Frank Perls papers and Frank Perls Gallery records

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Frank Perls papers and Frank Perls Gallery records

circa 1920-1983

https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/mw9163380a7-6151-44d0-b553-a17e8aae42a0

The Frank Perls papers and Frank Perls Gallery records measure 23.8 linear feet and date from 1920-1983, with the bulk dating from 1949-1975. Personal papers include writings, military records, appointment calendars, and photographs. Gallery records date from its opening in 1939 until its closure in 1981 and consist of financial, sales, and legal records; exhibition files; exhibition catalogs and announcements; subject files that contain a variety of correspondence with artists, dealers, galleries, museums, and friends and family, as well as reference materials and photographs; and scrapbooks.Personal papers contain biographical materials, including military records from Perls' service in the army during World War II, personal photographs, documentation on his estate settlement, and numerous short stories. Of particular interest are Perl's stories about his interactions with Pablo Picasso and his work to uncover fraud, fakes, and corruption in the art world. There are also many photographs of Picasso, photographs of family, the war, and Perls, including two original photographs of Perls by Man Ray.Gallery sales, purchases, consignments, insurance appraisals, loans, provenance research, and general business expenses are well documented in the General Business and Financial Records. Perls jointly owned artwork with several galleries in New York, including the Curt Valentine Gallery and M. Knoedler Gallery, and these consignment and joint sales are documented in the invoices. A complete accounting of the Gallery's income and expense reports from 1950-1971 is also be found in this series. Artists extensively documented through financial transactions are William Brice, James Strombotne, and Howard Warsaw. Extensive exhibition files document the gallery's exhibitions and Perl's curatorial work. Files contain varied documentation, such as photographs, catalogs, announcements, and publicity for Frank Perls Gallery shows from 1939 through 1971. Artists represented in this series include Sam Amato, Robert Chuey, Jaques Lipchitz, Pablo Picasso, James McGarrell, and James Strombotne. Files are also found for the two major retrospective exhibitions Perls organized and curated, <emph render="italic">Matisse Retrospective</emph> at University of California, Los Angeles and <emph render="italic">Sixty Years of Picasso Prints</emph> at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, both in 1966. Additional information about these exhibitions is also found in the Subject Files. Subject Files are extensive and varied in name, content, and topic. They consist mostly of correspondence with friends, family, colleagues, artists, critics, galleries and dealers, clients, arts organizations and associations, publications, and others. There are also reference files and exhibition files for exhibitions held at other galleries and museums in which Perls was interested, guest curated, or loaned artwork. The contents of each file unit varies, but many include correspondence, photographs, appraisal records, sales records, invoices, reports, and membership records. The files highlight his close personal relationship with many artists, including William Brice, Rico Lebrun, James McGarrell, Channing Peake, Pablo Picasso, and James Strombotne. Subject Files also contain abundant correspondence with colleagues and family members, including his brother Klaus, who owned and operated the Perls Gallery in New York. Many of the files concern Perl's work with art documentation and authentication. Subject Files have been arranged according to Frank Perls original order.Finally, scrapbooks contain newspaper articles, catalogs, and announcements about exhibitions at the Perls Gallery in New York during the late 1930s and the Frank Perls Gallery in Los Angeles during the 1950s.

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Archives of American Art

Information

SNAC Resource ID: 6630662

Archives of American Art

Related Entities

There are 16 Entities related to this resource.

Curt Valentin Gallery (New York, N.Y.)

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6k97zw3 (corporateBody)

Curt Valentin (1902-1954) introduced modern art to many art patrons and other individuals through his New York City art gallery. From the description of Photographs, [ca. 1937-1955]. (Museum of Modern Art (MOMA)). WorldCat record id: 122604539 ...

Chuey, Robert

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w672120w (person)

Matisse, Henri, 1869-1954

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6rn3b48 (person)

Matisse was born in 1869 to generations of weavers in Le Cateau-Cambrésis, a northern French town whose woolen mills constituted the main industry. He was raised in nearby Bohain, famous for its luxury fabrics. This early exposure to textiles would shape his visual language: examples from his own collection of carpets and cloths from Europe, Africa, and the Middle East would deeply inform his sense of color and pattern and appear in his compositions. Taking up painting after first studyin...

Peake, Channing, 1910-

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6jr41kx (person)

Amato, Sam, 1924-

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6rz0t5g (person)

B. 1924. From the description of Sam Amato artist file. (Whitney Museum of American Art). WorldCat record id: 228432335 ...

Picasso, Pablo, 1881-1973

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6g1618s (person)

Pablo Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist and theatre designer who spent most of his adult life in France. Regarded as one of the most influential artists of the 20th century, he is known for co-founding the Cubist movement, the invention of constructed sculpture, the co-invention of collage, and for the wide variety of styles that he helped develop and explore. Among his most famous works are the proto-Cubist Les Demoiselles d'Avignon...

McGarrell, James, 1930-

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6pn9pzt (person)

Painter, educator; Portland, Oregon. From the description of James McGarrell interview, 1978 Aug. 17. (Unknown). WorldCat record id: 220188036 James McGarrell (1930- ) is a painter and educator; Portland, Or. From the description of Oral history interview with James McGarrell, 1978 Aug. 17 [sound recording]. (Unknown). WorldCat record id: 613315623 Painter and educator, St. Louis, Missouri. Born in Indianapolis, Indiana. Fulbright Fellowship, 1955. Taugh...

M. Knoedler and Co

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w62w5kjh (corporateBody)

Perls, Frank

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6kf529b (corporateBody)

Frank Perls (1910-1975) was founder and sole owner of the Frank Perls Gallery in Beverly Hills, California. Frank Perls was born in Germany on October 23, 1910. His parents, Hugo and Kaethe Perls, owned one of the leading art galleries in Berlin, and sold the work of many well-known artists. Artists works included in the gallery inventory were pieces by Edvard Munch, Pablo Picasso, Claude Monet, Vincent van Gogh, and Paul Cézanne, among others. His parents enjoyed a clos...

Lipchitz, Jacques, 1891-1973

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w63n2432 (person)

Jacques Lipchitz (1891-1973) was a Cubist sculptor. From the description of Jacques Lipchitz letter to Sidney Shainwald, 1953 Aug. 3. (Unknown). WorldCat record id: 779477647 From the description of Jacques Lipchitz letter, 1953 Aug. 3. (Unknown). WorldCat record id: 613316804 Lithuanian born sculptor who worked in France and the United States. From the description of Letters to Ladislas Segy, ca. 1961-1962. (Getty Research Institute). WorldCat record id...

Man Ray, 1890-1976

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w64j0gzx (person)

Photographer. Halpert was director of the Downtown Gallery, New York, N.Y. and a friend of director of museum director, James W. Foster. From the description of Photograph of Edith Halpert, [ca. 1930]. (Unknown). WorldCat record id: 744432180 From the description of Photograph of Edith Halpert, [ca. 1930]. (Unknown). WorldCat record id: 122455038 Biographical/Historical Note American-born photographer, painter, a...

Strombotne, James

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w60s0q47 (person)

Perls, Klaus

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6555p5h (person)

Brice, William, 1921

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6cd419b (person)

Lebrun, Rico, 1900-1964

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6pk0gz7 (person)

Rico (Frederico) Lebrun (1900–1964) was an Italian-born American painter, muralist, printmaker, illustrator and sculptor. From the guide to the Rico Lebrun Papers, 1957-1965, (Special Collections Research Center, Syracuse University Libraries) Painter, teacher; Los Angeles, Calif. Born in Naples, Italy, Lebrun studied at the Beaux-Arts Academy and the Academy of Arts and National Technical Institute in Naples, assisting fresco painters between 1918 a...

Warsaw, Howard

http://n2t.net/ark:/99166/w6g291d2 (person)