Made You Look: Three Curators’ Perspectives on the Graphic Arts

One of the aims of Imperfect History is to consider the role of the curator, which is constantly evolving. These responsibilities include the care and interpretation of collection objects. While these tasks sound straightforward, they are complicated and subjective. With three exhibition curators (each of whom bring their varied personal, educational, and professional backgrounds to the table) and nearly 100,000 objects from which to choose for display, there are a myriad of perspectives that can emerge in the process of selection and interpretation.

The visual materials shown are multilayered and complex in meaning. There are many lenses through which one can assess them. By collaborating with my colleagues, Erika and Sarah, to provide labels for each object to juxtapose with my own, I hope to illuminate the fruitfulness of considering multiple viewpoints, whether they are disparate or overlapping. I also hope that seeing our different perspectives can allow you to consider yours.

Kinaya Hassane — lavender
Sarah Weatherwax — green
Erika Piola — blue

Imperfect History is supported by the Henry Luce Foundation, Walter J. Miller Trust, Center for American Art, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Jay Robert Stiefel and Terra Foundation for American Art.

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Montage of imagery including a white man planter seated on bale of cotton, Black laborers picking cotton, a paddleboat steamer, and a branch of cotton.

 Hassane 

[Proof Vignette of Southern Planter and Scenes from the South] (United States, ca. 1860-ca. 1870). Lithograph. Gift of David Doret.

This lithograph, which was most likely meant to be part of a larger image, depicts a white planter posing on a pile of bales of cotton on a perch that overlooks a group of Black workers. Behind him are pictorial representations of the industrial and maritime processes by which this cotton and his wealth were produced. The image reveals the ways that Black people and their labor are at the root of American economic prosperity because of their prominent, albeit secondary, position in the print. If we imagine this vignette as part of a larger image, one that probably forwards similar idealistic narratives of U.S. progress, then we can begin to further understand how visual imagery has propped up visions of American exceptionalism that came at the cost of fairness and equality.

 Piola 

[Proof Vignette of Southern Planter and Scenes from the South] (United States, ca. 1860-ca. 1870). Lithograph. Gift of David Doret.

The practical purpose of this proof print of a montage of scenes, views, and pictorial details symbolic of the Southern cotton trade, applicable before and after the Civil War, is necessarily one of conjecture and consternation. The artist, date, and how it was used—as a stand-alone image or part of a print—is not known. Is the “gentleman planter” a contemporary figure or an idealized icon of the past? Are the Black laborers free or enslaved men who are working in the cotton field? Is the mill depicted one of the South or North for which the side wheel paddle steamer is transporting cotton to be processed? The composition of the design is similar to stock imagery used in 19th-century commercial works of art and fraternal order certificates. Closely looked at as a discrete image or in the context of a larger piece, the graphics are rooted in an intersection of the history of race, politics, economy, and visual culture in this country.

 Weatherwax 

[Proof Vignette of Southern Planter and Scenes from the South] (United States, ca. 1860-ca. 1870). Lithograph. Gift of David Doret.

A clear hierarchy is displayed in the placement of the elements of this vignette, one that was probably intended to be incorporated into a large print. The white planter, placed at the center, is portrayed as an individual, confidently smoking while sitting on a bale of cotton. He shares the foreground space with a cotton plant, the source of his wealth and leisure. Relegated to the background of the print are the Black workers picking the cotton. Hunched over, their faces obscured, these field workers are interchangeable and exist merely to fuel the economic engine of the cotton trade as depicted by the industrial building and the steamboat.

View depicting a white man leading a delegation of Native American men under a shop sign across from a church on a city street. White men and a boy accompany them.

 Hassane 

William Russell Birch, [Artist's Study of Detail from New Lutheran Church, in Fourth Street Philadelphia], ca. 1799. Watercolor. Bequest of Charles A. Poulson, 1866.

In 1793, Frederick Augustus Muhlenberg (1750-1801) led a group of Indigenous (presumably Leni Lenape) leaders on a tour of the Old City neighborhood. William Russell Birch (1755-1834) emigrated from England in 1794, a year after the scene shown in this watercolor. Birch’s depiction therefore depended on written and oral accounts of the tour, which were told from white settlers’ perspectives and did not account for the violent removal of Native Americans from their land by American colonists. This depiction and many others in the Graphic Arts Collection speak to the need for viewers to understand historical objects not necessarily as “documents” of history and instead reflections of the biases that they present to us.

 Piola 

William Russell Birch, [Artist's Study of Detail from New Lutheran Church, in Fourth Street Philadelphia], ca. 1799. Watercolor. Bequest of Charles A. Poulson, 1866.

The Views of Philadelphia by William Russell Birch (1755-1834) show the city, built on the land of the Lenni Lenape, at the turn of the 19th century when it would soon no longer be the capital of the young nation. His artist’s study informs the content of Plate 6 of his series of twenty-seven engravings. A delegation of Native American men tour the city designed by William Penn. It is an allusion to the tours provided by Speaker of the House Frederick Augustus Muhlenberg (1750-1801) to envoys of Indigenous people in Philadelphia in 1793 for treaty negotiations. The tour proceeds under a store sign adorned with a majestic tree. Resembling the one in the 1774 Benjamin West painting that immortalizes the story of William Penn’s legendary treaty of 1682, the detail of the tree represents multiple possible interpretations, including its significance for the artist Birch and its perception by its 18th-century and modern-day viewers.

 Weatherwax 

William Russell Birch, [Artist's Study of Detail from New Lutheran Church, in Fourth Street Philadelphia], ca. 1799. Watercolor. Bequest of Charles A. Poulson, 1866.

William Birch (1755-1834) painted this watercolor as a preparatory sketch for an engraving included in his 1800 book The City of Philadelphia, a series of twenty-seven views. The sketch depicts Speaker of the House Frederick Augustus Muhlenberg (1750-1801) guiding a group of indigenous people, probably the Leni Lenape, around the city during treaty negotiations in 1793. Approximately half of Birch’s city views include Black or Indigenous persons, acknowledging the multi-racial nature of the young country’s capital city. In the finished engraving, however, Birch marginalizes this group of Indigenous people, moving them to the far left of the scene, giving prominence to the church as well as vehicular traffic not included in the preparatory sketch.

Full-length portrait of Oakley, attired in a smock and dress, and standing on a platform and holding a paint palette in front of a large painted figure of a woman with outstretched arms.

 Hassane 

Mathilde Weil, [Violet Oakley at Work Upon the Panel of "International Understanding and Unity" for the Senate Chamber, Capitol of Pennsylvania], ca. 1913. Gelatin silver print. Purchase 1989.

Violet Oakley (1874-1961), who is photographed here, was a Philadelphia artist during the early 20th century. In 1911, she was commissioned to paint a series of monumental murals at the new Pennsylvania State Capitol. This opportunity was an exceedingly unique one for a woman artist at the time. Critics of the period did not believe that the resulting work was Oakley’s. Mathilde Weil (1872-1942), a local photographer and literary editor, captured this image of Oakley at work, which could be seen as a rebuttal of critics’ efforts to discredit the painter. This photograph can also be seen as these women’s efforts to form an alternative archive about Philadelphia women artists, one in which they are active agents in their story.

 Piola 

Mathilde Weil, [Violet Oakley at Work Upon the Panel of "International Understanding and Unity" for the Senate Chamber, Capitol of Pennsylvania], ca. 1913. Gelatin silver print. Purchase 1989.

About 1913, Mathilde Weil (1872-1942) and Violet Oakley (1874-1961), two acclaimed and successful Philadelphia artists, faced each other at the Pennsylvania State Capitol to create this portrait of artists at work. Weil, an artistic photographer (and Library Company shareholder), known for her home portraits presents Oakley in the soft tonal quality of pictorialism, “at home,” at her canvas of the wall of the Pennsylvania Capitol. Oakley, an illustrator and the first woman artist to receive a large art commission for a public building in the United States, poses assuredly in front of her proudest accomplishment in art. Contemporaries, unmarried, and professionals in fields dominated by men, Weil and Oakley epitomized the New Woman caricatured, but not defined by the stereographs shown in the exhibition.

 Weatherwax 

Mathilde Weil, [Violet Oakley at Work Upon the Panel of "International Understanding and Unity" for the Senate Chamber, Capitol of Pennsylvania], ca. 1913. Gelatin silver print. Purchase 1989.

In the early 20th century, women artists were judged to lack the physical and intellectual ability to execute large scale projects like murals. In 1902, however, architect Joseph M. Huston (1866-1940) unexpectedly selected Violet Oakley (1874-1961), based on the “superior excellence of her work,” to the team of artists tasked with decorating the new Pennsylvania State Capitol. Professional Philadelphia photographer Mathilde Weil (1847-1942) captured Oakley not merely posing with her art but actively engaged with its creation as she holds a paint brush and palette and seems to just momentarily turn towards Weil. Placing Oakley in front of the large female figure in the Unity panel, Weil also emphasizes the female-centered nature of her photographic portrait. In 1916, Oakley became the first woman awarded the Medal of Honor in Painting by the Architectural League of New York for her Pennsylvania State Capitol murals.

Invitation with filigree and floral details and scenes of a ball and lithographers at work at drawing an image on a printing stone and inking one.

 Hassane 

Alphonse Bigot, Second Grand Ball of the Lithographic Printers Union … (Philadelphia: T. Sinclair's Lith., 1863). Chromolithograph. Gift of Margaret Robinson, 1991.

Being an artist in the United States has long been understood as a leisurely pursuit reserved for the upper class, rather than a trade. If we expand our view of what constitutes art from work that is solely created for aesthetic purposes, we can see how the history of visual culture has intersected with the history of labor movements in the U.S. This chromolithograph, which is an advertisement for an 1863 ball held by the Lithographic Printers Union, represents the confluence of these histories. From available evidence, it seems likely that Alphonse Bigot (ca. 1828-1872 or 3), the maker of this trade card, was part of the organization. At the same time that this card breaks down the boundaries between art and craft, it also begs the question of whether non-white lithographers, like Patrick Reason (1816-1898) of New York, were also members of such trade unions. The exclusion of Black people from labor movements is yet another gap made visible by this object.

 Piola 

Alphonse Bigot, Second Grand Ball of the Lithographic Printers Union … (Philadelphia: T. Sinclair's Lith., 1863). Chromolithograph. Gift of Margaret Robinson, 1991.

During the middle of the Civil War, the Lithographic Printers Union, instituted in 1854, held their second grand ball. On May 10th in the Sunday Dispatch, next to a list of killed and injured soldiers of the Battle of Fredericksburg, the grand affair was announced. Although the invitation shows a trade in celebration, it was not one unaffected by the war. Studios were understaffed from enlistments and commissions of work were fewer. At the same time, the Union’s members, including the artists of this invitation, produced lithographs of soldiers, battlefields, and volunteer saloons. The ball scene and work vignettes, however, do not belie the whiteness of the trade in which the men worked. Available records for the Philadelphia trade suggest that possibly one Black man, John Godber (b. ca. 1841), worked as a lithographer at this time while millions remained enslaved despite the Emancipation Proclamation.

 Weatherwax 

Alphonse Bigot, Second Grand Ball of the Lithographic Printers Union … (Philadelphia: T. Sinclair's Lith., 1863). Chromolithograph. Gift of Margaret Robinson, 1991.

Producing this invitation gave Philadelphia lithographer Alphonse Bigot (ca. 1828-1872 or 3) the opportunity to show off his artistic skill. He created a lively image of cherubs darting among swirling banners and curlicues and dancers moving to the sounds of an unseen orchestra, a sharp contrast to vignettes of the everyday work of a lithographic shop. Although clearly meant to demonstrate the talents of its creators, the invitation contains an imperfection—the “3” in the date is printed backwards. Established in Philadelphia in 1854, the Lithographic Printers Union opened its membership to “acknowledged practical Lithographic Printers” willing and able to pay a $3.00 (approximately $100 in 2021 currency) initiation fee and monthly dues of 20 cents. Although not explicitly stated in the constitution and by-laws, membership was most likely confined to white males.