State University of New York College at Buffalo - Buffalo State College Digital Commons at Buffalo State History Theses History and Social Studies Education 5-2012 By My Side: Charles E. Burchfield's Letters to Bertha K. Burchfield from 1923 to 1963 Alana Ryder [email protected] Advisor Cynthia A. Conides, Ph.D., Associate Professor of History, Director of Museum Studies First Reader Nancy Weekly, Adjunct Lecturer of History, Head of Collections and the Charles Cary Rumsey Curator, Burchfield Penney Art Center Department Chair Andrew D. Nicholls, Ph.D., Professor of History To learn more about the History and Social Studies Education Department and its educational programs, research, and resources, go to http://history.buffalostate.edu/. Recommended Citation Ryder, Alana, "By My Side: Charles E. Burchfield's Letters to Bertha K. Burchfield from 1923 to 1963" (2012). History Theses. Paper 7. Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.buffalostate.edu/history_theses Part of the American Art and Architecture Commons, Cultural History Commons, and the Women's Studies Commons By My Side: Charles E. Burchfield‘s Letters to Bertha K. Burchfield from 1923 to 1963 by Alana H. Ryder An Abstract of a Thesis in History with Museum Studies Concentration Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts May 2012 State University of New York College at Buffalo Department of History ABSTRACT OF THESIS By My Side: Charles E. Burchfield‘s Letters to Bertha K. Burchfield from 1923 to 1963 Over the past 80 years, research on American artist Charles E. Burchfield (1893-1967) has often placed little emphasis on the people and events that were essential for his artistic freedom and the success of his career. This paper, based on the contents of forty years of letters between Burchfield and his wife Bertha Kenreich (1886-1973), challenges the artist‘s mythology, which includes misconceptions of his isolation, lack of influences, dislocation from art history and the insignificance of human connections and activities. New dimensions of Burchfield's identity are examined, significantly his positions as a husband, father, friend to other artists represented by Frank K. M. Rehn, juror, commissioned artist and educator. The brilliant balance between and necessity for both a traditional life in Gardenville, New York and one in the cosmopolitan art world is explored. Burchfield‘s career and ability to create was based on the companionship, stability, validation and security that Bertha and his art circle granted. Through this recent access to alternative primary sources in the Charles E. Burchfield Archives at the Burchfield Penney Art Center, a new portrait of the artist emerges. Alana H. Ryder State University of New York College at Buffalo Department of History By My Side: Charles E. Burchfield‘s Letters to Bertha K. Burchfield from 1923 to 1963 A Thesis in History with Museum Studies Concentration by Alana H. Ryder Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts May 2012 Approved by: Cynthia A. Conides, Ph.D. Associate Professor of History Director of Museum Studies Chairperson of the Committee Thesis Advisor Andrew D. Nicholls, Ph.D. Professor of History Chair of the Department of History Kevin J. Railey, Ph.D. Associate Provost and Dean of the Graduate School THESIS COMMITTEE SIGNATORY Cynthia A. Conides, Ph.D. Associate Professor of History Director of Museum Studies Nancy Weekly Adjunct Lecturer of History Head of Collections and the Charles Cary Rumsey Curator, Burchfield Penney Art Center Acknowledgments For most of my life as a student, I have aspired to be a contributor to women's studies. During my undergraduate years, a number of my research papers focused on topics found in the footnotes, from the Power of Women series by 16th-century Netherlandish artist Lucas van Leyden to the illustrated autobiography Citizen 13660 by Mine Okubo on the Japanese internment. I found these exercises genuinely enriching and viewed them as acts against our "historical amnesia" and reductionism. Later, a seminar on the Buffalo-born Consensus school historian Richard Hofstadter sparked the idea to devote my thesis to a biographical alternative on a great historical figure. This paper was written almost three years into my career at the Burchfield Penney Art Center in Buffalo, New York. After seeing over a dozen exhibitions on Burchfield, I found the need to formally devote myself to studying the literature on the artist under the supervision of Burchfield scholar Nancy Weekly. I have my own love of writing and receiving ―old-fashioned‖ letters, so I was especially drawn to the research of Burchfield through his personal correspondence. I would sincerely like to thank Dr. Cynthia Conides, Nancy Weekly, the staff at the Burchfield Penney and my family for their support and contributions. This would not exist without their encouragement and the encouragement of those educators in my life who have inspired a quest for perspective and insight. Table of Contents I. Introduction ...................................................................................................................... 1-8 II. Literature Review ......................................................................................................... 9-55 i. The historiography of Burchfield ..................................................................................... 9-10 ii. 1920s and 1930s: ―On the Middle Border‖ and at the MOMA ..................................... 10-14 iii. 1940s and 1950s: Synthesis and reflection ................................................................... 14-20 iv. 1960s and 1970s: ―The settling of the soul‖ ................................................................. 20-30 v. 1980s and 1990s: Immortality through nature and ―subjective interiority‖ ................... 30-47 vi. 21st century: Burchfield‘s American modernism .......................................................... 47-55 III. The Letters ................................................................................................................. 56-99 i. Introduction ..................................................................................................................... 56-58 IV. Private Life ................................................................................................................. 59-75 i. Introduction to the private life ........................................................................................ 59-63 ii. Private life during the 1920s and 1930s......................................................................... 63-68 iii. Private life from the 1940s through the 1960s .............................................................. 68-75 V. Public Life .................................................................................................................... 76-99 i. Introduction to the public life ......................................................................................... 76-83 ii. Public life during the 1920s and 1930s .......................................................................... 83-93 iii. Public life from the 1940s through the 1960s ............................................................... 94-99 VI. Conclusion .............................................................................................................. 100-102 VII. Bibliography ......................................................................................................... 103-105 VIII. Appendix ............................................................................................................. 106-111 Appendix Figure 1 Oscar Bailey, Bertha and Charles E. Burchfield in his studio, Gardenville, NY, 1963 Photograph; Burchfield Penney Art Center at Buffalo State College, the Charles E. Burchfield Archives, Buffalo, New York. Gift of Oscar Bailey, 1963 Reproduced with permission of the Charles E. Burchfield Foundation Figure 2 Photographer Unknown, The Burchfield Children, 1938 Photograph; Burchfield Penney Art Center at Buffalo State College, the Frank K. M. Rehn Archives, Buffalo, New York. Gift of John Clancy, 1981 Reproduced with permission of the Charles E. Burchfield Foundation Figure 3 ―Society, Kenreich-Burchfield‖ wedding article, unknown newspaper, May 1922 Photocopy of newspaper article; Burchfield Penney Art Center at Buffalo State College, the Charles E. Burchfield Archives, Buffalo, New York. Reproduced with permission of the Charles E. Burchfield Foundation Figure 4 Charles E. Burchfield and Bertha K. Kenreich Marriage Certificate, May 20, 1922 Burchfield Penney Art Center at Buffalo State College, the Charles E. Burchfield Archives, Buffalo, New York. Reproduced with permission of the Charles E. Burchfield Foundation Figure 5 Charles E. Burchfield, Letter to Bertha K. Burchfield, undated Personal correspondence; Burchfield Penney Art Center, the Charles E. Burchfield Archives, Buffalo, New York. Purchased with funds from the Vogt Family Foundation in honor of Dr. Edna M. Lindemann, 2004 Reproduced with permission of the Charles E. Burchfield Foundation Figure 6 The William Hengerer Company Photograph Studio, Photograph of Bertha and Charles E. Burchfield, c. 1962 Hand-tinted sepia print; Burchfield Penney Art Center, the Charles E. Burchfield Archives, Buffalo, New York. Gift of Catherine B. Parker, 2012 Reproduced with permission of the Charles E. Burchfield Foundation Figure 7 Peter