Individuals and Collectors

Files consist of correspondence with private collectors and other individuals, including artists, researchers, art critics, gallery assistants, politicians, and business acquaintances. Correspondence concerns most of the same topics as the correspondence with institutions and dealers, such as sales, purchases, invoicing, loans, requests for photographs and information, requests for information about artists and specific works of art, damages and conservation work, authentication and appraisal of works, and national and international shipping. In addition, there is correspondence about the gallery's role in forming a collection of contemporary drawings (John S. Newberry Collection), and sculpture commissions (including an Alexander Liberman sculpture commissioned by Solomon Smith for the Church of the Holy Spirit in Chicago). The bulk of the correspondence with artists represented by the gallery can be found amongst the artists files. Artists' correspondence found here typically relates to artists seeking representation by the gallery and written recommendations (for grants, fellowships, and jobs) provided by Betty Parsons. Correspondence with gallery assistants includes letters from people seeking a position or making arrangements to travel from abroad to take a position, as well as letters from Jock Truman, Marie Hartley, and others to Parsons while she was away, concerning gallery matters. Files are arranged alphabetically.