The Art of Robert Winthrop Chanler

Robert "Sherriff Bob" Winthrop Chanler (1872-1930) was an innovative American decorative artist that lived and worked between upstate New York, New York City and Paris in the early 20th century. Descended from Astor fortune, his genealogy provided him the immense opportunity to explore the expression of decorative art at a time when values of "high" and "low" art were being challenged and redefined. His portfolio represents a unique period in American art, before abstraction is fully realized, when incredible wealth and changing social structures provided endless opportunities for expression in the early 20th century.

[robertwinthropchanler]

This Century-Old Mural Was Rescued From a Whitney’s Stairwell

The little-known work, by Howard Gardiner Cushing, features Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney in unconventional clothing and has been turned into 18 framed panels.

Be sure to check out Eve Kahn's latest article on the reclaimed murals of Chanler's contemporary, Howard Cushing, which were carefully removed from a spiral staircase in Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney's Westbury Studio.

[robertwinthropchanler]

Join us for an evening of cultural events at NISDA's Seaview Farm this Wednesday from 6:00 pm to 9:00 pm. The Silo Art Gallery be having an opening of...

On July 12, 2017, I'll be giving a lecture on Chanler and the Sea to the NISDA: Nantucket Island School of Design and the Arts as part of their Cultural Arts Lecture Series. I'll be joined by Marty Hylton and some of the students from University of Florida Historic Preservation Program who have been documenting the Chanler grotto swimming pool ceiling at Vizcaya Museum and Gardens. Please come if you'll be on the island!

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Cooper Hewitt Short Stories: The Fantastic Beasts of Robert Winthrop ChanlerCooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum | Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

In the last Cooper Hewitt Short Story, we tweeted about birdcages and their passionate collector, Alexander Drake. April’s Short Story—by Stephen Van Dyk, Head Librarian at Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Library—confronts birds and beasts not confined to cages, but rather fantastical interiors and the illustrated pages of library books. Margery Masinter, Trustee, Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum Sue Shutte, Historian at Ringwood Manor Matthew Kennedy, Publishing Associate, Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum “Strange beasts and fabulous birds appear at his beck and call,” reported the 1922 publication that accompanied an exhibition of Robert Winthrop Chanler’s work. About his persona, the publication continued, “Chanler, as a personality, has stoutly resisted that process of standardization which renders so many of us mere pitiful examples of quantity production.” And so characterized the fascinating life and boundary-blurring work of this eccentric artist. Robert

Read along as librarian Stephen Van Dyk walks through Chanler's fantastic book collection, which still survives at the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum's library.

[robertwinthropchanler]

This May, I’ll have the opportunity to talk to the Decorative Arts Society of Cincinnati about Robert Winthrop Chanler’s work. If you’re in the area, please do come! http://decorativeartsociety.org/our-programs.html

[robertwinthropchanler]

Chanler book launch at Rokeby

Wint Aldrich and his wife Tracie Rozhon stand on the porch of Rokeby, in Barrytown, June 5, 2016.

This past weekend, It was wonderful to celebrate the book Robert Winthrop Chanler: Discovering the Fantastic at the Chanler family estate at Rokeby in Barrytown, NY. The Poughkeepsie Journal was there taking photographs during the event.

[robertwinthropchanler]

Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney’s Studio Opens Its Doors to the Public

Sculptor and art patron Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney’s Greenwich Village studio is opening doors to the public.

Have you been dying to get inside of Chanler's Whitney studio in NYC but didn't know how to get in? You're in luck! The New York Studio School is now offering tours of its incredible historic building.

[robertwinthropchanler]

In collaboration with Miami’s Vizcaya Museum and Gardens, a rediscovery of a lost figure of American modernism—the early-twentieth-century American painter born into the Astor family, whose imagination and patrician clientele provide a fascinating artistic and biographical saga. American modernism is populated with a cast of extraordinary characters, but few were as exuberant as Robert Winthrop Chanler, who made his artistic reputation with exotic and brilliantly colored lacquered screens and architectural interiors whose compositions feature fantastical avian, jungle, and aquatic creatures, many overlaid with iridescent metallic finishes. Chanler painted what entertained and interested him, while attracting wealthy Gilded Age patrons and earning popular and critical acclaim at numerous exhibitions—including the 1905 Salon d’Automne, the show featuring paintings by “les fauves,” with Henri Matisse as their leader; and the legendary “International Exhibition of Modern Art” in New York City, popularly known as the 1913 Armory Show. But, despite such a prolific career and a fascinating body of work, Chanler quickly became an obscure figure after his death in 1930. Robert Winthrop Chanler: Discovering the Fantastic is the first comprehensive examination in more than eighty years of an artist who straddled the divide between fine and decorative art, defined notions of originality and authorship during the birth of American modernism, and posthumously challenges twenty-first century preservationists through his idiosyncratic techniques and unorthodox material choices. Co-published with Vizcaya Museum and Gardens, which preserves Chanler’s fantastic undersea mural on the swimming pool grotto ceiling of the historic estate, the book includes essays that explore major commissions and conservation issues, all illustrated with new color photography, as well as a chronology and exhibition history, making this the definitive study on an indelible American modernist.

This book is the culmination of many years of work and will serve as an important contribution to the understanding of Robert Winthrop Chanler’s life and work for years to come. It’s with great pleasure that I announce it is *officially* available for purchase!

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Thanks to Sylvia for sharing this great blog post with our Facebook page about the lost Chanler murals at the Florham estate. It's great to hear and learn new things from other Chanler enthusiasts...keep 'em coming!

[robertwinthropchanler]

The (Stained) Glass Menagerie | 1stdibs Introspective

At New York's Retro Modern Lighting, a set of windows created by American artist and aristocrat Robert Winthrop Chanler are on sale for more than a million dollars. An examination of their impeccable provenance and sheer uniqueness reveals why they are deserving of the hefty price tag.

An in-depth view at the stunning 5 of 7 windows that were originally installed in Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney’s studio on 8th Street.

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Portrait of Robert Winthrop Chanler by Guy Pene Du Bois (Private Collection).

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Credit: https://archive.org/details/artsdecoration1415newy

This great article by Chanler’s friend and fellow artist, Guy Pene du Bois, provides a colorful biography of the artist’s work and intent in the January 1921 edition of Arts and Decoration. The piece features beautiful photographs of Chanler’s work in the bedroom at Coe Hall, Planting Fields in Oyster Bay, NY.

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These photos are from the first trip I ever took to Woodstock, NY in June 2010. During this trip I had the pleasure of meeting Kiki Randolph, who passed on this past weekend. Kiki, the daughter of Clemence 'Clemmie" Randolph, was the goddaughter of Robert Chanler and belonged to a legacy of independent thinking, incredible vitality, profound creativity and humor. I will cherish these memories and I feel so privileged to have met her.

[robertwinthropchanler]

Kiki Randolph and her wonderful daughter, Pookie, have been incredible resources on the life and work of Robert Winthrop Chanler. Aside from sharing with me some of the incredible stories about the life that Sheriff Bob and Clemence, Kiki's mother, shared together, she had also become a dear friend. Kiki, you will be sorely missed.

[blakegopnik]

DAILY PIC: Everyone cites February, 1913 as the watershed moment in American art, when the Armory Show in New York brought over the first big dose of European modernism. This screen, by New York blueblood Robert Winthrop Chanler, had pride of place in the opening gallery of that show, and is now in the exhibition that celebrates its centennial at the New York Historical Society. Back in 1913, Chanler’s utterly wacky screens were some  of the most popular objects on view – a public success where Duchamp and the Fauves had to be satisfied with scandale. And those screens seem to argue that the months and years just before that February were the more interesting ones, when Americans knew they needed some kind of fresh and vigorous art, but had no idea yet what it ought to look like. Chanler made a grab at a solution, but it couldn’t compete with its rivals from France. As the NYHS exhibition makes clear, that wasn’t at all obvious at the time – and maybe ought not to seem so to us. (Rokeby Collection)

For a full visual survey of past Daily Pics visit blakegopnik.com/archive. The Daily Pic can also be found at the bottom of the home page of thedailybeast.com and on that site’s Art Beast page.

[heaveninawildflower]

'Giraffes.' Portion of a screen by Robert Winthrop Chanler. Plate from 'International Studio' (March 1922). Published 786 Sixth Avenue, New York.

archive.org

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Many thanks to Christopher Gray for his great article in the New York Times about Chanler and the upcoming symposium at Vizcaya Museum and Gardens!

[robertwinthropchanler]

Thanks to the family of Clemence Randolph for sharing this fantastic article entitled "The Grand Bohemian". The picture alone is worth a thousand words!