a 25 year old reporter and by the age of 35, Cresswell was director the company. In 1940, as chairman of the Friends of the Princeton University Library, it was Cresswell who arranged the financing to establish a three year experimental program of graphic arts led by Adler. Later that year, Cresswell resigned from the Tribune and purchased the Philadelphia Evening Ledger, where he became director and publisher.

Cresswell’s life was again interrupted, this time by World War II, and he reenlisted in 1942. It is unfortunate the not long after he arrived in England, Cresswell contracted an infection that spread quickly and he died in 1943. Happily, the three-year experiment in graphic arts was taken over by the Princeton University Library and continues to thrive today. The Friends’ room has been renovated and recently reopened as administrative offices.

When Princeton University Library received the wonderful donation of over two dozen paintings and drawings by Cleveland artist William Sommer (1867-1949), several staff members immediately fell in love. Various prints and watercolors were distributed to offices within the library, where they remained for almost thirty years.

The works were donated to Princeton University thanks to the Mildred Andrews Fund in honor of Dr. William Milliken, ’11, *33 (1889-1978). Arrangements were made between 1985 and 1986 by Sommer’s foremost collector Joseph M. Erdelac (died 2004), and Peter Putnam ‘42, *50 (1927-1987). Less than one year later Putnam was tragically hit and killed while riding his bicycle.

Happily, we have learned a great deal about the damage light can do to works on paper, watercolor in particular, and we have removed the originals from permanent display. Unhappily, for this particular watercolor by Sommer, it was not quite soon enough. A facsimile has been created to hang in its place, cleaning up the years of darkening caused by over-exposure to light. The original, on the left, will be housed in a cool, dark drawer to preserve what is left for future generation.

Sincere thanks to all the staff members who participated in this transfer and rehanging.
William Sommer (1867-1949), Profile of woman in purple dress, seated in green chair, reading a paper, 1936. Watercolor. Graphic Arts collection. Gift of the Mildred Andrews Fund in honor of Dr. William Milliken. Formerly owned by Rev. Dexter Chenny, given to him by William M. Milliken, acquired from William Sommer.

Attributed to Albert Anker (1831-1910), Greek battle plan, ca. 1900. Watercolor and pen. Graphic Arts Collection 2014- in process.

We believe Albert Anker painted this map to show the liberation of Greece, including the naval battle between the Athenian and the Peloponnese fleets. The sketch includes the handwritten description and index to the scene:

A Station de Phormios … la flotte athénienne = Phormios station … the Athenian fleet
B Flotte de Peloponnèse = Peloponnese fleet
C Flotte Athénienne marchand sur avant naupactus droits avant la bataille = Athenian merchant fleet advancing
D Peloponnèse avant la bataille dans la course simulé sur naupactus
C Fleet Athenian merchant on before Naupactus rights before the battle
D Peloponnese before the battle in the race simulated Naupactus