The Muse
Newsletter of the Slater Memorial Museum Fall 2008
Crocker’s Norwich, a New Exhibition By Vivian F. Zoë
A new permanent exhibition is set to open October 3 in the Slater Museum’s Gualtieri Gallery. The gallery, located between the Cast Gallery and the Converse Art Gallery on the main floor of the museum, is named for Joe Gualtieri, John Denison Crocker long-time (1963(1822 - 1907) 2000) Slater Museum director. Though not directly linked to the city’s Semiseptcentennial, the exhibition, entitled Crocker’s Norwich: The Long Nineteenth Century, ties together art and industry in Norwich during what many view as its most successful era. The concept of the “Long 19th Century,” as defined by British Marxist Eric Hobsbawm, refers to the period between the years 1789 and 1914 and ends with the start of World War I. Its events had such a strong influence on world history and culture that they defined the era. The rise of the industrial over the agrarian is evident in Norwich’s economic and artistic ascendance. By the time John Denison Crocker (1822-1907) was born in Salem in 1822, originally part of Norwich, the city was prominent and burgeoning.
Its industries, including ship building, arms and hardware manufacturing, paper production and textile processing, gave it the second-largest tax base in the state, after New Haven. Early homes in the architecture typical of New England colonials had been built around the Norwichtown Green and along radiating streets; in the Long Nineteenth Century, huge new “Victorian” mansions were built along Washington Street and Broadway, around Chelsea Parade and Little Plains Green. The stately homes of industrialists and commercial infrastructure in the city’s center and along the harbor, coupled with the remaining agrarian surrounding lands, provided endless subject matter for artists. Wealth brought by industry created opportunities for artists in sign painting, illustration, portraiture and landscape painting. Artists were deeply Long in storage, A Portrait of the Artist’s Mother is seen in the new exhibition. (Continued on page 3)
A Message from the Director
As we rush into the busy fall season, we normally hesitate to bring the lazy days of summer to a close. For better or worse, the lazy days never found the Slater Museum’s staff this summer. Although we were surrounded by construction, activity within the museum was hectic. Campus-wide systems improvements required that we move hundreds of objects out of basement storage to new, climate controlled quarters. This arrived just as we were beginning the installation of a new permanent exhibition, described beginning on page one. Long in gestation and long-overdue, the new show brings to life a time when Norwich truly was the Rose of New England. Although not planned as part of the city’s Semiseptcentennial celebrations, the exhibition provides a window into the world of Norwich artists over the course of a century, now a century ago. Also in the coming month, the Friends of Slater will travel by bus to Springfield, Massachusetts, where the Slater’s influence will be clearly seen. As this issue is going to press, we are also planning another opportunity for the community to purchase fine art donated for the purpose … just in time for the gift-giving season. Please join us for these offerings; we know you won’t be disappointed.
Upcoming Exhibitions, Programs and Events October 3
Opening of Crocker’s Norwich: The Long Nineteenth Century
5:00 - 7:00 PM 6:00 PM
Reception: Refreshments provided Gallery talk by Museum Director Vivian F. Zoë
October 4
Friends of Slater Bus Trip to the Springfield Museums
November 7
Opening of William Ashby McCloy Exhibition and Art Sale Details on page 8 and on our website at www.slatermuseum.org
The Muse is published up to four times yearly for the members of The Friends of the Slater Memorial Museum. The museum is located at 108 Crescent Street, Norwich, CT 06360. It is part of The Norwich Free Academy, 305 Broadway, Norwich, CT 06360. Museum main telephone number: (860) 887-2506. Visit us on the web at www.slatermuseum.org. Museum Director – Vivian F. Zoë Newsletter editor – Geoff Serra Contributing authors: Vivian Zoë, Leigh Smead and Patricia Flahive Photographers: Leigh Smead, Vivian Zoë The president of the Friends of the Slater Memorial Museum: Patricia Flahive The Norwich Free Academy Board of Trustees: Steven L. Bokoff ’72, Chair Jeremy D. Booty ‘74 Richard DesRoches * Abby I. Dolliver ‘71 Lee-Ann Gomes ‘82, Treasurer Thomas M. Griffin ‘70, Secretary Thomas Hammond ‘75 Theodore N. Phillips ’74 Robert A. Staley ’68 Dr. Mark E. Tramontozzi ’76 David A. Whitehead ’78, Vice Chair *Museum collections committee The Norwich Free Academy does not discriminate in its educational programs, services or employment on the basis of race, religion, gender, national origin, color, handicapping condition, age, marital status or sexual orientation. This is in accordance with Title VI, Title VII, Title IX and other civil rights or discrimination issues; Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 as amended and the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1991.
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infused with a sensibility typical of the late 19th century, looking back to the earliest years of the Long Nineteenth Century with sentimentality and longing. By the age of 25, around 1847, Crocker had moved temporarily to New York City and was here exposed to the still growing Hudson River landscape movement. His son, still alive in 1957, is quoted in an article of the Bulletin of the Brooklyn Museum reminiscing about his father’s taking the entire family (of eight children!) to the “Mountain House”, using every penny of proceeds from the latest portrait commission. Here they would enjoy the lake and fresh air while paterfamilias indulged a passion which was doubtless un-remunerative.
West Rock, New Haven Frederick Edwin Church, o/c, 1849
The new exhibition includes Crocker’s View of Norwich From the South, a gift of Mrs. Norma Schnip and newly conserved through gifts from the Friends of Slater Museum and the NFA Classes of 1943 and 1944. Crocker, though essentially an autodidact, benefited from and prospered along with his city. In addition to his participation in the city’s economic growth as an inventor, Crocker supplied its proud residents with images of their families, farms and the growing city around them.
integrated into the business milieu, maintaining studios outside their homes, mostly along Shetucket Street near the harbor, an area known as Chelsea. The new exhibition is intended to open a window into the artists’ work and lives in the Long Nineteenth Century in Norwich and to reflect the integration of art into daily life. John Denison Crocker leads the charge as portrait and landscape painter, mechanical engineer and pharmacist.
While most of Crocker’s landscapes are oriented horizontally, a new acquisition and new to Slater visitors, with restoration and framing made possible by a gift from the Friends of Slater Museum, Landscape with Hunters is included in the exhibition. The view here is oriented vertically, making the forest seem all the more enveloping of the hunters and their dogs.
John Denison Crocker’s powers of observation in portraiture and landscape painting, as well as in researching materials and techniques for developing “modern” goods distinguish him as a product of the Long Nineteenth Century. A realization that industrialization would make a permanent mark on Norwich might have prompted him to record, and thus preserve, images of his family, neighbors and the city’s agrarian environs.
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Parking Lot
While some may consider him a “lesser” artist in the pantheon of 19th century American painters, including those of the Hudson River School and White Mountain Painters, much of his work shows a pure, visionary genius. His desire to stay “home”, committing to his family and to Norwich, may have prevented him from acquiring a more global reputation. Some of his work fails to hide the struggle for excellence. But those that succeed do so mightily and rival the work of any American painter of the 19th century.
If you’ve been horrified to see what appears - to any normal red-blooded American – to be an immense paved, parking lot in place of the front lawn of the museum … fear not! We have been assured by the folks in charge of campus capital improvements projects that it is temporary and needed as a staging area for the construction of the new connector to house accessibility and climate control for the museum. The plan is to return it to the verdant expanse we all know and love.
On display in the new exhibition are many of Crocker’s landscapes. These favorites of Slater visitors are
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The viewer is impressed by the maturity of the trees, and in keeping with the era, humbled by the majesty of America’s natural gifts.
oil on canvas. Crocker’s sensitivity to natural light, atmospheric perspective and his understanding of the topography of New England are as evident in these as in his paintings. In addition to and before his landscapes, Crocker devoted his efforts to portraiture. Family members provided grist for his artistic mill and possibly examples used to promote his skills as a portrait painter for paying clients. A portrait of Harriet Elizabeth (Daughter of the Artist) as a young girl, long in storage, has her encircled with an oval frame and necklace of leaves of both representational and fantastical qualities.
Painted in 1855, relatively early in Landscape with Hunters John Denison C r o c k e r ’ s Crocker, o/c. 1880 c a r e e r, another piece new to the Slater is Lantern Hill which reflects the artist’s affection for his rural, native surroundings. Lantern Hill is located in North Stonington, where this piece has been hanging in a private collection. In the idyllic picture, a dog drinks at the stream approached by the shepherd and his small flock. Although the shepherd carries a sharp prod, he hardly looks ready or called upon to use it. The mountain, or hill looms in the distance. Although the picture may not be geographically or topographically accurate, we know that Crocker employed artistic license. A related piece, deemed a fantasy landscape, surely quotes elements of visual fact. Painted the same year as Lantern Hill, the piece features ruins on both sides of the river with a distinctly European flavor. At the same time, at least one figure in the extreme foreground appears to be wearing a costume reflective of the European conception of Native American regalia. A group in the mid-ground lounges and dances to the music of a small ensemble playing beneath the trees. Cows in the foreground use a river cove for drinking and, as in Lantern Hill, the mountains or hills loom in the misty distance.
In his portrait of Charles Augustus Converse (1814 -1901), Crocker reveals the man who funded the construction of the Converse Art Building on the NFA campus late in life. His penetrating eyes reflect the shrewdness that made him a wealthy man. Charles A. Converse was a founder of Hopkins & Allen, maker of the derringer, an early cousin of the Saturday night special. In 1865, Charles Converse built a factory building for cork cutting. The cork cutting process, coincidentally, used machinery patented to John Denison Crocker. Objects from the Slater’s archives support the exhibition. A hand-written “receipt” (recipe) for “Crocker’s Magical Stomach Powders” shows ingredients including Slippery Elm, Powdered Calamus Root, Alex’ Senna, Anise Seed, African Pepper, Sweet Fern, Carbonate of Soda, Gum Camphor and a quart of Grain Alcohol! Small wonder that Eva T. Case, wrote to Crocker in 1891 extolling its curative virtues. In the
A very rare group of pastel landscapes, rarely seen and from the collection of James W. Bussey, provide a glimpse into Crocker’s methods. These small works on paper may be studies completed en plein air or out of doors, in the field, as notes for larger works in
Fantasy Landscape John Denison Crocker, o/c, 1886
page with a yellow applied starburst label resembling an official corporate or government seal. From medicinal cure-alls to boot water-proofing, Mr. Crocker clearly invested energy, skill and intelligence in improving daily life. His powers of observation in portraiture and landscape painting, as well as in researching materials and techniques for developing “modern” goods make him a clear product of the industrial revolution. A near contemporary of John Denison Crocker and a Norwich native, Alexander Hamilton Emmons (18141884), was essentially a portraitist who maintained a studio on Shetucket Street, at the time, both the financial district of the city and the arts district. Charles and Frank Johnson, founders of the Norwich Savings Bank, included a studio for Emmons in their new bank building and commissioned him to paint portraits of “Norwich Worthies” for display at the 1878 opening of the Otis Library. At least a decade later, the stewards of the library concluded that its mission did not include preserving and presenting paintings, so they were donated to the Slater Museum.
Label fragment (above) and patent (below right) from Crocker’s Magical Stomach Powders
letter, included in the exhibition, she requests more of the Magical Powders. John Denison Crocker had no federal Food and Drug Administration to worry about at the time. Taking powders in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries was hardly uncommon. Curators of the (Harriet Beecher) Stowe Center in Hartford have been known to show visitors the tidy and convenient traveling case which was Mrs. Stowe’s source for her numerous powders while on the road. It is a leather box with a comfortable handle and latched cover. Inside is a honeycomb network of slots which accommodate the glass vials of medicinal powders. The Stowe Center has graciously provided an image of the case, on view in the show.
Emmons assayed landscape and still life somewhat less successfully than Crocker. On a regional level, however, Emmons’ work follows a tradition of documentation like that of John Singleton Copley, Ralph Earl, and the painters of the Peale Family. His portraits, included in private collections throughout
Crocker’s rights to a new file cutting machine were granted on February 28, 1865. On view from the Slater Museum’s archives is a newspaper clipping listing John D. Crocker’s patent claim, his application and the final patent approval documents. These open a remarkable window into the bureaucracy of such transactions in the nineteenth century. The pre-printed components of the forms comprise standard language in cursive lettering, with “the blanks” filled in with an equally fluid and regular handwriting in pen. Green silk ribbons bind the seven 12 by 14 inch pages, including the drawings on textile. The ribbons are sealed to the bundle’s front
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the city, open a window into the world of wealth and influence fueled by industry. Included in the exhibition is a portrait of Thomas Winship by Emmons donated by Raymond Case, the sitter’s great nephew. About Thomas, Case wrote, “He never married but was quite a gallant of the old days. I remember a dignified dowager calling on my grandmother when I was a small child and wondering when she stood before the portrait and softly called ‘Tommie, Oh, Tommie!’”
and peddlers. His work often features farm workers, rivers, woods and fields unmarred by urban development. Despite the fact that Norwich had become an urban industrial metropolis by the time Dodge arrived in 1897, his markedly Thomas Winship Alexander Hamilton nostalgic and Emmons, o/c, 1860 lingering rural vision extends an essentially earlier aesthetic. Included in the new exhibition, Dodge’s oil paintings Corn Huskers and Apple Gatherers are reminiscent of the work of Millet and Corot, painters whose work he would have studied in and around Paris.
Mr. Case’s mother, Ada, is depicted at a young age in the portrait here also by Emmons. The child was, by family legend, kept occupied and still for the sitting by a basket of peppermints. She appears to have been about three years old at the sitting. Her sister Ida was depicted by Emmons as a living, adorable toddler, despite her untimely decease. One can clearly see the use of the death daguerreotype, also included in the exhibition, as a model for the painting. Also included in the exhibition is work by teacher, artist, inventor and entrepreneur, Ozias Dodge (18681925) who served as Director of the Norwich Art School from 1897-1910. He had studied at the Yale School of Art, the Art Students League and under Jean Gérome at the École des Beaux Arts in Paris. Influenced by the Realists and the French Barbizon artists, Dodge was prepared by temperament and background to contribute to the lingering influences of The Long Nineteenth Century in Norwich.
Self Portrait Alexander Hamilton Emmons, o/c, 1875
It may have been as the result of fortune in marrying that Ozias came to Norwich. Robert Porter Keep, a friend of his bride’s father and third superintendent of the Norwich Free Academy, was a guest at the wedding. Keep invited Ozias to Norwich to lecture about French painting. In his presentation, Dodge used stereopticon slides, an innovation which portended his later interest in marrying art and science. At that time, Keep was looking for a replacement for the director of the Art School.
Dodge’s work is represented in the collections of the Smithsonian Institute, the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, and the Library of Congress. Much of his artwork celebrates the natural and built environments as well as the ordinary people who were essential to making life possible: fishermen, farmers
A catalogue from Ozias’ last year at the Academy (1910) shows him teaching from 9:00 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. “daily,” including “Preparatory, Antique, Life and Illustration.” The listing “Antique” refers to “Drawing from the Antique” … using ancient sculpture (in this case casts) to represent the human figure. His catalogue proclaims, “After a year spent in learning to draw from the casts, the student is able to decide upon a course of study which will lead to some practical result.” In 1910, Ozias left the Academy to pursue the refinement and promotion of his invention of a two-color etching process. According to his wife Hannah’s memoir, “he wanted to perfect a process for fine newspaper reproductions and … he dreamed of enriching the
quality of the original prints which were then appearing in the art field.” Ozias Dodge’s etchings of the typical but precarious perspectives Norwich offered include views looking down from the ridge above his home over treetops to the roofs below as seen in Mediterranean Lane and School House, Norwichtown. The fact that Norwich had become an urban industrial metropolis by the time Ozias and Hannah arrived in 1897 did not escape him, however and his affection for the industrial as well as the rural is evident. In his etching Chappell Coal, he makes what in other hands might appear dirty, dingy and ugly, elegant, mysterious, fascinating and elegant. Ozias Dodge walked the corners and reaches of his neighborhood, Norwichtown, the oldest of the city. From its craggy ridges and hilltops, he painted the landscape as well as the human-made features such as houses and graveyards. The influence of impressionism is evident in his work as exemplified in the oil on board Old Graveyard, Norwichtown. The Old School House (c. 1783) depicted by Ozias at the turn of the twentieth century, still stands on the Norwichtown Green. Crocker, Emmons, and Dodge form a continuum depicting the landscape and faces of Norwich during the “Long 19th Century.” In addition, Crocker and Dodge were inventors whose ingenuity brought industry and recognition to Norwich. Dodge created the first two-color etching process, a multi-color process still used today. Crocker invented mechanisms for manufacturing, medicinal cures for common ailments and finishes and sealants for paintings and waterproofing garments. The new exhibition also includes the work of Norwich natives Daniel Wadsworth Coit (1787-1876) and Henry V. Edmond (1838-?), as well as sculpture by Connecticut native Chauncey Bradley Ives (1810 – 1894) and New York native Henry Dexter (1806-1876). Individuals depicted include industrialists and politicians like former Norwich Mayor and Connecticut Governor William Alfred Buckingham, a Lebanon native. Scenes and streetscapes include the stately homes made possible by the industry and ingenuity of these people and the natural surroundings that inspired artists and Corn Husking, Laurel Hill Ozias Dodge, o/c, 1898 residents in their commitment to the city.
The Slater Museum Receives Grants, New Members The Slater Museum is grateful to funders who recently awarded grants for special projects and programs. •
The Connecticut Humanities Council made a grant for the continued research and analysis on the Norwich heritage partnership, a project on which the Slater is partnering with the Norwich Historical Society. The grant will make it possible to uncover the common stories inherent in many historic sites and museums in the Nine Mile Square and lead eventually to region-wide interpretation of history.
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The Tri County Foundation Made a grant to support the creation of a new permanent display on how a plaster cast is made. It will help visitors to gain more insight and appreciation for the Slater’s collection of casts.
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The Connecticut Trust for Historic Preservation gave the museum a grant to assess the condition of the magnificent wrought iron gates, temporarily removed for their safety during masonry restoration and now slated for their own restoration.
Beginning last Spring, the museum reached out to engage new members and was rewarded with 46 new Friends of Slater Museum. To these folks, we say thank you and Welcome!
Sale of McCloy Works Opening November 7, 2008, the Slater Museum will present a sale of works on paper by William A. McCloy. Some will recall the sale held in 2001, when museum supporters were able to purchase works at very affordable prices. William Ashby McCloy (1913-2000) studied at Phillips Andover Academy, University of Iowa and Yale University. He taught at Connecticut College for twenty-four years, and his work has sold well at auction and in galleries, mostly on the West Coast. His long, collegial friendship with former Slater director Joseph Gualtieri led him to create Aspirations in 1975-76, a major outdoor sculpture of core-10 steel, specifically for the Museum grounds. Immanuel Kant William Ashby McCloy, linocut, n.d.
William McCloy’s work reveals a fertile imagination, coupled with skillful draftsmanship. The many pieces he donated to the Slater Museum reflect constant change and investigation. His donation was intended to be used by the museum as an income generator. A limited number of oil paintings and mixed media works will also be available. All of the work in the exhibition will be for sale. Slater Memorial Museum Hours: Tuesday through Friday, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday and Sunday 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. Closed to the public on Mondays and holidays Visitors may park in designated visitor parking spaces or any empty parking place on campus. Parking is difficult between 1:30 and 2:15 p.m. during school days due to the school buses. The museum’s main telephone number is (860) 887-2506. A recording will provide information on current exhibitions, days of operation, directions, admission fees and access to staff voice mailboxes. Visit us on the web at: www.slatermuseum.org