Salmagundi Club: An American Institution
Works by Robert Blum, William Merritt Chase, Emil Carlsen, Gari Melchers, Howard Chandler Christy, Frank Desch, Guy Wiggins, and other prominent American artists
Art Museum of Western Virginia, Roanoke, Virginia
November 5, 2004 - January 2, 2005
The Art Museum of Western Virginia presents Salmagundi Club: An American Institution. The exhibition features sixty works of art by Salmagundi Club members from the 1870s to the present, along with mugs decorated by prominent artists that were created to benefit the Salmagundi Clubís library, and artists' palettes, of which the Salmagundi Club has the world's largest collection.
A related exhibition of works by Salmagundi Club artists in the Art Museum's permanent collection will open Friday, November 19. Artists featured will include local favorites Walter Biggs and Allen Ingles Palmer, as well as Reynolds Beal, Ralph Blakelock, Walter Dorwin Teague, and others.
The Salmagundi Club was started in 1871 by a group of artists who gathered on Saturday nights to discuss each others works, paint and socialize. The name "Salmagundi" meaning a collection of odds and ends, was made popular by Washington Irving's book The Salmagundi Papers. By 1880, the popularity of the club had grown to such an extent that the organization was formally established. Through the Salmagundi Club, members formed a welcoming community where artists in New York City had a means to try out new ideas and have their work critiqued, create in a friendly atmosphere, and exhibit and network with other artists. In addition to their artistic endeavors, members of the Salmagundi Club also enjoyed each others company through boxing matches, social dinners and costume parties.
Throughout the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the Salmagundi Club was known for its exhibitions and influential membership. Many of the key figures in American art were Salmagundi Club members, including William Merritt Chase, Howard Chandler Christy, Childe Hassam, and George Inness, Jr. Artists with Virginia connections such as Walter Biggs, Gari Melchers and Allen Ingles Palmer also played active roles in the club.
ART MUSEUM OF WESTERN VIRGINIA
Center in the Square, One Market Square, Roanoke, Virginia 24011
artmuseumroanoke.org