“Containers of ideas”: The collection of printmaking artifacts of Philip Hofer The Harvard community has made this article openly available. Please share how this access benefits you. Your story matters Citation Duroselle-Melish, Caroline. 2013. “Containers of ideas”: The collection of printmaking artifacts of Philip Hofer. Harvard Library Bulletin 24 (1), Spring 2013: 45-64. Citable link http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:42673627 Terms of Use This article was downloaded from Harvard University’s DASH repository, and is made available under the terms and conditions applicable to Other Posted Material, as set forth at http:// nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:dash.current.terms-of- use#LAA “Containers of Ideas”: Te Collection of Printmaking Artifacts of Philip Hofer Caroline Duroselle-Melish n 1939, shortly after his arrival at harvard as founding curator of the Department of Printing and Graphic Arts in the Treasure Room of Widener ILibrary, Philip Hofer started planning an exhibition on early modern printmaking techniques, for, as he wrote to a correspondent, such an exhibition was greatly needed and few had been mounted in the country at the time.1 Hofer intended the show to be on permanent display and to comprise not only prints but also a number of printmaking surfaces, including woodblocks and copper plates from his collection. Hofer’s plan for an exhibition on the subject of technique so early in his tenure at Harvard refected his view of the feld of graphic arts: technique was the necessary point of departure for understanding the prints and illustrated books he collected, and such knowledge included the examination and the collecting of the printmaking surfaces used to produce images. Such refections were the fruits of his formative years frst as a student and collector, then as a curator, teacher, and publisher. Tey were shaped by the reproductive print tradition of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries and in response to the world of graphic arts from the 1920s and 1930s. Philip Hofer was born in 1898 into a well-to-do family from Cincinnati, Ohio.2 Afer obtaining his undergraduate degree from Harvard in 1921, he moved back to Ohio where he worked in the family coal business for several years. In 1927, he returned to Harvard to get a masters degree in fne arts. Afer graduating, Hofer went to live in New York and worked in investment banking, taking care of the family’s wealth afer his father died in 1929. During this period, he also built a reputation as a fne Tis article is an extended, fully documented version of a talk given at the 2010 meeting of the Renaissance Society of America in Venice, Italy. Te author would like to thank Ilaria Andreoli for inviting her to give a paper there, Hope Mayo for reading the text and encouraging her to submit it for publication, and Susan Gonzales for providing invaluable assistance in the Harvard Art Museums Archives. 1 Letter from Philip Hofer to T. Stephenson, January 16, 1939, Department of Printing and Graphic Arts Departmental Files, Houghton Library (cited hereafer as P&GA Files). 2 For an account of Hofer’s personal and professional life, see William Bentinck-Smith, “Prince of the Eye: Philip Hofer and the Harvard Library,” Harvard Library Bulletin 32, no. 4 (Fall 1984): 317–347. Caroline Duroselle-Melish 45 Figure 3.1. Alexandre Iacovlef. Portrait of Philip Hofer. Paris, 1928. 56 x 44 cm. MS Typ 714, Department of Printing and Graphic Arts, Houghton Library. 46 “Containers of Ideas”: Te Collection of Printmaking Artifacts of Philip Hofer collector that led to his appointment in 1930 as “Advisor for the Spencer Collection” of “illuminated books and manuscripts and works of fne printing, illustration, and binding” at the New York Public Library, while continuing to work in fnance. His main responsibility at the NYPL was to advise trustees of the library on purchases for the collection. In 1934, he joined the staf of the Pierpont Morgan Library, then headed by Belle da Costa Greene, as assistant director. Tis appointment turned out to be an unhappy arrangement, and in 1937 he resigned. Shortly afer, in 1938, he received an ofer to work at Harvard and to establish a Department of Printing and Graphic Arts in the Treasure Room of the Widener Library where rare books and manuscripts were then housed. In 1942 when Houghton Library opened its doors, Hofer became its frst curator of Printing and Graphic Arts. Hofer started collecting books seriously when he was an undergraduate. By the time he was a graduate student, he was a collector of medieval manuscripts, books, prints, and drawings. His interest in the latter was perhaps encouraged by his mother, herself a collector of drawings and other artworks.3 His collecting preferences, however, were clearly stated in a 1934 letter to Fogg Art Museum director Paul Sachs: Hofer knew best “books, manuscripts, drawings [. .] in that order.” 4 No doubt, the course “Te History of the Printed Book” that he took in graduate school had nurtured his enthusiasm for books. Taught by George Parker Winship, assistant librarian in charge of Harvard’s collection of rare books and manuscripts, the course dealt with the cultural and social history of book production, mainly from the ffeenth century.5 One of the main components of the course pertained to the collecting of books and the training of “the taste of book-buyers,” which involved learning how to evaluate books as art objects, that is, mostly, for their aesthetic qualities. Within the sphere of books, Hofer quickly carved out for himself a collecting niche: the feld of illustrated books. Te fact that he sold 200 books from his library in 1933 in New York indicates a shif in his interests.6 Specifcally, he desired to depart from the 3 Letter from Paul Sachs to Hofer, October 7, 1927, HC3, box 44, f 869, Harvard Art Museums Archives (cited hereafer as HAMA). 4 Letter from Hofer to Paul Sachs, April 22, 1934, HC3, box 45, f 871, HAMA. In another letter to Paul Sachs, Hofer described his early collection of drawings as “entirely a dilettante selection”: March 10, 1944, HC3, box 45, f 876, HAMA. 5 Michael B. Winship, “Fine Arts 5e: Te Invention and the Afermath” in George Parker Winship as Librarian, Typophile and Teacher: Talks by Tomas R. Adams, Martin W. Hutner, and Michael B. Winship, Delivered in the Memorial Rooms of the Harry Elkins Widener Memorial Library on April 17, 1997; Together with a List of Students in Fine Arts 5e Compiled by Mariana S. Oller (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard College Library, 1999), 28–40. 6 Ritter-Hopson Galleries, Press Books, First Editions, Colored Plate Books and Other Choice Selections from the Library of Philip Hofer, New York City: Unrestricted Public Auction . (New York City: Ritter-Hopson Galleries, 1933); and Bentinck-Smith, 331. Caroline Duroselle-Melish 47 conventional taste for frst editions and Anglo-American fne press books of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Similarly, in his new collecting orientation, Hofer did not systematically purchase incunabula but went for the lesser known (and therefore less expensive) sixteenth- and seventeenth-century illustrated books.7 Hofer was becoming a selective and sharp collector preferring quality to quantity; his frequent trips to Europe were hunting excursions to capture select trophies, even when other collectors would not have considered them such. In many respects, he already deserved the title “Prince of the Eye,” he was later given.8 Whenever possible, he tried to document the entire chain of production of a printed image. In the early 1930s, he started acquiring drawings for book illustrations and printmaking surfaces. During this period he purchased William Blake’s series of drawings intended for the engravings of Te Book of Job, as well as a plate engraved by the artist for Gay’s Beggar’s Opera.9 At the age of 32, Hofer had one of the best private collections of Francisco Goya prints and drawings in the world, and he owned three of the artist’s etched plates.10 His collection also included a lithographic stone and several woodblocks by Honoré Daumier. Beyond their historical and aesthetic value, these artifacts satisfed his passion for objects, and gave him “pride and joy,” as he explained to a correspondent.11 As with his books and manuscripts acquisitions, Hofer collected prints, drawings, and printmaking matrices produced in various countries over a wide range of time.12 In his activities as curator, Hofer demonstrated early on a strong interest in the technical aspect of printmaking. Te frst exhibit he organized at the New York Public Library was on the art and technique of the woodcut.13 A number of shows 7 William A. Jackson, “Te Hofer Collection,” no. 24 in the Contemporary Collectors series, Te Book Collector 9 (Summer and Autumn 1960): 151-164, 292-300; and Philip Hofer, “Te Illustration of Books,” Te Dolphin, no. 3 (1938): 400. 8 Bentinck-Smith, 317. 9 Letter from Hofer to Paul Sachs, October 7, 1930, HC3, box 44, f 869, HAMA; and William Blake, Illustrations of the Book of Job . Reproduced in Facsimile from the Original ‘New Zealand’ Set Made about 1823–4, in the Possession of Philip Hofer, with a Note by Philip Hofer (New York: E. P. Dutton, 1937), 6. 10 Letter from Hofer to T. Stephenson, January 16, 1939, P&GA Files. 11 Letter from Hofer to Fred Anthoensen, February 28, 1945, P&GA Files: “I have four Daumier blocks and they are my pride and joy.” 12 Hofer also collected the works of contemporary artists such as Eric Gill: see Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University, Loan Exhibition of Work of Five Contemporary English Artists; Engravings, Drawings, Water Colours, Illustrated Books, & Small Carvings.