John Sloan

John Sloan's New York Edited by Heather Campbell Coyle and Joyce K. Schiller Essays by various contributors Published by the Delaware Art Museum in association with Yale University Press, 2007 Paperback, 224 pages 124 color images “An irresistible jewel box of a book.” —New York Times Book Review, Dec. 2, 2007 Produced to accompany the Delaware Art Museum’s exhibition Seeing the City: Sloan’s New York, this title takes a close look at early-20th-century New York City through the eyes of Ashcan School artist John Sloan (1871-1951).

John Sloan’s compelling images of New York City are the subject of this generously illustrated book. His art clearly reflects his experience of the city as he walked its neighborhoods and observed human dramas played out in streets and apartments. Moving to the city in 1904, Sloan frequently took the city as his subject for paintings, prints, drawings, and photographs through the 1920s. Sloan’s student, Guy Pène du Bois, described him in 1916 as “the historian of Sixth Avenue, Fourteenth Street, Union Square, Madison Square.”

Drawing on the rich archival resources of the Delaware Art Museum’s John Sloan Manuscript Collection, John Sloan’s New York presents a unique perspective on New York and its people and also on John Sloan, who was captivated by the soul of the city. The authors situate Sloan’s paintings within the geography and social fabric of New York. The contributors to the volume investigate a variety of topics, including Sloan’s pedestrian experience of New York, his interest in the city’s shop windows and sidewalks, his fascination with moving pictures and cinema aesthetics, and the artist’s relationships with John Butler Yeats and Robert Henri.

John Sloan’s New York is “an irresistible jewel box of a book, a treat for connoisseurs of early American modern art and New York City buffs alike,” Phillip Lopate wrote in the New York Times Book Review (Dec. 2, 2007, p. 46). He also praised the volume’s “stunningly beautiful” color reproductions of Sloan’s works of art. Click here to read the full review.
 
About the contributors: Heather Campbell Coyle is associate curator, Delaware Art Museum. Joyce K. Schiller is curator, Delaware Art Museum. Molly S. Hutton is director, Schmucker Art Gallery, Gettysburg College. Susan Fillin-Yeh is an independent scholar and retired museum director and curator of Douglas F. Cooley Memorial Art Gallery, Reed College. Katherine E. Manthorne is professor of art history, Graduate Center, City University of New York. Alexis L. Boylan is assistant professor of art history, University of Tennessee.