The Jewish Museum, New York (October 18, 2019–February 9, 2020)
New York's Jewish Museum now presents Edith Halpert and the Rise of American Art,
the first exhibition to explore the remarkable career of Edith Gregor
Halpert (1900-1970), the influential American art dealer and founder of
the Downtown Gallery in New York City. A pioneer in the field and one of
New York’s first female art dealers, Halpert propelled American art to
the fore at a time when the European avant-garde still enthralled the
world. The artists she supported — Stuart Davis, Jacob Lawrence, Georgia
O'Keeffe, Yasuo Kuniyoshi, Ben Shahn, and Charles Sheeler key among
them — became icons of American modernism. Halpert also brought vital
attention to overlooked nineteenth-century American artists, such as
William Michael Harnett, Edward Hicks, and Raphaelle Peale, as well as
little-known and anonymous folk artists. With her revolutionary program
at the Downtown Gallery, her endless energy, and her extraordinary
business acumen, Halpert inspired generations of Americans to value the
art of their own country, in their own time.
Edith
Halpert in 1955 with Georgia O'Keeffe's In the Patio IX, one of the
prizes of her personal collection. Archives of American Art,
Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC, Downtown Gallery records .Horace
Pippin, Sunday Morning Breakfast, 1943, oil on fabric. Saint Louis Art
Museum, Missouri, museum funds; Friends Fund; bequest of Marie Setz
Hertslet, museum purchase, Eliza McMillan Trust, and gift of Mrs. Carll
Tucker, by exchange, 164:2015
Joseph
Whiting Stock, Baby in a Wicker Basket, c. 1840, oil on canvas
National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC, gift of Edgar William and
Bernice Chrysler Garbisch
The exhibition, on view through February 9, 2020, features 100 works
of American modern and folk art, including paintings, sculptures, and
prints by artists such as Davis, Lawrence, O’Keeffe, Kuniyoshi, Shahn,
and Sheeler, as well as Arthur Dove, Elie Nadelman, Max Weber, and
Marguerite and William Zorach, among others, and prime examples of
American folk art portraits, weathervanes, and trade signs. Along with
major artworks that were exhibited at and sold through the Downtown
Gallery, highlights from Halpert’s acclaimed personal collection of both
modern and folk art, reassembled for the first time since its landmark
sale in 1973, are on view.
Born to a Jewish family in Odessa, Russia (now Ukraine), Halpert
opened the Downtown Gallery in 1926, at the age of 26, at 113 West 13th
Street, the first commercial art space in bohemian Greenwich Village.
She deliberately promoted a diverse group of living American artists,
fundamentally shifting the public's opinion of whose voices mattered in
the art world. Though an outsider in many respects — as a woman, an
immigrant, and a Jew — Halpert was, for over 40 years, the country's
most resolute champion of its creative potential and the defining
authority of the American art landscape. Not only did her trailblazing
career pave the way for the next generation of women leaders in the art
world, Halpert's inclusive vision continues to inform our understanding
of American art today as being pluralistic, generous in its parameters,
and infused with idealism.
The Downtown Gallery quickly attracted important clients. Abby
Aldrich Rockefeller, founder of The Museum of Modern Art, under
Halpert’s tutelage became a key patron to many modern artists and later
an enthusiastic collector of American folk art. Halpert became an
influential advisor to other art patrons who, like Rockefeller, went on
to build new museums or donate major collections of American art to
public institutions across the country. Halpert’s circle of collectors
included Duncan Phillips, founder of the Phillips Collection in
Washington, DC; William H. Lane, the great benefactor of the Museum of
Fine Arts, Boston; and Electra Havemeyer Webb, who established the
Shelburne Museum in Vermont.
Although she enjoyed these relationships, Halpert never lost sight of
her most important clients: everyday men and women who simply loved art
and wanted to live with it. Halpert’s influence, her eye, and her
passion for American art became a guiding force in the cultural
development of America’s heartland. Her mission, as she saw it, was to
bring art within reach of average Americans. Her innovative sales
tactics, which included affordable pricing and the option to buy on an
installment plan, helped make American art accessible to a new class of
collector. American art, she believed, belonged to the American people.
Halpert’s socially progressive values were on full display at her
gallery. In addition to regularly presenting work by women, immigrants,
and Jewish artists, the Downtown Gallery was the first major mainstream
art space in New York City to consistently promote the work of African
American artists, including Jacob Lawrence and Horace Pippin. When the
Japanese American painter Yasuo Kuniyoshi was classified as an enemy
alien during World War II, she mounted a defiant exhibition of his
paintings in 1942. Later, as McCarthyism swept the nation, Halpert
publicly defended her artists, proclaiming, “Works of art are not a
dispensable luxury for any nation. We will have communism in art if
Congress can control what we paint, and free and individual expression
is stifled.” Her insistence that we support free expression and
diversity of opinion, and that these are the defining features of
American art and culture, has never been more timely or more relevant.
Edward
Hicks, The Peaceable Kingdom, c. 1846, oil on canvas. de Young | Fine
Arts Museums of San Francisco, gift of Mr. and Mrs. John D.
Rockefeller 3rd, 1993.35.14
Almost as stunning as the achievement of her influential 40-year
career is the speed with which her contributions have been forgotten.
Her name is scarcely recognized today, even among art scholars. That she
was a woman may have something to do with this historical erasure;
throughout her life she was underestimated by her peers. The way she
wielded influence was also a factor. Halpert’s accomplishments were
often credited to others, particularly when she worked in tandem with
important curators, collectors, and patrons.
Today, the continued strength of the American art market, nearly 100
years after Halpert first opened the Downtown Gallery, is a testament to
her extraordinary vision and steadfast belief in the value of American
art. But Halpert’s true legacy lies in the dozens of artists she
discovered and sustained; in the many women art dealers and curators she
inspired; and in the thousands of artworks that found their way through
her into American public collections.
Edith Halpert and the Rise of American Art is organized by
Rebecca Shaykin, Associate Curator, The Jewish Museum, New York. The
exhibition is designed by Leslie Gill Architect (Leslie Gill, Ines
Yupanqui). Exhibition graphic design is by pulp, ink. (Beverly Joel),
and lighting is by Clint Ross Coller.
A free audio tour includes an introduction by Claudia Gould, Helen
Goldsmith Menschel Director, The Jewish Museum; commentary by exhibition
curator Rebecca Shaykin; and audio from a 1962-1963 Archives of
American Art oral history interview of Edith Halpert. (Audio of wall
labels are available online.)
