Editor's note: The Gibbes Museum of Art provided source material to Resource Library for the following article. If you have questions or comments regarding the source material, please contact the Gibbes Museum of Art directly through either this phone number or web address:



 

The Art of Alfred Hutty: Woodstock to Charleston

January 20, 2012 through April 22, 2012

 

The Gibbes Museum of Art organized the exhibition The Art of Alfred Hutty: Woodstock to Charleston, offering a career retrospective of the 20th century American artist Alfred Hutty, the master painter and printmaker who is considered one of the principal artists of the Charleston Renaissance. The exhibition ran from January 20, 2012 through April 22, 2012 at the Gibbes Museum of Art. Following the premiere at the Gibbes, the exhibition is traveling to the Greenville County (S.C.) Museum of Art and the Morris Museum of Art in Augusta, Georgia. The Greenville County Museum of Art exhibition is being held May 16 through July 15, 2012. (right: Alfred Hutty (American, 1877 - 1954), Day's End (also known as Close of Day), ca. 1940, Watercolor on paper 18 x 24 inches. Courtesy of Mr. and Mrs. Frank Brumley, Charleston, S.C.)

The Art of Alfred Hutty: Woodstock to Charleston features evocative landscapes and realistic studies of the human condition created by Alfred Hutty (1877-1954) in Woodstock, New York and Charleston. The exhibition includes sixty works in oil, watercolor, pastel, and most importantly, etchings, drypoints, and lithographs.

Among the first artists to settle in the Art Students League colony at Woodstock, New York, in the early 1900s, Hutty established himself as a leading painter of the town's natural environs. For more than a decade, he honed his skills in oil and watercolor, producing intimate portrayals of Woodstock's mountains, lakes, and streams before his career took him to South Carolina.

Hutty first visited Charleston in 1920 and according to one of the main legends of the Charleston Renaissance he excitedly wired his wife back in Woodstock: "Come quickly, have found heaven." Hutty began dividing his time seasonally between homes and studios in Charleston and Woodstock, teaching art classes for the Carolina Art Association at what is now the Gibbes Museum of Art -- a relationship that eventually led to the Gibbes' status as the largest public repository of Hutty's work. In Charleston, Hutty was inspired to try his hand at printmaking for the first time, and it is this artistic medium for which he is best known. His skillful prints depicting the city's surviving colonial and antebellum architecture, its rural environs, and its African American population drew unprecedented national attention to both Hutty and to Charleston. (left: Alfred Hutty (American, 1877 - 1954), Meeting Street, ca. 1925, Oil on canvas, 23 1/2 x 29 1/2 inches. Courtesy of the Gibbes Museum of Art/ Carolina Art Association, Charleston, S.C.)

The exhibition is accompanied by a full-color catalog titled The Life and Art of Alfred Hutty. This illustrated survey of Hutty's career offers the first comprehensive examination of his impact on American art in the South and beyond. The text and catalog of prints offer authoritative documentation of more than 250 of Hutty's works. Published in cooperation with the University of South Carolina Press, the book is edited by Gibbes Curator of Collections Sara C. Arnold and Stephen G. Hoffius and features essays by Arnold, Alexis L. Boylan, Harlan Greene, Edith Howle, and a catalog of known prints by Hutty.

During the exhibition at the Gibbes, related programming included Rebirth, Refinement, and Rivalry: A Charleston Renaissance Symposium, which was moderated by Angela Mack, featuring the contributors to The Life and Art of Alfred Hutty. The sympsium was held Friday, January 20, 2012.

 

Object labels with text from the exhibition

[Label 1]
 
Untitled (New York Snow Scene), n.d.
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Oil on canvas
Courtesy of Dr. James G. Simpson, Charleston, S.C.
 
Hutty grew up in the Midwest, and as a student in Kansas City, Missouri, in the mid 1890s he showed promise as a draftsman. He won a scholarship to the newly established Kansas City School of Fine Arts where he was given his first introduction to formal art training. Early on, he used his art skills to design stained-glass windows in an art-glass factory in Kansas City and worked briefly as an illustrator for the Kansas City Star.
 
Hutty married Bessie Burris Crafton in 1902 and the couple had their first and only child, Warren Crafton Hutty in 1904. Shortly after the birth of their son, Hutty moved his family from Kansas City to St. Louis, Missouri, where he enrolled in art classes at the Saint Louis School and Museum of Fine Arts. In St. Louis, Hutty first encountered the work of his future teacher and mentor, Birge Harrison who was directing the New York Art Students League summer school in the newly founded art colony at Woodstock, New York. In 1908, Hutty moved his family to New York and enrolled in Harrison's classes.
 
 
[Label 2]
 
Early June, ca. 1914
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Oil on canvas
Courtesy of Patricia Holsclaw and the family of the late Raymond Holsclaw
 
In addition to his participation in the Art Students League during his early days at Woodstock, Hutty was associated with the Blue Dome Group, one of the many art communities that formed in and around Woodstock. The Blue Dome Group was established and directed exclusively by women but counted Hutty, Jonas Lie, and several other men as associates. The teaching emphasis was solely on painting the female figure in plein air. Hutty and Lie exhibited in New York City with the Blue Dome Group in 1914. Early June was exhibited at the National Academy of Design in 1915, and is likely an example of Hutty's early work with the group.
 
 
[Label 3]
 
Sketchbook, 1908
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Bound volume
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
A1991.005
 
Upon learning of the burgeoning art colony in Woodstock, New York, Hutty moved his family from St. Louis, Missouri, to the small New York village and enrolled in Birge Harrison's classes at the New York Art Students League summer school. This, Hutty's earliest known surviving sketchbook, dates to his first summer in Woodstock in 1908. Its rough pencil sketches of the mountain ridges and trees demonstrate his instinctive gravitation toward interpreting nature.
 
 
[Label 4]
 
Untitled (early sketch of Broadview)
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Watercolor on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
2010.003
 
In 1912, Hutty and his wife Bessie purchased a sheep farm on Ohayo Mountain in Woodstock where Hutty established his studio. Overlooking the Catskills to the west and the Hudson Valley to the east the farm was dubbed "Broadview" by the Huttys. The panoramic views of snow-capped mountains and hardwood forests provided lasting inspiration for Hutty and the home served as the couple's primary residence for the rest of their lives.
 
 
[Label 5]
 
Untitled (Autumn Landscape, Woodstock), n.d.
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Oil on canvas
Courtesy of Private Collection
 
After his initial move to Woodstock in 1908 Hutty temporarily left the town and sought work in the New York City area to support his family while continuing his artistic training. The Huttys relocated to Leonia, New Jersey, on the outskirts of Manhattan, and Hutty once again found employment working in stained-glass design for Tiffany Studios. While living in Leonia, Hutty enrolled in George Bridgman's anatomy and life classes at the New York City Art Students League in 1911. He also studied at the League under Impressionist landscape painter Frank Vincent DuMond in 1912.
 
Hutty developed an impressionistic style early in his career. Following the principles of landscape painting that he garnered under the tutelage of Birge Harrison, Dumond and others, he focused his efforts on capturing the moods of the changing seasons as this autumn landscape exemplifies.
 
 
[Label 6]
 
Virgin Morning, 1917
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Oil on canvas
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1956.005
 
Hutty began to exhibit his works throughout the country during the second decade of the twentieth century. Some of his earliest oils were exhibited at the National Academy of Design in 1913 and within a year he had developed a relationship with the prestigious Macbeth Gallery in New York City. In 1915 Hutty exhibited a group of twenty oil paintings, representing his work in both landscapes and figures, at the Salmagundi Club in New York City. Several months later he organized a group show at the Kanst Gallery in Los Angeles, exhibiting his works alongside fellow Woodstock artists Birge Harrison, Harry Leith-Ross, Zulma Steele, and Marion Bullard.
 
Virgin Morning was exhibited in numerous galleries and museum exhibitions in 1917 and illustrates Hutty's delight in the individuality of trees that he would later bring to his etchings.
 
 
[Label 7]
 
Ships in Harbor, 1917
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Oil on canvas
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1999.025
 
When the United States entered World War I, Hutty looked for opportunities to serve the country using his artistic skills. Ultimately he accepted a position as a marine camoufleur for the United States Shipping Board. His duties included designing new camouflage patterns for navy vessels. This "dazzle" system of camouflage was intended to distort the outlines of the ships in order to mislead enemy submarines as to the vessel's size and course.
 
While stationed along the docks in New York, Hutty sketched ships at harbor that bore the innovative designs that he had in part developed. From those sketches Hutty painted a series of three oil paintings that were shown in the Allied War Salon at the American Art Galleries in New York in 1918.
 
 
[Label 8]
 
Windswept, 1924
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Etching on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.005.0012
 
Though printmaking was a prevalent part of the Woodstock art colony from the beginning, Hutty did not begin to experiment with this medium until after his first trip to Charleston in 1920. Though his earliest prints depicted Charleston scenes, he did not restrict his printmaking to southern views.
 
Hutty enjoyed the solitude of nature and he often ventured into the woods with his sketch materials. He was especially fond of capturing the essence of various tree species. His prints of these subjects frequently drew the most attention from contemporary critics: "No one surpasses Hutty in the delineation of trees" wrote Ada Rainy of the Washington Post, "under his skillful needle, his trees emerge glorified beings endowed with personality." Hutty's Windswept was awarded the Samuel T. Shaw Prize for etching at the Salmagundi Club in New York in 1924.
 
 
[Label 9]
 
Little Italy, 1925
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Etching on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.005.0002
 
This intimate etching is of the village of Glasco, New York, a community on the Hudson River where a glass factory in Shady, New York, had a warehouse. The winding road depicted in the etching became known as the Glasco turnpike and runs between the towns of Glasco and Shady just north of Woodstock.
 
 
[Label 10]
 
New England Fishing Village, 1923
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Etching on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1977.017.0009
 
Though Charleston and Woodstock were Hutty's chief subjects, during summers he spent in Woodstock he often sought out new destinations for creative inspiration. In the early 1920s Hutty spent time in Gloucester and Rockport, Massachusetts, where he executed several etchings of the towns' fishing wharves including New England Fishing Village.
 
 
[Label 11]
 
Untitled (Maine Coast), ca. 1935
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Oil on canvas
Courtesy of the Howle-Throckmorton Collection, Charleston, S.C.
 
By the 1930s Hutty and his wife Bessie were traveling regularly by automobile. In 1932 they summered on Nantucket Island, Massachusetts. In 1935 they traveled to Maine, staying at Perkins Cove in Ogunquit, using Brooks Fish House Studio as Hutty's base for part of the summer and later moving inland, where he taught classes at North Bay Farm on Great Pond Lake in Oakland.
 
 
[Label 12]
 
Across the Valley, 1930
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Etching on paper framed with pencil sketch
Courtesy of the Howle-Throckmorton Collection, Charleston, S.C.
 
Across the Valley was the first print selected for distribution by the American College Society of Print Collectors in 1930. Hutty's etching is shown here along with his original pencil composition. The patterned grid on the pencil drawing was used to guide the transfer of an image to a copper plate. Notably the trees depicted in the pencil sketch and in the final etched print are inverted in the printing process.
 
 
[Label 13]
 
The Footlight Players Workshop, ca. 1936
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Watercolor on paper
Courtesy of Mr. and Mrs. Leonard Long
 
During the 1940s Hutty became closely affiliated with Charleston's local theater organization, the Footlight Players. Serving as the president and second vice president of the group for several years running, Hutty also functioned as the set designer and often painted scenery for the productions.
 
This painting features the Footlight Players' workshop on Queen Street, a building the organization purchased and renovated for productions. Hutty made an etching similar to this painting which he allowed the organization to use in its publications. In 1946, Hutty and the Footlight Players' young director, Emmett Robinson, together painted a mural called Personalities of Charleston Theatre History in the interior of the building. The mural represents two hundred years of key actors, playwrights, and directors of Charleston theater in one scene, and it remains on the workshop walls today.
 
 
[Label 14]
 
Meeting Street, ca. 1925
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Oil on canvas
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1961.010
 
Hutty first arrived in Charleston in 1920 to serve as director of the Carolina Art Association Art School held at the Gibbes Art Gallery (now known as the Gibbes Museum of Art). He returned to the city for the next three years to work in this capacity, teaching drawing and painting in portraiture, landscape, and still life.
 
He immediately recognized the wealth of subject matter the city had to offer artists and in a report to the Carolina Art Association after his second season in Charleston, he stated "you have a very attractive city to artists, attractive in many ways; and from now on I am sure that you will find more artists coming each year (They will bring the tourists later I am bound to confess!)"
 
During the 1920s, Charleston's leading citizens actively promoted the city as a tourist destination. Views of Charleston like Hutty's painting Meeting Street, which depicts the city's central thoroughfare and one of its most distinguished landmarks in St. Michael's church, played an important role in making "America's Most Historic City" better known to the rest of the country.
 
 
[Label 15]
 
At the Bend, Church Street, n.d.
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Watercolor on paper
Courtesy of Private Collection
 
Hutty believed that he produced more work in Charleston than anywhere else. He was frequently found on the streets of the Charleston peninsula with his easel set up to take in the aging colonial and antebellum homes resulting in works such as At the Bend, Church Street. The bend in the road near Church and Water Streets was only a few blocks away from Hutty's Tradd Street studio and many of Hutty's paintings were inspired by this picturesque thoroughfare.
 
 
[Label 16]
 
The Old Smyth Gate, Charleston, South Carolina, 1927
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Etching on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.007.0012
 
Not unaware of the budding tourist market in Charleston, Hutty likely identified a commercial audience for his work soon after his arrival. Images of Charleston's historic gates and gardens, such as Hutty's masterful rendering of The Old Smyth Gate, were popular among visitors to the historic city. Hutty produced an edition of 150 prints of this admired subject.
 
The Smyth gate, often referred to as the "pineapple gate" by Charleston's tourist industry, is located at 14 Legare Street. The massive brick columns, capped with decorative stone finials resembling pineapples, and the striking wrought iron gate panels were added to the original property in the early 1800s by the second owner, George Edwards. J. Adger Smyth bought the house in 1879 from his business partner, Andrew Adger. It remained in the Smyth family until 1930.
 
 
[Label 17]
 
My Doorway on Tradd Street, 1941
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Drypoint on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.005.0013
 
After visiting Charleston annually for eight years -- each season renting different rooms and studios scattered throughout the historic district -- Hutty and his wife Bessie decided to invest in a residence of their own. In 1928, they purchased a house at 46 Tradd Street. Originally built by William Vanderhorst for his son James around 1770, the historic, brick single-house had fallen into severe disrepair. The Huttys renovated the main house and converted the detached kitchen that also had served as quarters for enslaved servants in the nineteenth century into a studio for Alfred. Hutty made several etchings of his beloved Charleston home including My Doorway on Tradd Street.
 
 
[Label 18]
 
Magnolia Gardens, 1920
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Oil on canvas
Gibbes Museum of Art
1920.006.0001
 
While the cityscapes of Charleston proved to be a great inspiration to Hutty, he was enamored of the South's spring foliage. He recalled in an interview years after his first arrival, "although I loved the old town greatly, the magnificence of the Middleton and Magnolia Gardens completely enthralled me." His enthusiasm for the rich spring flora is reflected in the many paintings he made on the grounds of these historic plantations. Magnolia Gardens was one of the first paintings Hutty completed during his inaugural visit to Charleston in 1920, and was the first work by Hutty acquired by the Gibbes Museum of Art.
 
 
[Label 19]
 
Day's End (also known as Close of Day), ca. 1940
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Watercolor on paper
Courtesy of Mr. and Mrs. Frank Brumley, Charleston, S.C.
 
Hutty considered his watercolor Day's End his finest painting, and his drypoint etching of the same scene one of his favorite prints. Developed with thin washes of paint, Day's End evokes a contemplative narrative. Depicting an African American couple cast in long arboreal shadows, headed for an open field of hazy evening light and toward a modest farm, this painting suggests the end of a long day or long journey and movement toward a period of rest.
 
The painting demonstrates Hutty's revived interest in watercolor. In 1940, around the time this work was completed, he remarked in an interview: "I am having a renaissance of deep zest for watercolor." Day's End also exemplifies Hutty's increased interest in the rural customs of southern life. Like many artists of the American Scene art movement that flourished during the Depression, Hutty began to capture rural landscapes on canvas and in print form.
 
 
[Label 20]
 
The Discussion Group, ca. 1946
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Watercolor on paper
Gibbes Museum of Art
1996.008
 
Later in his career, Hutty's oils and watercolors were rarely exhibited outside of Charleston or Woodstock and despite his success as an etcher Hutty was always reluctant to be identified solely as a printmaker. Prior to an exhibition of his watercolors at the Corcoran Art Gallery in 1940 he wrote, "I painted in oil and watercolors a long, long time before I began etching.... I have year by year sent fewer paintings in color to the northern shows but I still use both media. They [the paintings] are frequently shown in my studio or at the Fort Sumter Hotel where I have a permanent exhibit.... They are frequently sold too, so that is why they are seldom seen in exhibits in the north!" Hutty often painted watercolors and oils of Charleston scenes that he also translated to print; The Discussion Group and Discussion Group in Carolina exemplify this practice.
 
 
[Label 21]
 
Des Gens, 1927
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Lithograph on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1977.017.0044
 
During the summer of 1927 Hutty studied the mechanics of lithography. He enrolled in a class taught by his friend Bolton Brown in Woodstock and began to reproduce his pencil sketches as lithographs. Brown, who published Lithography for Artists in 1930, began making lithographs in Woodstock in 1918 and taught the process to many other artists, including Theodor Wahl, George Bellows, Mary Bonner, and Konrad Cramer.
 
That summer Hutty produced a group of lithographs, primarily of European and Woodstock scenes. Brown recalled in his journals that "Hutty sat out in the field one day and drew a lithograph on stone while the rain poured down in rivers using one of my waterproof crayons." Though Hutty was pleased with his results in the technique, handling the heavy stones required for lithography was a laborious process. Hutty, who was fifty years old when he took up the medium, professed in a letter dated April 17, 1932, that he "had many times planned to take up lithography but so far had never again touched a stone." The dozen or so lithographs Hutty produced during the summer of 1927 were indeed his last.
 
 
[Label 22]
 
Burnham Beeches, England [no. 1], 1926
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Etching on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1977.017.0027
 
While visiting London in 1926, Hutty was recognized for his prints and drawings by the British Society of Graphic Art and was elected the first American member of the group. Known for its emphasis on draftsmanship, technique, and conservative styles, the society's tenets paralleled Hutty's own values. His induction into the group was an honor that Hutty especially treasured.
 
He turned to familiar subjects while he was abroad. Drawn to English treescapes as seen in Burnham Beeches, England and rural French village scenes such as Gossips, Ile de Noirmoutier, France, Hutty continued to demonstrate his sensitivity to line and his penchant for rendering romantic landscape views.
 
 
[Label 23]
 
An Early Morning Market Fair, ca. 1926
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Watercolor on paper
Courtesy of the Howle-Throckmorton Collection, Charleston, S.C.
 
Many artists of Hutty's generation, privileged enough to travel abroad, studied in Europe early on in their careers. Hutty made his first voyage overseas with his wife in May 1926, just one year shy of his fiftieth birthday. Their tour abroad lasted nearly five months and included visits to London, Devon, Cornwall, Bruges, Scotland, and France before the couple returned to the United States in October.
 
Hutty spent the mornings drawing and often used the afternoon to work in color. In a letter to his son he proclaimed, "I am sadly in need of this new material... have been working hard and had little time for writing." Early Morning Market Fair is presumed to be one of the many scenes he created during his travels -- the pencil sketch and watercolor exemplify this working process.
 
 
[Label 24]
 
In Bedon's Alley (Bedon's Alley), 1921
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Etching on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.007.0020
 
Based on his pencil drawing of the same scene, In Bedon's Alley is one of the first etchings Hutty issued. Portraying life in an African American slum in the heart of Charleston, Hutty revealed a side of Charleston that had previously been overlooked or ignored by local artists. Venturing down alleys and side streets Hutty chose to illustrate the backside of Charleston's historic homes, exposing the rundown condition of the buildings and sheds, and the African American inhabitants washing and drying laundry.
 
 
[Label 25]
 
Jenkins Band (no. 2), 1933
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Drypoint on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.007.0024
 
The Jenkins' Orphanage Band traveled up and down the eastern seaboard to raise funds for the Jenkins Orphanage in Charleston. Founded in 1892 by Reverend Daniel Joseph Jenkins, the orphanage was the first in the state to house African American children. While many of the children were taught different trades such as printing, shoemaking, tailoring, and chair caning, the band has been recognized as one of the country's important Jazz "incubators". From this training ground, many musicians who performed with the orphanage later populated some of the most notable jazz bands of this century.
 
Hutty produced a pencil drawing and at least two drypoint prints depicting the Jenkins Band. While the pencil drawing indicates the band is gathered in a back alley for an informal performance or practice, this drypoint print is a lively depiction of the band playing in front of a prominent arched gate.
 
 
[Label 26]
 
Meditation, 1924
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Drypoint on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.007.0054
 
Women and particularly African American women frequently factor into Hutty's compositions. They are often the subject of his prints and drawings and are pictured in groups as well as individually. The range in Hutty's depictions of African Americans is challenging to scholars. Meditation, for example, is an intimate and sensitive portrait of a woman who is captured in a moment of thoughtful contemplation. While other works, such as Phoebe Passes My Gate, portray figures from a distance with undefined facial features or even exaggerated features invoking period stereotypes rather than personal connection. This dichotomy in depictions of African American subjects is common in Hutty's work.
 
 
[Label 27]
 
Grinding Sugar Cane, n.d.
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Drypoint on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.007.0069
 
During the late 1930s, Hutty's work seemed to embrace aspects of the American Scene art movement that flourished during the Depression. These artists often concentrated on the agrarian customs of southern life, and Hutty made more frequent trips to the outskirts of Charleston, where he focused on capturing rural scenes, often documenting farmers and fishermen at work.
 
Around this same time, Hutty shifted his primary printmaking technique from etching to drypoint. Drypoint lines, which are scratched directly onto the surface of the plate, hold more ink and allowed Hutty to create darker and more richly defined areas of light and shadow.
 
 
[Label 28]
 
Rural South, ca. 1938
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Drypoint on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.007.0083
 
During the years of the great Depression, the federal government's New Deal provided funding to the graphic arts though agencies such as the Works Progress Administration and the Federal Art Project. Many artists traveled to the South to document the most impoverished and rural parts of the region. Among them were photographers: Dorothea Lange, Walker Evans, and Marion Post Wolcott; and renowned regionalist painters: Thomas Hart Benton, Howard Cook, and Rockwell Kent.
 
Though Hutty was never employed as a WPA artist, his work during this period was clearly influenced by the renewed national interest in southern subjects. The images in his "Rural Series" as he referred to it, included some of his most prized prints. This drypoint, Rural South, was shown in the Metropolitan Museum of Art exhibition Artists for Victory in 1942.
 
 
[Label 29]
 
Toward a New Day, ca. 1942
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Drypoint on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.007.0086
 
In Toward a New Day a multigenerational family group parts with of one of their own. The group in stasis looks on the back of a younger man about to crest a knoll away from them, toward the horizon, perhaps a son and brother or husband. This man's dress, what appears to be a soldier's uniform, further emphasizes his separation from the group. Hutty's depiction of a strong, self-confident group of African Americans relates a more hopeful and dignified narrative for his subjects than many of the images produced by his white Charleston contemporaries who more commonly portrayed African Americans in traditional service roles.
 
During the era of World War II African American soldiers appear in Hutty's prints on several occasions. Around this time, Hutty was mentoring an aspiring young artist, William Henry Jackson, who was African American. Believing Jackson exhibited special artistic talents, Hutty wrote letters on his behalf hoping to open doors for his art education and to grant him access to local museums and galleries. While Jackson was an enlisted man in the armed forces, Hutty continued to guide his art education through correspondence and welcomed him to his studio when he was in town.
 
 
[Label 30]
 
Monday Morning in Charleston, 1922
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Etching on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.007.0042
 
One of his earliest etchings, Monday Morning in Charleston, is shown here with the original zinc plate from which Hutty struck his prints. The etching process involves drawing images with a needle onto a copper, zinc, or steel plate that has been covered with an acid-resistant wax called a ground. Once the drawing is complete, the plate is dipped into an acid bath during which time the exposed metal is bitten or etched by the acid. The plate is then inked with a roller and wiped clean, leaving ink in only the etched areas of the plate. Then the plate is mounted to paper, and plate and paper are run through a press where the image is transferred.
 
Before 1923 Hutty often waited to transfer his drawings to plates until he returned to Woodstock where he had easier access to a printing press. With only a few exceptions of prints made in the mid-1920s when he used a New York City printer, Hutty prepared his own plates and printed all editions of his etchings himself. Beginning in 1921 Hutty followed his signature on his prints with a snail symbol; he claimed that, having entered the "etching game" late in life, "I use the snail as my mark on the etchings, because I was so long getting at it!"
 
 
[Label 31]
 
a. Figure sketch on Fort Sumter stationary
b. Figure sketches on paperboard
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Pencil on paper
Courtesy of Virginia Nichols, Charleston, S.C.
c. Postcard of Attack on Fort Sumter by Alfred Hutty
Courtesy of Harlan Greene, Charleston, S.C.
 
In addition to showing his prints and paintings at his studios in Woodstock and Charleston, Hutty was given a permanent exhibition space at the Fort Sumter Hotel. Located along the Charleston Battery, this hotel was a prime location to draw the attention of out-of-town tourists and other temporary winter residents. These figure sketches doodled on scrap pieces of paper show glimpses of his working process.
 
In 1949 Hutty completed a nine-by-eighteen-foot mural titled Attack on Fort Sumter, which occupied a wall at the Fort Sumter Hotel. An image of the mural was published on period postcards.
 
 
[Label 32]
 
Exhibition Catalogs
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
 
Hutty's work was featured in at least one solo exhibition in a museum or commercial gallery every year between 1922 (the year after he first took up etching) and 1935. His prints were featured in solo shows at the Corcoran Gallery in Washington, D.C in 1922, 1923, and 1931, at Doll and Richards Gallery in Boston in 1924 and 1935, and in New York's Grand Central Galleries in 1931 and 1935. In February 1929 sixty of Hutty's etchings and lithographs were exhibited at Kennedy Galleries in New York City, alongside a showing of a hundred prints by James McNeill Whistler.
 
Hutty frequently exhibited in New York City, Boston, Philadelphia, Washington, Chicago, Detroit, and Los Angeles. Nine times between 1926 and 1932 his pieces were displayed in Europe -- six times in London, twice in Paris, and once in Florence.
 
 
[Label 33]
 
Lost Morning, 1936
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Drypoint on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.007.0096
 
In 1936, Dubose Heyward -- author of Porgy the renowned novel on which the folk opera Porgy and Bess by composer George Gershwin is based -- published his fifth book, Lost Morning. The story of an artist who fears his career has been corrupted by commercialism, Heyward's main character in the novel Felix Hollister is portrayed as an outsider to the small town in which he lives, much like Hutty was to Charleston. Heyward even compares the fictional work of Hollister or "Holly" to that of Alfred Hutty in the book. Though Heyward asked a local Charleston artist, Elizabeth O'Neill Verner, to illustrate a Charleston edition of Porgy, he asked Hutty to contribute cover art for Lost Morning.

 

Object labels from the exhibition

At the Edge of the Wood, ca.1925
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Oil on canvas
Courtesy of Mr. and Mrs. Leonard Long, Charleston, S.C.
 
Ships in Harbor, 1917
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Oil on canvas
Courtesy of Dr. James G. Simpson, Charleston, S.C.
 
Berkshire Willows, 1929
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Drypoint on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.005.0005
 
My Charleston Studio, 1931
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Etching on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.007.0018
 
Saint Philip's Church, n.d.
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Oil on canvas
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1992.005.0001
 
St. Philip's on Church Street, n.d.
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Oil on canvas
Courtesy of Dr. James G. Simpson, Charleston, S.C.
 
Back Street Wash Day, ca. 1950
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Oil on canvas
Courtesy of the Wright Southern Collection, Charleston, S.C.
 
Backstage, n.d.
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Watercolor on paper
Courtesy of Private Collection
 
Houses in Charleston, n.d.
By Alfred Hutty (American,1877-1954)
Oil on board
Cheekwood Botanical Garden & Museum of Art, Nashville, Tennessee, gift of the 1989 Collectors Group with matching funds provided through the bequest of Anita Bevill McMichael Stallworth, 1989.8.2
 
In a Southern City, n.d.
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Watercolor on paper
Courtesy of Dr. James G. Simpson, Charleston, S.C.
 
The Bishop's Gate, 1924
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Etching on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.007.0077
 
Old St. Michael's Church, 1928
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Etching on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.005.0014
 
White Azaleas - Magnolia Gardens, 1925
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Oil on canvas
Courtesy of the Greenville County Museum of Art, Museum purchase with funds from the 1998 Museum Antique Show
 
Untitled (Lowcountry Marsh Scene), n.d.
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Oil on canvas
Courtesy of Private Collection
 
St. Andrews Church, n.d.
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Watercolor on paper
Courtesy of the Wright Southern Collection, Charleston, S.C.
 
Figures with Ox Cart, n.d.
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Watercolor on paper
Courtesy of Mr. and Mrs. William B. McGuire, Jr., Charlotte, N.C.
 
The Conversation, n.d.
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Watercolor on paper
Courtesy of Mr. and Mrs. Jim and Jayne Taylor, Charleston, S.C.
 
The Ox Cart, n.d.
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Watercolor on paper
Courtesy of Mr. and Mrs. Jim and Jayne Taylor, Charleston, S.C.
 
Carolina Cabin, ca. 1940s
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Oil on canvas
Courtesy of the Howle-Throckmorton Collection, Charleston, S.C.
 
Discussion Group in Carolina, ca. 1946
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Drypoint on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.007.0068
 
High Tide, n.d.
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Pastel on paper
Courtesy of the Wright Southern Collection, Charleston, S.C.
 
At Low Tide (no. 1), 1921
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Etching on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.007.0057
 
Backstage, 1940
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Drypoint on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.007.0004
 
Backstage, 1940
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Pencil on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1977.008.0001
 
At the Wedding, n.d.
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Watercolor on paper
Courtesy of the Wright Southern Collection, Charleston, S.C.
 
The Wedding, n.d.
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Etching on paper
Courtesy of Patricia Holsclaw and the family of the late Raymond Holsclaw, Charleston, S.C.
 
Figure sketch for The Wedding. n.d.
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Pencil on paper
Courtesy of Dr. Virginia Nichols, Charleston, S.C.
 
Twin Beeches (no. 1), 1927
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Lithograph on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1977.017.0047
 
Gossips, Ile de Noirmoutier, France, 1927
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Etching on paper
Courtesy of the Howle-Throckmorton Collection, Charleston, S.C.
 
An Early Morning Market Fair, ca. 1926
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Pencil on paper
Courtesy of the Howle-Throckmorton Collection, Charleston, S.C.
 
Bedon's Alley, 1920-21
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Pencil on paper
Courtesy of Dr. James G. Simpson, Charleston, S.C.
 
Jenkins Orphanage Band, ca. 1931
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Pencil on paper
Courtesy of Dr. and Mrs. Bert Pruitt, Charleston, S.C.
 
The Crap Game (no.2), ca. 1927
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877­1954)
Drypoint on paper
Courtesy of the Howle-Throckmorton Collection, Charleston, S.C.
 
Phoebe Passes My Gate, 1931
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Etching on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.007.0104.001
 
Potato Pickers in the Lowcountry, 1935
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Drypoint on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.007.0055
 
Figure sketch for Potato Pickers in the Lowcountry, ca. 1935
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Pencil on paper
Courtesy of Virginia Nichols, Charleston, S.C.
 
In Cypress Gardens, 1936
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Drypoint on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.007.0010
 
The Patriarch- Middleton Gardens, 1942
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Drypoint on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.005.0007
 
Pounding Rice, 1937
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Drypoint on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.007.0063
 
Deep South, 1937
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Drypoint on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.005.0010
 
Day's End, ca. 1939
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Drypoint on paper
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
1955.005.0009
 
Deep Swamp Spiritual (aka Spirituals in the Lowcountry), ca. 1930
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Watercolor on paper
Courtesy of the Wright Southern Collection, Charleston, S.C.
 
Lost Morning
By Dubose Heyward (American, 1885-1940)
Book
Inscribed by Dubose Heyward "For Alfred and Bessie ­ with the appreciation and affection of Dubose, August 20th 1936"
Collection of the Gibbes Museum of Art
A2010.001
 
Untitled (portrait of a woman), n.d.
By Alfred Hutty (American, 1877-1954)
Graphite on paper
Collection of Gibbes Museum of Art
2011.012

(above: Alfred Hutty (American,1877 - 1954), Potato Pickers in the Low Country, 1935, Drypoint on paper, 10 x 8 5/8 inches. Courtesy of the Gibbes Museum of Art/ Carolina Art Association, Charleston, S.C.)


Resource Library readers may also enjoy:

Read more articles and essays concerning this institutional source by visiting the sub-index page for the Gibbes Museum of Art in Resource Library

For further biographical information please see America's Distinguished Artists, a national registry of historic artists.


Search Resource Library for thousands of articles and essays on American art.

Copyright 2012 Traditional Fine Arts Organization, Inc., an Arizona nonprofit corporation. All rights reserved.