men: Fund in honor of the Archives' first director. The grant 

 will support the publication of the Archives' Journal, a 

 quarterly publication. The Archives has until December 15, 

 1998, to raise the matching $500, 000 in cash contributions 

 and pledges. 



In FY 1997. the Archives received the second installment of 

 a $240,000 grant from the Henry Luce Foundation for the 

 processing and microfilming of the papers of Rockwell Kent, 

 as well as the papers of Downtown Gallery and the papers of 

 the American Federation of Arts. Each of these collections 

 will be described in published finding aids. 



Also in FY 1997, the Archives was awarded a grant in the 

 amount of $214,500 by the Getty Grant Program of the J. 

 Paul Getty Trust for the processing of three important collec- 

 tions. The collections include the papers of three important 

 art galleries: the Jacques Seligmann Galleries, Kraushaar Gal- 

 leries, and the Robert Schoelkopf Gallery. These gallery 

 records have been among the highest prioriry for processing. 

 All three of these collections have been actively consulted and 

 are in constant demand by researchers. 



Also in FY 1997, the Archives received a $29,000 grant 

 from the Ahmanson Foundation to process and microfilm the 

 Millard Sheets Collection. Millard Sheets (1907-1989) was a 

 painter, muralist, educator, and designer in various mediums. 

 He provided architectural designs for more than 100 build- 

 ings and taught art at the Scripps College for 26 years, as well 

 as serving as director of the Otis Art Institute. The collection 

 documents Sheets's personal, artistic, and business activities 

 for over 50 years. 



Completed in FY 1997 was the processing, arrangement, 

 and description of the personal papers of Abraham Rattner, 

 funded by a $21,000 grant from the Judith Rothschild Foun- 

 dation. Abraham Rattner (1895-1978), abstract expressionist, 

 was primarily known for his brightly colored canvases depict- 

 ing religious and social protest themes, as well as for his work 

 with stained glass, mosaic, and tapestry. 



Another significant gift to the Archives was made by Mrs. 

 Viola Goldberg in December 1996. Her gift of $10,000 will 

 be used to support the Archives' oral history program, as well 

 as Archives' publications. 



The Archives received $40,686 from the 1997 SI Latino 

 Pool Allocation Fund for two Latino projects: a field survey to 

 locate art-related manuscript material in Puerto Rico, and an 

 oral history project to interview eleven key figures in the 

 Cuban-American art community in Miami. Both efforts 

 promise to increase the Smithsonian's unique sources for the 

 study of Latino and Latin American art and to promote new 

 scholarship. 



Exhibitions and Education 



The exhibit "A Shared Experience: One Hundred Years of Art 

 at the MacDowell Colony" was on view January 30 through 

 March 25, 1997, in the Gallery Space of the New York 

 Regional Center. This project was generously funded by a 

 grant from the Ruth Bowman Philanthropic Fund of the 



Jewish Communal Fund. The show, which consisted of papers 

 and photographs pertaining to the establishment of the Mac- 

 Dowell Art Colony and artists, writers, and composers who 

 worked there, was organized by The Currier Gallery of Art, 

 Manchester, New Hampshire. 



"Invitation to Contemporary Art" was on display in the 

 New York Regional Center from April to August 1997. The 

 exhibit consisted of sixty-five fanciful announcements from 

 the Archives' collection of the papers of art historian Ellen 

 Hulda Johnson (1910— 1992). The announcements, dating from 

 1961-1986, are made of a variety of materials — paper, plastic, 

 textiles, sand, and wood. They are printed, perforated, folded, 

 encapsulated, and intended to attract attention. The display, 

 curated by Archives Southeast Regional Collector Liza Kir- 

 win, provided a personal and, at times, amusing look at a crea- 

 tive means of art promotion. 



"Visual Thinking: Sketchbooks from the Archives of 

 American Art" opened in the New York Regional Center on 

 September 5, 1997. The show, which was also featured on the 

 Archives' website, contained sketchbooks from prominent as 

 well as little-known nineteenth- and twentieth-century 

 American artists, including William Harnett, John White 

 Alexander, Luis Mora, Robert Henri, Oscar Bluemner, and 

 David Park. The sketchbooks surprise in their variety and 

 reveal intimate glimpses into the workings of the creative 

 process. 



The Archives has arranged for loans of works from its collec- 

 tions to a number of sister organizations during 1997. Among 

 these are loans to the Parrish Art Museum, Southampton, 

 New York, for "The Tenth Street Studio Building: Attists- 

 Entrepreneurs from the Hudson River School to the Impres- 

 sionists" (August to November 1997) and to the Paul Robeson 

 Cultural Centet at Rutgers University for "Paul Robeson: 

 Here I Stand," to be shown at the Jane Voorhees Zimmerli 

 Art Museum (on view April to July 1998). 



The Archives managed an effective internship program in 

 the summer of 1997. The Archives was among the first 

 Smithsonian units to be selected to participate in the new 

 James E. Webb Internship Program for Minority Graduate 

 Students in Business and Public Administration. The 

 graduate intern's project was to assist in the planning of an 

 intensive project to collect documentation on Puerto Rican 

 artists and arts organizations active in Puerto Rico and New 

 York. Another intern, a participant in the Minority Internship 

 Program, worked on the arrangement, preservation, and 

 description of papers of Tomas Ybarra-Frausto. 



West Coast Regional Director Paul J. Karlstrom traveled to 

 Australia March 10-17, I 997. co participate in a program joint- 

 ly sponsored by the Smithsonian and the USIA. Dr. Karlstrom 

 conducted a full schedule of lectures and media interviews in 

 Canberra, Sydney, Brisbane, and Melbourne, speaking on such 

 topics as California art and culture and their influence on 

 popular culture in the U.S., American popular culture, and 

 other topics related to American art. In May Dr. Karlstrom 

 traveled to Taiwan as part of the Smithsonian International 



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