An Introduction to Collecting: Meeting the Withs

Chris With in his art-filled home

Spring Curatorial Intern Jason Rosenberg shares his experience meeting art collectors and Phillips supporters Beverly and Chris With.

For some, collecting is a childhood hobby; for others, collecting is a much more serious endeavor, one that cannot be satisfied by immediate fulfillment but is rather a quest for meaning and way of living with an additional benefit of monetary value. But for two long-time members and donors of the Phillips, Beverly and Chris With, the financials couldn’t be less important to their passion for collecting. For these refreshing, inspiring patrons, collecting is fueled by one thing only: an undeniable pure love and devotion to the arts, more specifically works on paper and theater.

In a world where corporations routinely purchase art for its immense investment value and subsequent advantages in tax write-offs as a legal public good, the Withs are a balm. Visiting their Logan Circle home-turned-gallery with my curatorial mentor this spring Vesela Sretenović, I came to see both the underpinnings of an art collection and the history behind forming one.

On the walls of the With residence

The Withs met during their studies back at UCLA, and first made their way to DC thanks to a job opening offered to Chris at the National Gallery. Art was in his veins—his parents began a collection of their own back in the day—but surely not to the scale the Withs have worked to adorn their apartment today. The Withs’ collection of prints and drawings—including some old masters but also many DC-based artists such as linn meyers, Jae Ko, Jonathan Monaghan, Barbara Liotta, and Renee Stout, among many others—covers their walls from top to bottom, recalling the centuries-old salon style presentation of art as well as the term horror vacui, or fear of empty space. But there’s a clear method to this madness, with seemingly every piece placed with remarkable precision—all the way from the staircase to the bathrooms. As I made my way throughout the house, I quickly realized I had a ticket to one of DC’s best private galleries in town.

After a brief chat and visit to nearby neighborhood galleries with the Withs, I walked away with both an idea of what a collection could be and a newfound perspective on art acquisition. For those thinking about starting their own collection, find your theme. Don’t be afraid to go out and support the up-and-comers. If you see something that speaks to you, buy it. Not all art collecting is purely financially based. For every bad news story of a corporation like Shell funneling thousands of pieces of art for profit, there’s a couple like the Withs—collecting for the joy of life and power of art.

Jason Rosenberg, Chris With, Vesela Sretenović, and Beverly With

To the Withs: thank you for all of your insight and for proving my cynicism wrong. I look forward to seeing your collection grow. Until then, I know I, the Phillips, and the larger art community of DC, deeply appreciate your work!

Finding New Meaning in The Soup

Museum Educator Carla Freyvogel shares how her students helped her understand Picasso’s The Soup (on view in Picasso: Painting the Blue Period) from a different perspective. 

We stand in the middle of the gallery facing Pablo Picasso’s The Soup, balancing on our left leg, the right leg extended just a bit behind us, the body weight focused on the ball of the left foot. Our arms are outstretched. We waver a bit and return to standing.

Pablo Picasso, The Soup, 1903, Oil on canvas, 15 3/16 x 18 1/8 in., Art Gallery of Ontario, Gift of Margaret Dunlap Crang, 1983. 83/316 © 2022 Estate of Pablo Picasso / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Then, we try another pose—the pose of the grown-up in the image. This time the right foot is forward and somehow our weight is grounded evenly between our feet. But our upper backs…how to bend them so completely to mirror the head and shoulders of our subject? I ask my students to place a hand at the nape of their necks. Can you actually bend your neck to the extent this woman has? “No!” is what almost everyone says, so we talk about how Picasso exaggerated this downward curve of the neck to convey what–defeat? despair? fatigue? We talk about it.

They take their places on the floor in front of The Soup. The students are between nine and ten years old. Many of them remark on the steam coming out of the bowl, the softness of the white brushstrokes, the hints of pink that can be seen against the blue background.

“What do you think might be going on in this painting?” I ask. We have framed this tour in terms of unearthing narratives. At nine and ten, they have lots of ideas of good stories to go with each piece of artwork they see.

“Well, I think that the little girl has just given the woman a bowl of hot soup,” a girl offers from the front row.

I am shaken by this. The little girl is offering the soup? I had long assumed that the despondent woman (the mother?) was sacrificing the soup for her child, willing to go hungry herself.

“Tell me more,” I respond.

My student goes on to tell me a story based around this image. The mother was sick and tired, the girl was young and stronger, though both of them were suffering on some level. But it came time for the little girl to care for her mother and so she did, providing her warm soup while going a bit hungry herself.

Just when I think that Picasso has called in all of my compassion chips, has banged at my heart, willing me to embrace the despair and sadness of the women he observed, my student takes it to the next level. We grown-ups are not supposed to obtain compassion from our children, from the younger generation. We are supposed to be strong and willful, to be the tough ones when the going gets tough.

But what if we are not? What if life were so hard that we had to accept charity from the very person we were on this earth to protect?

Entertaining my student’s perspective makes my experience with The Soup even more meaningful and heartbreaking.

Archives 101: An Introduction to Archival Processing

In this series, Phillips Manager, Archives and Library Resources Juli Folk and Digital Assets Librarian Rachel Jacobson explain the ins and outs of how archives work.

The previous “Archives 101” post introduced the concept of archival collections. Archives and special collections establish policies to guide what materials are accepted and preserved by an institution. Because every collection is unique and can include a variety of different materials, formats, and related information, they require varying levels of description, so the standards for archival organization are applied to best suit the needs of individual repositories. I will discuss the first few steps that occur after an archive is accessioned into a repository as a new collection, also understood as archival processing. In addition to including activities that promote preservation, processing also provides improved physical and intellectual access to the records. Generally speaking, during processing, materials are surveyed, arranged, described, and preserved for long-term storage with archival-quality housing.

Surveying the collection establishes an understanding of the contents of the collection and the physical state of the materials. During this step, it’s important to gather all contextual information (e.g., donor agreements, accession details, preliminary inventories) and prepare a standardized way to capture the details. The archivist will:

  • • Count the boxes, volumes, and items
  • • Review existing container labels
  • • Confirm the materials appear as expected
  • • Note any damage or special handling needs
  • • Identify existing groups of related materials

These steps may also help identify missing components and will aid in gathering the information needed to write detailed historical/biographical notes.

After the survey is complete, it is time to create a processing plan that intellectually arranges the collection into Series, and, if necessary, Subseries, usually determined by subject, function, or form. Series filing systems may be geographic, chronological, or alphabetical and a collection can include only a single series or many series. Intellectual arrangement decisions are based on the state of the collection and the needs of potential users, who can include museumgoers, researchers, art historians, students, and teachers. Intellectual arrangement also relies on two fundamental archival principles stated below.

Provenance refers to the individual or group that created or collected the items and dictates that records of different origins be kept separate to preserve their context. Establishing provenance is key to creating accurate and helpful accession records.

Original order refers to how the collection was organized when it was brought to the repository for accessioning. It often indicates how the record creator(s) considered, maintained, and used the materials. If the original order is useful and meaningful, then retaining it preserves existing relationships and evidentiary significance that will be helpful to collection users. If the original order is non-existent or not meaningful, then an archivist will likely suggest a new arrangement to better serve future researchers.

Before processing, the Duncan Phillips Directorial Correspondence was organized chronologically, in folders labeled only with the first letter for the correspondents within. This box contains all correspondence from 1954-1955 from individuals and businesses whose names begin with letters between A-L. Courtesy of The Phillips Collection Library & Archives.

This is an example where the original order was known but found to be unhelpful for users of the collection. As the label on the box describes, the original order of the Directorial Correspondence of Duncan Phillips was chronological and alphabetical by the correspondent’s name. However, this meant that a folder labeled ‘A’ would contain dozens of correspondents with the first letter ‘A’, making it difficult to pinpoint individuals. Therefore, it was determined that additional processing would help provide valuable information about individual correspondents. The arrangement is still chronological by correspondent, but individual correspondents have been separated into their own folder.

After processing, the Duncan Phillips Directorial Correspondence is organized alphabetically by correspondent, with multiple years arranged together, for ease of research. Courtesy of The Phillips Collection Library & Archives.

Surveying and arranging the materials provides all the information needed to describe the collection in a Finding Aid. Finding aids contextualize the materials and breadth of a collection, describing why it is important and unique. They contain detailed notes used by researchers to determine whether the contents of a collection may be useful to their research. We’ll discuss Finding Aids in more detail next!