ARCHIVE: Societe Anonyme.
Société Anonyme
Catalogues and Ephemera
(Société Anonyme). Goll, Ivan. Archipenko: An Appreciation. Translated from the French by Mary Knoblauch. New York: Société Anonyme, Inc., [1921].
8vo; 8 pp.; stapled printed wrappers.
[Exhibition announcement.] Société Anonyme Inc. (Museum of Modern Art) Presents the First Exhibition in New York of the Works of Alexandre Archipenko. New York: Société Anonyme, Inc., 1921.
One typed leaf, folded; 4 pp.; 6 ¼ x 6 ½ inches.
[Exhibition announcement.] Société Anonyme opens its 15th Exhibition of Modern Art on Friday, March 23, 1923. New York: Société Anonyme, Inc., 1923.
One typed leaf, folded; 4 pp.; 6 ¼ x 6 ½ inches.
[Exhibition announcement.] Société Anonyme, Inc. opens its 19th Exhibition of Modern Art on Monday, March 31, 1924 to April 12, 1924, inclusive. New York: Société Anonyme, Inc., 1924.
One typed leaf, folded; 4 pp.; 7 x 8 ¼ inches.
Société Anonyme. Brochure Quarterly, July 1928. Contains Katharine S. Dreier, “The Invisible Line,” and Sara Parsons, “Photography in Aesthetics.” New York: Laurence Gomme fore the Society Anonyme, 1928.
8vo; 30 pp.; stapled printed wrappers; discrete de-accession stamps from the Yale University Art Library.
[Exhibition announcement.] Société Anonyme opens its 37th Exhibition and Third Exhibition of Art in connection with The Rand School of Social Science on January 5th, 1931. New York: Société Anonyme, Inc., 1931.
Leaflet, folded in quarters to form booklet; 11 x 17 inches.
[Exhibition announcement.]. Société Anonyme; Fine Arts Committee of the American Woman’s Association; Wadsworth Atheneum. Impressionism to Abstraction, 13 Women Painters from France, Germany, Belgium, Norway, Poland and the United States: a loan exhibition. Hartford, CT: Avery Memorial, [1934].
One printed leaf, folded; 3 pp.; 9 ½ x 12 inches.
[Exhibition announcement.]. Société Anonyme; Fine Arts Committee of the American Woman’s Association. Impressionism to Abstraction, 13 Women Painters from France, Germany, Belgium, Norway, Poland and the United States: a loan exhibition. New York: Fine Arts Committee of the American Woman’s Association, 1934.
Leaflet, folded in quarters to form booklet with printed cover; 8 ½ x 14 inches.
(Société Anonyme). 4 Painters: Albers, Dreier, Drewes, Kelpe. [New York: Société Anonyme, Inc., 1936].
8vo; 8 pp.; leporello in self-wrappers.
(Société Anonyme). Some New Forms of Beauty, 1909 – 1936. A Selection of the Collection of the Société Anonyme – Museum of Modern Art: 1920. With an introduction by Katherine S. Dreier. Springfield, Massachusetts: George Walter Vincent Smith Art Gallery, 1939.
8vo. 32 pp.; stapled printed wrappers.
The Société Anonyme was co-founded in 1920 by Katherine Dreier, an artist and early patron of surrealist and abstract art, with the educational aim of establishing an international organization for the promotion and study of progressive art in America. The Dictionary of Women Artists writes that Dreier “was one of the major impresarios of the avant-garde in the 1920s, and an advanced painter in her own right. Her exhibitions of radical European art were the first of the their kind, and her establishment of the Société Anonyme collection […] functioned as North America’s first museum of modern art” (Gaze, Delia, ed. Chicago: Fitzroy, 1997; Vol. 1, p. 138).
Drier (b. 1877, Brooklyn NY – d. 1952, Milford CT) came from a family actively committed to progressive politics, including women’s rights and social reform. Her mother participated in the settlement house movement and her sisters advocated for women’s suffrage. Dreier tied her love of art to these causes, herself a proponent for women’s rights. In fact, her salon would not only champion modern art but also provide a haven for female artists. Isabel Bishop said of it, “The place was an inspiration” (ibid).
Dreier studied drawing and painting under Scottish-American Walter Shirlaw for three years before moving in 1909 to Europe, where she exhibited at the Salon des Beaux-Arts in Paris and the Dore Gallery in London. Her first solo show in New York came in 1913 at the Macbeth Gallery and was well received. Notably, Dreier’s work was also included in the 1913 Armory Show, the exhibition widely credited with introducing Americans to European modernism. It was there that she saw Marcel Duchamp’s Nude Descending a Staircase, which profoundly influenced not only her own artistic style but also her attitude toward modern art in general.
Dreier co-founded the Société Anonyme with Duchamp and Man Ray in 1920 and served as its president. Over the course of its 21-year tenure the Société sponsored over 80 exhibitions and was instrumental in introducing a reluctant American public to the latest developments in modern art. It collected and exhibited artists such as Wassily Kandinsky, Alexandre Archipenko, Fernand Leger, Kurt Schwitters, and Lazlo Maholy-Nagy and was guided by its motto, a quote borrowed from Franz Marc’s letters and taken to heart: “Traditions are beautiful – but to create them – not to follow.”
In 1941, following the dissolution of the organization, Dreier donated the collection to the Yale University Art Gallery. The important role played by the Société in defining the modernist canon has reemerged in recent years, most notably with the major retrospective at the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles in 2006.
The items here include ephemera and catalogues recording the activities of the Société Anonyme between 1921 – 1939. The Brochure Quarterly for 1928 includes essays of art criticism by Dreier and photographer Sara Parsons, respectively entitled “The Invisible Line” and “Photography in Aesthetics.” Two exhibition announcements document Impressionism to Abstraction: 13 Woman Painters, the 1934 exhibition arranged by Dreier that included an international roster of women from Germany, France, Belgium, Norway, Poland, and the United States.
Additional documents include:
• an exhibition catalog and announcement for Archipenko’s first New York show;
• an important retrospective catalog, illustrated with works from the collection and with a full bibliography of “twenty years of achievement” that includes all exhibitions (noting in particular the inaugural U.S. exhibitions for artists), lectures, etc.; and
• lists of works lent by the Société Anonyme for exhibitions at other salons, museums, or cultural institutions.
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