The Bruton Sisters and Dorr Bothwell
Dorr Bothwell in her studio, 1967
Photograph by Bill Foote
Dorr Bothwell papers, 1900-2006
Archives of American Art
Bay Area artist Dorr Bothwell (1902-2000) created powerful, inventive, and ground-breaking work during her long and prolific career. She worked in many mediums, including painting, serigraphy (fine art silk screen printing), drawing, and collage. As a young woman in her mid-twenties, she lived for two years in American Samoa, where she studied the native culture. She was fully embraced as a Samoan when she consented to be tattooed on both legs from her knees to her hips. What a brave and adventurous woman!
In 1930, Bothwell and the Bruton sisters attended a party at Ralph Stackpole's studio in San Francisco. This is the night when the sisters met Henri Matisse, and Bothwell performed a Samoan dance for him. You can read more about that magical evening here: The Brutons Meet Matisse. It's clear from Esther's account that the Brutons greatly admired Bothwell.
Bothwell's beautiful work Dreamer (1929) was included in the exhibition The Bruton Sisters: Modernism in the Making. This work was included not only because Bothwell was a friend and contemporary of the Brutons, but also because it shares many of the modernist elements found in the Brutons' work.
Bothwell spent the 1930s in Southern California where she became part of a surrealist art movement. Her subsequent work shows the influence of this period.
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Dorr Bothwell, Memory Machine, 1947 From the collection of the Museum of Modern Art, New York Although I knew that Bothwell and the Brutons were at the same party in 1930, I didn't have any additional insight into their relationship over the years. That's why I was delighted to learn that their friendship remained close over the following decades. I was recently contacted by a researcher who is studying the life and career of the American textile designer Dorothy Liebes (1897-1972). She alerted me to a letter she discovered in the Dorothy Liebes Papers at the Archives of American Art. Liebes and Helen Bruton were both very involved in the 1939-40 Golden Gate International Exposition on Treasure Island. In fact, they both worked in the same building (The Palace of Fine and Decorative Arts) where Liebes was in charge of the Decorative Arts Display and Helen Bruton headed up the Art in Action program. The letter, dated April 27, 1971, is from Dorr Bothwell to Dorothy Liebes and includes a paragraph I found most interesting: |
Great update. Love following the Bruton Sisters and contemporaries
ReplyDeleteMore info to flush out all the connections. Wonderful new insights.
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