The Letters BETWEEN EDWARD WESTON AND WILLARD VAN DYKE $15 The Letters BETWEEN EDWARD WESTON AND WILLARD VAN DYKE The Letters between Edward Weston and Willard Van Dyke document a friendship that spanned twenty-six years from 1931 to 1957. Readers can look inside the photography of the thirties and documentary cinematog­ raphy of the thirties and forties- from photographers' points of view. Cameras, films, exhibitions, and expe­ ditions are all discussed in the letters. Willard Van Dyke met Edward Weston in September 1928. Both art­ ists were attending an exhibition in San Francisco at the California Palace of the Legion of Honor. Van Dyke was impressed with Weston's portrait Galvan and asked photographer John Paul Edwards to introduce him to Weston. More than a year later, in November 1929, Van Dyke traveled to Carmel to study photography with Weston. Van Dyke was just a few weeks short of his twenty-third birth­ day and Weston was forty-three years old. Despite the age difference, Weston and Van Dyke became friends. Weston's encouragement of Van Dyke as a young photographer and later his enthusiasm for Van Dyke's cinematography career are threads connecting the seventy-four letters included here. Some of the images and people discussed in the letters are reproduced as text illustrations. Many of the portraits are by Willard Van Dyke and have not been previously reproduced. BETWEEN EDWARD WESTON TheAND WILLARDLetters VAN DYKE Willard Van Dyke: contact sheet, August 1937, Willard Van Dyke Archive The Letters BETWEEN EDWARD WESTON AND WILLARD VAN DYKE by Leslie Squyres Calmes Center for Creative Photography • The University of Arizona Center forCreative Photography The University of Arizona Copyright© 1992 Arizona Board of Regents All Rights Reserved Photographs and Letters by Willard Van Dyke Copyright© 1992 Barbara Van Dyke Photographs and Letters by Edward Weston Copyright© 1981 Center for Creative Photography Arizona Board of Regents Design by Nancy Solomon Typography by Typecraft Printing by Fabe Litho, Ltd. Laminating by Pavlik Laminating Bound by Roswell Bookbinding ISBN 0-938262-23-8 ISSN 0735-5572 COVER: Left: Weston at 683, 1933, by Willard Van Dyke, made from a negative in the Willard Van Dyke Archive Right: Willard Van Dyke, 1933, by Edward Weston Edward Weston Archive The Center forCreative Photography is a research museum devoted to twentieth-century photography. Among its collections are archives of photographers who have made significant contributions to pho­ tography as an art form. Each issue of The Archive is drawn from the Center's extensive collections of photographs, manuscripts, and negatives. Members of the Center receive an issue of The Archive and copies of announcements to Center exhibitions and events. For information about membership, write to: Center for Creative Photography, The University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ 85721. Contents Introduction by Leslie Squyres Calmes vn The Letters between Edward Weston and Willard Van Dyke 1 Notes to the Letters 53 Inventory of the Letters 63 Selective Index 65 Envelope from letter fromEdward Weston to Willard Van Dyke, September 5, 1931 Willard Van Dyke Archive Envelope from letter fromWillard Van Dyke to Edward Weston, July 8, 1950 Edward Weston Archive Introduction by Leslie Squyres Calmes WILLARD VAN DYKE MET EDWARD WESTON in book, The Art of Edward Weston. Van Dyke also September 1928. Both artists were attending an spent many week-ends in Carmel photographing exhibition in San Francisco at the California Palace and talking with Weston and other artists. Weston of the Legion of Honor.1 Van Dyke was impressed was a visitor in Oakland less often although he did with Weston's portrait Galvan and asked John Paul make one historic and memorable visit to Van Edwards to introduce him.2 Years later, writing his Dyke's and Mary Jeannette Edwards's gallery/ autobiography, Van Dyke described seeing his first studio at 683 Brockhurst during November 1932. Edward Weston photographs, "I kept coming back He wrote in his daybook that "a party was given to them as I studied the exhibition ... I didn't know exclusively for photographers at Willard's. Those whether I liked them or not, but I had never seen who gathered and partook of wine and photo­ photographs that fascinated me as much." 3 technique ... formed a group with the primary More than a year later, in November 1929, Van purpose of stimulating interest in real photography Dyke traveled to Carmel to study photography and encouraging new talent." 4 Group f/64 was with Weston. Although Van Dyke had been photo­ formed during that evening and existed as a loose graphing in the pictorialist style for about four confederation of photographers for essentially three years, he was dissatisfied with his work and years, from 1932 to 1935. Van Dyke became more thought he could learn from Weston. Van Dyke and more interested in cinematography as a way to was just a few weeks short of his twenty-third document society and began in 1934 a gradual birthday and Weston was forty-three years old. De­ move away from still photography. He was in­ spite the age difference, Weston and Van Dyke be­ terested in documenting the effects of the Depres­ came friends - a friendship documented by letters sion and thought that filmmaking would prove to spanning the twenty-six years from 1931 to 195 7. be a fast and effective way to present issues and to When the letters begin in 1931, Weston was living create social change. in Carmel, California, and Willard Van Dyke was living in Oakland, one hundred miles to the north. Beginning in 1935 , the men wrote less often. Weston was an established photographer. Van Thirty-three letters cover the next twenty-two Dyke was a part-time photographer, a student at years. Each made a major location change in the University of California at Berkeley, a gas sta­ 1935 - Weston to Santa Monica to open a portrait tion attendant, and still unsure of the direction his studio with his son Brett, and Van Dyke to New life would take. York City to pursue documentary cinematog­ During the years between 1931 and 1934, Van raphy. Edward Weston received the first John Dyke and Weston corresponded frequently. Forty­ Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellow­ one letters are published in this book from that ship given to a photographer in March 1937. The period and cover a range of topics including exhibi­ Guggenheim fellowship and its renewal in 1938 al­ tions by both photographers and Weston's first lowed him to work exclusively on his photography vu Edward Weston: Willard Van Dyke With Contax, 1937 81 :276:051 without the constraints of making a daily living. He friendship with an exchange of letters several times produced more than fifteen hundred negatives dur­ a year. When Van Dyke traveled to California to ing those two years. Van Dyke arranged to make a lecture about documentary films in 1954, he and short trip with Weston and Charis Wilson on one of Weston had a brief, last visit. Weston died at his their August 1937 Guggenheim journeys.5 On this Wildcat Hill home in Carmel on January 1, 1958. trip with Weston, Van Dyke made some of his last Willard Van Dyke continued making documen­ photographs before concentrating for the next tary films until he was asked to be the Director of thirty years on documentary filmmaking. Van the Film Library at the Museum of Modern Art in Dyke said, "That trip provided one of the most 1965. He served in this capacity until 1974. Just prolific periods of photography I have ever experi­ prior to his retirement he was asked by John Szar­ enced. Everything worked together - the weather, kowski, director of the Department of Photo­ the company, and the varied landscape. The photo­ graphy, to guest direct a retrospective of Weston's graphs that I made that year remain among the best work. This 1975 exhibition was Van Dyke's final I ever did. "6 tribute to Weston. CaliforniaEdward and and the Charis West Wilson Weston co-authored The seventies brought a renewed interest in Van numerous publications during the forties including Dyke's early photography and exhibitions of his in 1940, an account of their work followed. He returned to still photography in Guggenheim years. The Westons remained in 1977 and traveled to Ireland to photograph in 1979 California during World War II and were volun­ and 1980. The last years of his life were spent work­ teers in the Ground Observer Corps, Aircraft ing on his autobiography while living in Santa Fe, Warning Service. Van Dyke produced documen­ New Mexico. In 1985 he was named the firstArtist tary films for the United States Office of War In­ Laureate in Residence for Harvard and Radcliffe. formation. Edward had a major retrospective of He planned to finish editing his manuscript at Har­ his work at the Museum of Modern Art in New vard but died en route to Cambridge, Massachu­ York in 1946. In 1947, Van Dyke and his documen­ setts, onJanuary 23, 1986. tary film company, Affiliated Film Producers,The Willard Van Dyke sent the Center for Creative persuadedPhotographer, the United States State Department to Photography what was to become the core of his finance a series of films about American artists. archive in 1985. After his death, his wife Barbara Van Dyke's documentary tribute to donated additional materials. The bulk of the Wes­ Weston, was directed and photographed by Van ton letters to Van Dyke were found in a family gar­ Dyke during the summer and fall of 1947. He and age in 1991 - apparently undisturbed since Willard Weston traveledThe Photographer, to various points in California in­ left California.