WASHINGTON, DC.- The Smithsonian’s Archives of American Art presents an intimate look into artists’ lives in the upcoming exhibition “A Day in the Life: Artists’ Diaries from the Archives of American Art.” The exhibition will be open Sept. 26 through Feb. 28, 2015, in the Lawrence A. Fleischman Gallery at the Smithsonian’s Donald W. Reynolds Center for American Art and Portraiture.
Reading an artist’s diary is the next best thing to being there. Direct and private, diaries provide firsthand accounts of appointments made and met, places seen and work in progress—all laced with personal ruminations, name-dropping and the occasional sketch or doodle. Whether recording historic events or simple day-to-day moments, these diary entries evoke the humanity of these artists and their moment in time.
“A Day in the Life” will feature 35 diaries, dating from 1865 to 2001, containing the intimate details of daily life and the occasional revelations that are the stuff of personal histories. The exhibition will also showcase a video diary by Brooklyn-based artist Joe Hollier. The video, made in 2014, offers a contemporary take on keeping a diary in the digital era. This diary asks new questions about what it means to record one’s life in the age of blogs, social media and personal smart phones.
“From diaries kept under lock and key by their authors to diaries created for public consumption, this exhibition highlights the creative and assorted ways artists have approached their personal and professional lives and responded to the world around them,” said Kate Haw, director of the Archives of American Art.
Many diaries included in the exhibition reveal keen observations of events that are central to American culture and history. Among some of the significant entries is Rubens Peale’s account of viewing President Abraham Lincoln’s body lying in state in Philadelphia in 1865 and Janice Lowry’s collages and comments about the terrorist attacks Sept. 11, 2001.
Several of the diaries on view also provide a valuable record of artists’ working methods, or in some cases, the conceptual development of a particular work of art. Oscar Bluemner’s 1911–12 painting diary featured detailed landscape studies and his observations of color, line, form and space. In Joseph Cornell’s diary, as in his art, he struggled to hold on to life’s evanescence. He wrote on scraps of paper—the backs of envelopes, magazine clippings, wrapping papers—recording his impressions of music, art, ballet and the intertwined sensations of seeing, feeling and remembering. Childhood diaries anticipate the creative careers of the authors, such as Reginald Marsh, who was known for his paintings of New York street scenes; he demonstrated a knack for illustrating the everyday in his teenage diary.
Some of the featured artists committed fully to maintaining a diary, but not all had the need or resolve to write regularly. For decades, painter F. Luis Mora carried his tiny, monthly journals in his pocket, documenting the daily art happenings in New York City. In contrast, abstract expressionist painter Jack Tworkov wrote only intermittently in one volume spanning nearly a decade, but his reflections on his art and life were profound.
