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MONEY, POWER and MODERN
ART
Part 3:
The year of contradictions
By Henry C
K Liu
PART 1: Ruthless empire
builders
PART 2: A monetary coup d'etat
The year the US Federal Reserve System
came into existence, 1913, was also the year the Armory
Show in New York introduced modern art to the United
States. American painter Arthur B Davies (1862-1928) was
the principal organizer of the Armory Show, which  revolutionized American art
by introducing Modernism to the viewing public. In 1911,
Davies and others, concerned that their increasingly
modern works were becoming unacceptable to the
conservative mainstream National Academy of Design in
New York, formed the Association of American Painters
and Sculptors. They planned to launch a large
independent show devoted to contemporary works. Davies,
with fellow artist Walt Kuhn and critic Walter Pach,
were determined that the exhibition should include the
European avant-garde as well as the American
independents. The result of their efforts was the
International Exhibition of Modern Art, better known as
the Armory Show, which opened in New York on February
12, 1913, in the 69th Regiment Armory at 25th Street and
Lexington Avenue, in the midst of frenzy maneuvering by
the money trust to bring about the birth of a central
bank.
With about 1,600 works, the show
transformed New York's and perhaps America's attitude
toward modern art from apathy to excited contention.
Most critics at the time found the works "insane" and
"degenerate". The New York Times warned that the show
could "disrupt, degrade, if not destroy not only art but
literature and society as well". A Chicago newspaper
"light-heartedly" suggested that visitors to the show
"smoke two pipefuls of 'hop' and sniff cocaine".
However, it aroused the curiosity if not interest of the
public, 70,000 of whom came to see it in New York,
Chicago and Boston.
By the time the Armory Show
was being organized, Davies and Lillie P Bliss had
become good friends. Six weeks before the show opened,
and probably at the suggestion of Davies, Bliss
purchased a painting and a pastel by Edgar Degas and an
oil by Jean Renoir from the New York branch of the
Durand-Ruel Galleries. All three works would be
exhibited in the Armory Show. The Degas painting,
Jockeys on Horseback Before Distant Hills,
formerly called Racecourse, a small oil of 1884
for which Bliss paid US$20,000, was the work the Museum
of Modern Art would eventually exchange to acquire Pablo
Picasso's Les Demoiselles d'Avignon.
Born
Lizzie Plummer Bliss in Fall River, Massachusetts, on
April 11, 1864, she used the name Lizzie only when
signing checks and her will and was known to her friends
as Lillie. She was the younger of two daughters and the
second of four children of Cornelius Newton Bliss
(1833-1911) of Fall River and Mary Plummer Bliss
(1836-1923) of Boston. Her father, a successful textile
merchant, moved the family to a six-story house at 29
East 37th Street in the Murray Hill section of New York
when Lillie was two. The Blisses were comfortably
affluent and politically influential. However, despite
their prominence, the family lived outside the public
eye, as Boston Brahmins tended to do. Cornelius Bliss
was one of a coterie of Republican leaders who were in
the forefront of party affairs for over a generation. He
was treasurer of the Republican National Committee from
1892 to 1908, served as chairman of the New York State
Republican Party, represented New York at Republican
conventions, and refused offers to run for governor and
mayor of New York on several occasions. He was interior
secretary in president William McKinley's first cabinet,
serving from 1897 to 1899, but rejected an offer to be
McKinley's vice-presidential running mate in 1900 and
supported Theodore Roosevelt, who became president when
McKinley was assassinated by an anarchist. During the
time that her father worked in Washington, Lillie often
acted as his hostess at his infrequent but lavish
parties.
In New York, Lillie regularly attended
concerts, went to the theater and frequented art
galleries. Throughout her youth the emphasis at home was
on music, and her love of music, both classical and
contemporary, led her to support young pianists and
opera singers and to help found the Juilliard Music
Foundation (now the Juilliard School). When she believed
in someone's career or talent she supported them
unequivocally and often anonymously. An avid reader, she
was fluent in French and an accomplished pianist.
One of Lillie's early connections with the
visual arts was probably related to her father's
membership in the Union League Club, which still
functions today as a prestigious conservative club, of
which Mr Bliss was president from 1902 to 1906. It
organized exhibitions of works by living artists, lent
by members, artists and galleries such as Durand-Ruel
and Knoedler; for example, in 1891, 34 works by Claude
Monet were shown. These shows were publicly advertised,
open to all and well attended.
However, it was
her friendship with Dr Christian Archibald Herter
(1865-1910) that bridged the gap between music and art
for Lillie. She and Herter shared a serious interest in
music; he was as accomplished a cellist as she was a
pianist, but additionally, Herter was educated and
interested in art, having been brought up in an
art-conscious home. Herter, a physician and
distinguished biochemist, was credited with helping to
establish the study of biochemistry as a separate
discipline in the United States. Through his friendship
with John D Rockefeller Jr, Herter in 1901 became a
charter member of the board of directors of the
Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research (now
Rockefeller University) in New York. Lillie's closeness
to the Herter family resulted in her meeting Abby
Aldrich Rockefeller. Adele Herter, Christian Archibald's
sister-in-law, was a painter and friend of Abby's, whose
portrait she painted during the summer of 1907. In March
1911, Abby Rockefeller and Adele Herter were two of
seven women who signed the certificate of incorporation
for the Women's Cosmopolitan Club in New York, and in
1911-12 Lillie was listed as a member. In 1929, Abby and
Lillie were among the founders of the Museum of Modern
Art in New York.
Lillie's life changed
dramatically when she met Davies. Over the next two
decades she became his faithful and principal patron and
confidante. Davies was a romantic artist who was widely
admired during his lifetime for his symbolic pictures of
female nudes in idyllic landscapes. He was handsome,
charismatic, articulate and persuasive, and he seems to
have especially appealed to women. Through his travels
abroad from 1893, he knew about contemporary artistic
trends in Europe. He was a galvanizing force in New
York, and his advice was sought by dealers, collectors
and artists. He was also a confident collector in his
own right: from a Cezanne exhibition held at Alfred
Stieglitz' gallery in 1911, he bought the only picture
that was sold.
By 1916, Lillie began to see and
buy with the eye of a connoisseur. Her increasing
self-confidence as a collector is evident in her
purchase of bold works by Paul Cezanne, the artist she
especially admired. At the time of her death, she owned
26 of his works, many of them now considered pivotal to
an understanding of his oeuvre. In January 1916, she
acquired eight of the 17 watercolors in the Montross
Gallery's Cezanne exhibition, in addition to an oil
painting, Bottle of Liqueur, previously known as
Fruit and Wine (circa 1890). The works in this
show, which attracted the favorable attention of
artists, were selected by French critic Felix Feneon.
Among the watercolors on view, Lillie bought the
magnificent House Among Trees (circa 1900) and
Foliage (1895). Lillie was unconcerned that the
reviews were less than sympathetic during the time it
was on display since reviews, positive or negative, did
not influence her purchases.
Lillie's enthusiasm
for Cezanne's work never wavered. Between 1920 and 1926,
she purchased six more of his paintings through Marius
de Zayas, a Mexican artist turned dealer who had learned
the art business as a protege of Stieglitz: the large
and important Bather (circa 1885); Pines and
Rocks (circa 1896-1900); Still Life with Ginger
Jar, Sugar Bowl, and Oranges (1902-06); Dominique
Aubert, the Artist's Uncle, formerly called Man
in a Blue Cap (Uncle Dominic) (circa 1866); and two
small gems, Pears and Knife (1877-78) and
Carafe, Milk Can, Bowl and Orange, formerly
called The Water Can (1879-80).
Two
notable Cezannes in Lillie's collection were purchased
at the 1922 auction of privately owned modern paintings
at New York's Plaza Hotel. Many of the bids were
disappointing, and owners had to buy back a number of
the offerings. Lillie paid $21,000 for Still Life
with Apples (1895-98), the highest price paid at the
sale. It was her most expensive purchase to date, and
Lillie was adventurous to buy it, since it was
considered to be unfinished. This painting was one of
her favorite works, and is today a major work of the
Museum of Modern Art. She also purchased Cezanne's
Portrait of Madame Cezanne (1883-85). Both were
originally owned by Ambroise Vollard, an eminent French
art dealer, publisher and entrepreneur, and had been
lent anonymously to the 1921 Metropolitan Museum
exhibition. Both have impeccable provenances; Lillie
bought what she loved but was mindful of the good taste
of respected prior owners.
In 1921, John Quinn
and Bliss were among the collectors who urged Bryson
Burroughs, the curator of paintings at the Metropolitan
Museum of Art, to organize a loan exhibition of
Impressionist and Post-Impressionist art, which opened
to the public in September. The protests were scathing,
and the fury, of the press and of a self-appointed
Committee of Citizens and Supporters of the museum, was
widely reported in New York. Quinn lent 26 works to the
show, and Lillie, anonymously, lent 12, including five
Cezannes. The show was criticized as "dangerous", and
Quinn was accused of masterminding the exhibition. In
response to the uproar, Quinn denounced these criticisms
as the Ku Klux Klan-inspired ravings of ignorant
"lunatics". The Quinn collection made such a profound
impression on the young Alfred H Barr Jr when he saw it
at the memorial exhibition in January 1926 that, during
his tenure at the Museum of Modern Art, where he would
become the founding director in 1929, he sought to
acquire important Quinn pictures when they became
available. Bliss also acquired works by other artists of
Cezanne's generation. Some time before 1926, she bought
Paul Gauguin's The Moon and the Earth (Hino Te
Fatou, 1893). This painting was so reviled by
critics of the 1921 Metropolitan Museum show that it was
illustrated in The World as typical of the "vile,
Bolshevist" work included.
Arthur B Davies died
suddenly in Italy on October 23, 1928. Commemorative
exhibitions were held during the next two years in
several venues, and Lillie Bliss lent generously to all
of them. In April 1929, Davies' collection was sold at
auction, Lillie Bliss and Abby Aldrich Rockefeller being
among the buyers, and Abby had a Davies show in her new
private gallery in her house. Abby had known Davies for
only a few years, but she credited him with encouraging
her to acquire modern art, from 1924 on. Davies' death,
and the sale of his collections not long after the
dispersal of the Quinn collection, combined with the
steadfast reluctance of the Metropolitan Museum
regularly to show and support late-19th- and
20th-century art, made the time ripe seriously to
consider establishing an institution dedicated to
exhibiting modern art in New York.
At the end of
May 1929, Abby invited Lillie, their mutual friend Mary
Quinn Sullivan (no relation to John Quinn) and A Conger
Goodyear to her home to discuss founding a museum for
modern art in New York. Mary Sullivan was an art
teacher, dealer and collector. Goodyear was a collector
of modern art and a former board member at the Albright
Gallery in Buffalo, New York; he agreed to head the
venture and became chairman. His presence at the meeting
was apparently due to Walt Kuhn, who, in a letter of
July 9, 1929, to his wife, Vera, took credit for the
fact that Goodyear was made chairman of this exploratory
committee. Lillie, the leading collector among them,
became vice president; Abby, the truly wealthy one, was
appointed treasurer. A short time later three more
persons were asked to join them: Paul J Sachs, an
eminent art history professor at Harvard and scion of
the investment firm Goldman, Sachs, also a collector and
an acquaintance of Abby; Frank Crowninshield, a
publisher and friend of Lillie; and Mrs W Murray Crane,
a friend of both women. As a group, they had the
knowledge, resources, dedication, status and efficiency
that would result in the museum's opening to the public
five months later.
Ill with cancer, Lillie
visited the museum's Toulouse-Lautrec/Redon exhibition
on the day it closed, March 2, 1931. The then
29-year-old Alfred Barr, the defining director of the
Modern, and Bliss saw each other often during the short
time they were acquainted, and they had much in common.
Like her, he deeply loved music; they went to the movies
and attended concerts together. Lillie must have greatly
respected Barr's brilliance and enthusiasm; after all,
she planned to leave her collection in his charge.
Unfortunately, however, their relationship would never
mature, as did that of Barr and Abby Rockefeller, on
March 12, 1931, Lillie died. Lillie Bliss could not
afford to support the museum financially in the same way
as Abby Rockefeller. However, in bequeathing her
collection to the museum three months before its first
anniversary, she had quietly and secretly decided what
form her support would take. Her will stipulated that
the Museum of Modern Art would have to raise an
endowment to make her gift a reality.
Specifically, the will stated that the works
cited in her bequest would become "the absolute
property" of the museum once it had been established "to
the full and complete satisfaction" of the trustees of
her estate that the museum was "sufficiently endowed ...
on a firm financial basis and in the hands of a
competent board". She also stipulated that two of her
Cezannes - Still Life with Ginger Jar, Sugar Bowl,
and Oranges and Still Life with Apples - and
her The Laundress (Honore Daumier) could never be
sold or otherwise disposed of, and that if the Modern
did not want them, they "would become the property of
the Metropolitan Museum of Art". The Cezannes remain at
the Modern and the Daumier went to the Met in 1947.
Two months after her death, the 12th exhibition
held by the Museum of Modern Art, from May 13 to October
6, 1931, was a "Memorial Exhibition: The Collection of
the Late Miss Lizzie P Bliss, Vice President of the
Museum". Works by 24 artists were selected, and a small
catalogue was issued. By the time the show closed,
32,144 people bad seen it. The public opening was
preceded by a memorial service held in the galleries and
attended by 300 guests.
In March 1934, the
trustees met the financial terms of the Bliss will, her
bequest was accessioned and a Museum of Modern Art with
a permanent collection became a reality. In order for
the museum to secure the bequest, the estate required
that the museum raise $1 million. However, because of
the difficulty of raising funds during the Depression,
this initial sum was reduced to $600,000. The money came
from several sources: Abby Aldrich Rockefeller, $200,000
(given to her by her husband for this purpose); the
Carnegie Foundation, $100,000; the other trustees,
$200,000; and an anonymous donor, $100,000. The
anonymous donor was Abby's son, Nelson A Rockefeller,
who would later become very active in the museum. He
made the donation because he wanted his mother to know
that someone in the family besides herself was deeply
supportive of the new museum. He told his mother of his
gift two months later.
Two years after the
museum had moved to its new quarters, a limestone
townhouse at 11 West 53rd Street, the Bliss bequest was
shown in its entirety. From May 14 to September 12,
1934, the exhibition was seen by 30,445 people.
The Lillie P Bliss bequest ensured that the
museum had a foundation upon which to build its future.
Her action reflected her confidence in her friends to
secure the endowment and in Alfred Barr to make her
dream come true. Her courage and intelligence are
reflected in the paintings she left to the public. The
most important works in her collection are the French
paintings and drawings from the latter part of the 19th
century by artists whose present fame has overcome the
neglect or derision they often endured during their
lifetimes: Cezanne, Degas, Gauguin, Odilon Redon,
Georges Seurat and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec.
Mabel Dodge also helped organize the 1913 Armory
Show, which introduced Picasso, Henri Matisse, Cubism
and Dada to the American scene. The rich hostess and
journalist ran her salon at 23 Fifth Avenue, where
left-wing intellectuals and activists met. This included
John Reed; Louise Bryant; investigative reporter Lincoln
Steffens (The Shame of the Cities, 1904); poet
Max Eastman, editor of The Masses; artist John Sloan;
Walter Lippmann, who as an influential columnist would
oppose the Korean and Vietnam Wars as well as
McCarthyism; Margaret Sanger; Bill Haywood; and Emma
Goldman. Three months after the armory Show, Dodge was
among those who supported 1,200 striking textile workers
from Paterson, New Jersey, who staged a pageant in New
York's Madison Square Garden to dramatize their demands.
Paterson was known as the Silk City of America. More
than one-third of its 73,000 workers held jobs in silk
factories where high-speed automatic looms were
introduced at the beginning of the 20th century. In 1911
silk manufacturers in Paterson decided that workers, who
had previously run two looms, were now required to
operate four simultaneously. Workers complained that
this would cause unemployment and consequently would
bring down wages.
On January 27, 1913, 800
employees of the Doherty Silk Mill went on strike when
four members of the workers' committee were fired for
trying to organize a meeting with the company's
management to discuss the four-loom system. Within a
week, all silk workers were on strike and the 300 mills
in the town were forced to close. During the dispute
more than 3,000 pickets were arrested, most of them
receiving a 10-day sentence in local jails. Two workers
were killed by private detectives hired by the mill
workers. These men were arrested but were never brought
to trial. However, the strike fund was unable to raise
enough money and, in July 1913, the workers were starved
into submission.
Bill Haywood of the American
Socialist Party and Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, a founding
member of the American Civil Liberties Union who was
active in the campaign against the conviction of Nicola
Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti, arrived in Paterson and
took over the running of the strike for the Industrial
Workers of the Work (IWW). John Reed, a well-known
socialist journalist, arrived in the town to report the
strike. He was soon arrested and imprisoned in Paterson
County Jail. Other left-wing journalists such as Walter
Lippmann and Mabel Dodge arrived to show solidarity with
Reed and to support the demand that reporters should be
free to report industrial disputes. After World War I,
Dodge married Tony Lujan, a native American, and
established an artist colony in Taos, New Mexico. In
1922, D H Lawrence stayed at Taos, where he wrote The
Plumed Serpent (1926). The main character in his
short story "The Woman Who Rode Away" was based on
Dodge.
Martin Green, a writer attuned to
cultural juxtapositions, links the Armory Show and the
Paterson Strike Pageant with the argument that modern
art and revolutionary politics share a spiritual,
transcendental goal. Green detailed the scene inside the
salon of Mabel Dodge, who was ensconced in
respectability yet actively subverted it, as Abby
Aldrich Rockefeller did in a more obtuse manner. He also
reported vividly the scene at Wobblies union halls where
people of any race or nationality were welcome and
workers' poems were composed on the spot.
Reed,
who wrote Ten Days That Shook the World, and who
was the only American to be buried inside the Kremlin,
wrote: "All I know is that my happiness is built on the
misery of others ... and that fact poisons me, disturbs
my serenity, makes me write propaganda when I would
rather play." He put down his beloved Louise Bryant
(1885-1936) for writing a glowing review about the
Armory Show while the world was on the edge of war and
the possibility of changing the world was imminent. Reed
had this deep sense of social responsibility to inform
and radicalize readers and he was irritated with Bryant
for her lack of interest in, passion for, and commitment
to the ideals of the workers' movement, for being
interested in stale bourgeois ideas about nothing and
which would do nothing.
Green argues that these
two events were the last manifestations of pre-World War
I radicalism. They were linked by some of the same
personalities: John Reed, Louise Bryant, Emma Goldman,
Isadora Duncan, Marcel Duchamp, Gertrude Stein, and
more. There was a touch of the aristocratic salon in the
opulent antique furniture and the sumptuous buffets. Yet
Dodge's passion was not cultivated conversation but free
speech, the left-wing political cause of the moment that
was also the left-wing cultural cause. Because the
censorship laws of the time were tied up with the
repression of radicalism in both politics and art, the
battle for bold, honest, forthright truth-telling allied
soapbox rabble rousers to birth-control advocates to
modern artists. Walter Lippmann came from the Olympian
precincts of The New Republic to partake of the
free-speech evenings, and so did anarchist leader Emma
Goldman, birth-control activist Margaret Sanger, and
French painter Jean Crotti (newly arrived from a Europe
being ravaged by World War I and, like many fellow
Parisian expatriates, besotted with the energy of
Manhattan).
In 1913, a leftist radicalism burst
forth with revolution in art and revolt by labor.
Simultaneously, a rightist radicalism quietly took form
through a monetary coup d'etat, the establishment of a
central bank. It was a year of deep contradictions.
NEXT: Modern art and socialism
Henry C K Liu is chairman of the New
York-based Liu Investment Group.
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2004 Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved. Please
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