Banned to Beloved: Harold Stevenson Retrospective

Dian Jordan, Ph.D. Candidate University of Texas of the Permian Basin Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

“I cannot exhibit this painting at the Museum.”

Jan 23, 1963 Lawrence Alloway, Guggenheim NY

Photo: Shunk-Kender © Roy Lichtenstein Foundation Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York

2005

Photo © Tais Melillo Oral History Challenge

Let the person tell their story…

uninterrupted.

Photo: Shunk-Kender © Roy Lichtenstein Foundation Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

Andy Warhol (center) interviews Stevenson.

Silver Clouds launch on The Factory roof (Fall 1965)

Photo © Billy Name Oral History Challenge

• Permissions / info regarding found photographs

•Warhol website - details of event and ID of Billy Kluver (right).

•Provided the agent contact for Billy Name.

•Agent suggests Billy can call to discuss other details or find more photos. Photo © Billy Name Oral History Challenge

• With Billy Kluver’s name, I was able to find audio

•6,000 hours of audio over 20+ year time span

•http://ubumexico.centro.org. mx/sound/warhol_andy/warh ol_tapes/Warhol-Tapes-17- On-The-Roof-With-Billy- Kluver.mp3

•“It is very curious…” Photo © Billy Name

Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

Bow and Arrow

Acquired by

Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden Smithsonian Institution

Reproduction request not granted Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

Smithsonian archives

•Oral History tapes

•Tapes of others (artists, agents, collectors) that mention Stevenson

•Other tapes had transcripts – called and received for Stevenson

•Exhibition (dates) folio Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

Expand the search beyond “artists”

•Donors

•Curatorial staff

•Restricted interviews Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

Museum of Modern Art, New York

•Oral History tapes

•Lily Auchincloss

LA: I'm a trustee of the Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine and chairman of the arts program. Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

Library of Congress

1950s-1960s music industry icon, Joe Smith

25 years ago, former DJ, interviews music legends.

Yoko Ono – Stevenson’s neighbor in NYC.

Oral History Challenge

Become educated on copyright law and permission requests.

LIFE and Time magazines are difficult to obtain permissions from… and expensive.

Reproduction request not granted

Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

“I was a poor starving artist. I finally found an 8th floor walkup with a balcony overlooking a courtyard.”

Remember the 8th floor walk-up part…

Photo by Rosine Bigot Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

LeSensuel Fantastique

25 panels

Portrait of Lord Timothy Willoughby de Eresby

Photo by Andre Morain courtesy of the Harold Stevenson collection

Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

New Adam goes “His lordship to US. is in the Time magazines buff.”

Nov 29, 1963 Dec 6, 1963

“Eyebrows will go up.”

Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

Stevenson is unaware of Willoughby’s lineage & social class.

Willoughby lives with Stevenson in Paris.

“whom I first thought to be a naughty British ‘pay boy’ literally from the streets.”

Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

Nothing Important We were of men who through often Ever Dies of filthy darkness grope. By: Romain Gary We did not dare to breathe a prayer, Or to give our anguish scope:

Something was dead in each of us, And what was dead was hope.”

Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

“Tell me about this painting.”

Frames on his table were the significant stories of his life.

Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

“She asked me to marry her. ”

..I just couldn’t. I had to say no.”

Oral History Challenge

In July, no air conditioning was an issue.

Bring water.

Schedule interviews for mornings.

Take food to elderly that live alone.

Oral History Challenge

Select an interesting item to prompt conversation.

“Harold, tell me about this photograph?” Oral History Challenge

Embedded knowledge

Stevenson is known for portraits

Ask the not- obvious question

What is this piece (landscape)

Beavers Bend State Park

Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

Depression era poverty

Native American Indians

Cowboys

Bible belt of Southern Christian religion

Alta Fly and Harold Stevenson - art camp

Photo courtesy Harold Stevenson collection Oral History Challenge

Alta Fly was eager to share her correspondence with Harold, dating back to the 1950s.

Photo courtesy of the Alta Fly collection Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

Lawrence Alloway “Frankly, if I included letter, January 1963 Harold’s spectacular nude, I Jim Dine Jasper Johns believe that the whole Roy Lichtenstein James Rosenquist weight of public attention Andy Warhol would be drawn towards ‘The Replaces Stevenson New Adam’. For this reason… with I cannot exhibit this Robert Raushenberg painting at the museum....”

Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

Iris Clert prints Alloway letter.

World-wide distribution --- before social media

February 29, 1963 Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

Guggenheim New York prepares for

Six Painters and the Object Exhibition Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

“What a sadness, …we must wait until history has claimed a work before it can go ‘home’. I do not mean to rave of injustice nor unfairness and I know how hard and fast the rules of big organizations are ….” Courtesy Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum Archives, New York Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

“One of the functions of the Museum is an educational one, and in my judgment, our obligations would not be furthered by having The New Adam in it.”

Lawrence Alloway February 13, 1963

Courtesy Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum Archives, New York Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

“The work obviously recalls Michelangelo’s Adam from Sistine chapel….”

Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

“What I remember is that Robert Rosenblum really championed this acquisition and exhibition, and the fact of its history….” Lisa Dennison

Selections from the Collection: Pop and the Art of Assemblage, 1960–1975, May 13 – September 1, 2006. Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York. Photo: David Heald Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

8 x 40 feet 2.5 x 12 meters

9 panels

Sometimes referred to as 8 panels

5 & 6 are split

Courtesy Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum Archives, New York National Conference of the Oral History Assn. Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim October 9-13,2013 Oklahoma City, OK USA

Study for panels Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

1 panel study

Face in pencil sketch

Model reposed on right arm Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

The final first piece.

Ropes and pulleys lower the panels from Stevenson’s 8th floor walk up to the courtyard below and into the gallery

“It was hard to live with Alloway’s injustice.

Think what would happen today if such a thing should be perpetrated, say - on a feminist?

Harold Stevenson 2001

Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

“Art is not solely the possession of the artist, but the society in which it must reside.”

Stevenson

Harold Stevenson: From Idabel to Guggenheim

Harold Stevenson…

As he remembers

Iris Clert Gallery, Paris France

January 1963