Charcoal Club of Baltimore

The Charcoal Club has been an arts club in Baltimore, Maryland, United States, on an intermittent basis since 1883.

History

Started as the Sketch Club in 1883 by a group of male artists in Baltimore who "desired to draw and paint from life" (meaning nude models), the Charcoal Club was incorporated in 1885.[1][2] The founding officers included Adalbert J. Volck. Joseph Evans Sperry, Alfred Winfield Strahan, and Lee Woodward Zeigler.[3][4][5] The Club held exhibitions of local and national artists and its "annual juried exhibition of contemporary American art [was]...from 1911 to 1926...the high point of Baltimore's brief art season".[6] The club was also known for its wild annual "Bal des Arts", and in the 1920s many New York City-based artist would attend.[6][7]

In 1991, the Charcoal Club decided to allow the admission of women artists to the club.[8] The club is known for a focus on traditional art techniques and realism.[8]

References

  1. ^ "Charcoal Club Records, 1888-1970, MS 1792". Maryland Historical Society. Retrieved 2020-03-10.
  2. ^ "An Evening of the Charcoal Club". The Baltimore Sun. 1885-05-01. p. 4. Retrieved 2020-03-10. Charcoal Club of Baltimore incorporated 1885
  3. ^ Wiegand, Henry H. "The Charcoal Club of Baltimore", Art and Archaeology 19 (5-6) June 1925: p. 274.
  4. ^ "Alfred Winfield Strahan Papers MS.12". Baltimore Museum of Art (BMA), Archives and Manuscripts Collections. Archived from the original on 2012-04-25.
  5. ^ "Lee Woodward Zeigler papers, 1911-1968". Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution. Retrieved 2020-03-10.
  6. ^ a b Kirwin, Liza (1985). "Back to Bohemia with the Charcoal Club of Baltimore". Archives of American Art Journal. 25 (1–2): 44–45.
  7. ^ "Baltimore Charcoal Club to Give Bal des Arts This Week". The New York Times. 1926-01-03. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2020-03-10.
  8. ^ a b O'Mara, Richard (1996-11-07). "Drawing the Line Art: Charcoal Club digs in its heels and its easels against the abstract, modernist movement. It sketches what it sees, or it sketches nothing at all". Baltimore Sun News. Retrieved 2020-03-10.

Further reading

  • Wiegand, Henry H. (June 1925). "The Charcoal Club of Baltimore". Art and Archaeology. 19 (5–6): 274–277.