As Director of Exhibitions and Publications at the Museum of Modern Art from 1939 to 1967, Monroe Wheeler heavily influenced typography, book design, and the development of the museum exhibition catalog. During his tenure at MoMA, Wheeler developed close relationships with many of the artists whose works he exhibited and published. Season’s Greetings is a volume of over fifty handmade art objects and limited printings that were sent to Wheeler from various artists, many of whom he knew intimately.
FORWARD TO SEASON’S GREETINGS
BY JOSEPH SCOTTThere was a nuanced elegance in everything he did. It was grounded in a practical, mid-western sensibility and honed early, by his late teens.
As co-publisher and book designer of Harrison of Paris, Albert Skira and Ambroise Vollard admired his publications for their skillful combination of authorship, illustration, design and typography. In New York, his 30-year tenure as Director of Exhibitions and Publications for the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) created a standard of excellence for others to emulate worldwide.
Monroe Lathrop Wheeler witnessed most of the twentieth century, surrounded by an international group of artists, writers, poets, photographers, socialites and philanthropists. His intimate circle was co-hosted by lifelong companion Glenway Wescott, generously encouraged by heiress Barbara Harrison Wescott and made erotically triangular by photographer George Platt Lynes.
As co-publisher and book designer of Harrison of Paris, Albert Skira and Ambroise Vollard admired his publications for their skillful combination of authorship, illustration, design and typography. In New York, his 30-year tenure as Director of Exhibitions and Publications for the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) created a standard of excellence for others to emulate worldwide.
Monroe Lathrop Wheeler witnessed most of the twentieth century, surrounded by an international group of artists, writers, poets, photographers, socialites and philanthropists. His intimate circle was co-hosted by lifelong companion Glenway Wescott, generously encouraged by heiress Barbara Harrison Wescott and made erotically triangular by photographer George Platt Lynes.
Wheeler approached life with a meticulous sense of detail. On the back of a MoMA press photo, in his unmistakable handwriting, he noted “Monroe Wheeler at his office desk, designed by Bill Miller (Christian William Miller) and with MW’s Arshile Gorky rug on the wall and his Robsjohn-Gibbings chair.” This process would repeat itself thousands of times.
Noteworthy dinner party conversation was jotted down on small slips of paper. Professional correspondence was annotated and carefully filed. Love was professed and mourned in trans-Atlantic letters and cables. Newspapers were clipped. Books were amassed. Gallery posters stowed away. Art was hung, stored, loaned and graciously accepted. And the pile of material grew ever larger with each passing decade full of accomplishment and event.
The Christmas season was a particularly busy time. In addition to commissioned art for his own holiday cards, dozens of envelopes would arrive each year from artists and well wishers around the globe. Many contained original works and privately circulated lithographs. You’ll find a selection here, pulled from the remaining archives still in private hands.
With Glenway’s death in 1987, followed by Monroe’s in 1989, ownership of this legacy passed to Anatole Pohorilenko, a man fiercely protective of Monroe and who shared his love for the arts and the art of organization. The extent of this legacy was uncovered in 2014, after the untimely death of Anatole, on a quiet suburban street outside Philadelphia, in a converted Catholic nunnery.
And as the facade of what was known began to melt away, one overstuffed closet led to another. The attic, no longer off limits, groaned heavily under the weight of hundreds of storage boxes. Similar caches in the basement and garage reached toward the ceilings.
The intimate and private papers of Monroe were intact, carefully organized and stowed away in their 1990 estate cartons. Never before seen photographs of Katherine Anne Porter on her deathbed were stored in “KAP material” boxes. Early George Platt Lynes shots of the inner circle were filed in “GPL private” containers. Great authors sat next to poets. Philanthropists and baroness’s mingled with Alfred Kinsey correspondence. Blank stationery yearned for one more letter.
The intimate and private papers of Monroe were intact, carefully organized and stowed away in their 1990 estate cartons. Never before seen photographs of Katherine Anne Porter on her deathbed were stored in “KAP material” boxes. Early George Platt Lynes shots of the inner circle were filed in “GPL private” containers. Great authors sat next to poets. Philanthropists and baroness’s mingled with Alfred Kinsey correspondence. Blank stationery yearned for one more letter.
It was as if you could hear them, in an ongoing and lively debate, discuss the comings and goings of 1920’s Paris, 1950’s New York and points in between, with Monroe Lathrop Wheeler leading the way, ready for the next great adventure.
AFTERWORD OF SEASON’S GREETINGS##
BY VINCENT CIANNI
“With the news of your not having the western hemisphere on your shoulders, a great wave of hope sweeps over us.” So wrote Monroe Wheeler to Nelson A. Rockefeller who was about to return to New York City in 1945 after serving as head of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s Inter-American Conference on Problems of War and Peace.
This was not only an expression of relief that World War II was over, but also a sophisticated, sincere, and eloquent articulation of Wheeler’s formal friendship with and admiration of Rockefeller, a trustee at the Museum of Modern Art since 1932. Wheeler effortlessly and impeccably mingled personal and professional relationships in his communications with his fellow administrators, trustees, and just about every significant artist of the mid-20th Century while he served as director of publications and exhibitions at the Museum of Modern Art from 1939 through 1967.
This was not only an expression of relief that World War II was over, but also a sophisticated, sincere, and eloquent articulation of Wheeler’s formal friendship with and admiration of Rockefeller, a trustee at the Museum of Modern Art since 1932. Wheeler effortlessly and impeccably mingled personal and professional relationships in his communications with his fellow administrators, trustees, and just about every significant artist of the mid-20th Century while he served as director of publications and exhibitions at the Museum of Modern Art from 1939 through 1967.
Monroe Wheeler was an urbane and gracious fund-raiser, writing countless letters to philanthropists, artists, trustees, and board members to help raise money for the construction of MoMA’s new building designed by Philip Johnson at 21 West 53rd Street, which opened in 1951. At the same time, he wrote letters of recommendation for eminent artists in support of their Guggenheim Fellowship applications, and letters to these same artists to introduce them to young art students and trustees alike. In 1944, Wheeler crafted tactful yet sophisticated letters to Henri Matisse, Constantin Brâncuși, Alberto Giacometti, and the Parisian gallery owner, Aimé Maeght, on behalf of William Burden, then a trustee (and later president) of MoMA, in anticipation of Burden’s trip to Paris.
