Clay Edgar Spohn was born November 24, 1898, in San Francisco, to Lena (Schaefer) and John Henry Spohn. From 1919 to 1921, Spohn studied at the University of California at Berkeley, and from 1922 to 1924, he studied at the Art Students League in New York under Kenneth Hayes Miller, Boardman Robinson, George Luks and Guy Pene Du Bois. He also became acquainted with Alexander Calder at the Art Students League. In 1924, Spohn was employed as an assitant designer to muralist Ezra Winter. From 1926 to 1927 he studied in Paris at the Academie Modern, a school run by Fernand Leger and Orthon Fireze.
Returning to San Francisco in 1927, Spohn became an active member in the Bay Area art scene. The Treasury Department commissioned him, in 1938, to execute a mural for the Montebello, California post office, and in 1939, he completed another mural under the sponsorship of the WPA for Los Gatos Union High School in Los Gatos, California.
In 1942, the San Francisco Museum of Art mounted Spohn's solo exhibition "Fantastic War Machines and Guerragraphs", consisting of a series of drawings inspired by dreams of World War II. From 1945 until his resignation in 1950, Spohn was employed as instructor of drawing and painting at the California School of Fine Arts, where he befriended Clyfford Still and Mark Rothko. In 1949, at the California School, he organized a group exhibition entitled "The Museum of Unknown and Little Known Objects", in which Spohn's extraordinarily-constructed objects were a focal point.
Spohn moved to Taos, New Mexico in 1952, and participated in several national exhibitions. He was Visiting Lecturer at Mount Holyoke College, Massachusetts, in 1958, after which he moved to New York City where he executed a series of paintings under the sponsorship of the collector J. Patrick Lannan. From 1964 to 1969, he taught at the School of Visual Arts in New York.
After a two year move to Taos, Spohn returned to New York in 1971. In 1974, the Oakland Museum sponsored a retrospective of Spohn's work.
Clay Spohn died in New York City on December 19, 1977.
The Clay Spohn papers measure 20.4 linear feet and date from circa 1862 to 1985 with the bulk of the material dating from 1890 to 1985. The collection consists of biographical material, correspondence, business records, notes and writings, artwork, printed material, and photographs reflecting the life and career of painter and educator Clay Spohn.
Part 1 includes sketchbooks with annotated drawings by Spohn, writings including reminiscensces by Spohn, letters, clippings, and photographs of Spohn's artwork.
Part 2 includes biographical material; correspondence between Spohn and his colleagues; business records such as Spohn's general accounting records; Spohn's notes and writings on a variety of subjects; drawings and sketchbooks; printed material such as exhibition announcements and catalogs; and photographs of subjects such as Spohn, his family and colleagues, his house, and his artwork.
The collection is arranged into three parts. Part 1 was lent to the Archives of American Art in 1964 by Clay Spohn, and was microfilmed and returned to Spohn. Part 2 was donated to the Archives of American Art by Urban Neininger in 1978 and was partially microfilmed. Because material from part 2 was not processed until over three decades after filming Part 1, the overall organization is inconsistent. In general, material within folders is arranged chronologically.
The material on reel D169 was lent for filming by Clay Spohn in 1964. The material on reel 5461-5474 was donated by Spohn's friend and the executor of his estate, Urban Neininger, in 1978. An additional 0.4 linear feet of papers were donated by Spohn's biographer, David Beasley, in 2008.
The collection is open for research. Use of unfilmed material requires an appointment.
The Archives of American Art makes its archival collections available for non-commercial, educational and personal use unless restricted by copyright and/or donor restrictions, including but not limited to access and publication restrictions. AAA makes no representations concerning such rights and restrictions and it is the user's responsibility to determine whether rights or restrictions exist and to obtain any necessary permission to access, use, reproduce and publish the collections. Please refer to the
Portions of the collection and materials lent for microfilming are available on 35mm microfilm reels D169, and 5461-5474 at the Archives of American Art offices and through interlibrary loan. Researchers should note that the arrangement of the collection as described in this finding aid does not reflect the order of the collection on microfilm.
Clay Spohn Papers, circa 1862-1985, bulk 1890-1985. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
Part 2 of the collection was processed by Jean Fitzgerald in 1998. The finding aid to Parts 1 and 2 was written by Jean Fitzgerald in 1998. A small addition was accessioned in 2008 and minimally processed in 2017.
The Archives of American Art also holds material lent for microfilming (D169) including sketchbooks, writings, correspondence, and related material. Lent materials were returned to the lender and are described in the first series of the finding aid.
The three sketchbooks found here contain notes and annotated drawings made by Spohn during his stay in Paris. Sketchbook I contains a drawing of Hemingway's friend, Musgrave, at Le Dome, schematic drawings for a "portable studio," and notes about what to take to Giverny. Sketchbook II contains a self-portrait drawing and one drawing each of Musgrave and Duff Twisden, Hemingway's model for "Brett" in
Writings consist of Spohn's reminiscences in the form of a 100-page letter to sculptor and art historian Mary Fuller McChesney. He answers questions about his career and describes, with words and drawings, his works for the exhibition
Found here is a letter from Reginald Vaughn discussing the acquisition of Spohn's Los Gatos mural for the Morrison Center for Rehabilitation, a letter from the W.P.A. office concerning exhibitions, and three clippings. Also found are twelve photographs of artwork (primarily Spohn's murals) including: the mural
Biographical material includes a variety of official documentation for Spohn and his parents. Documents concerning Spohn's parents include their marriage license. Documents concerning Spohn include his baptismal certificate, passport, the contents of two wallets, membership and identity cards, biographical sketches, two wills, and Spohn's death certificate. There is also a typescript biography of Spohn, "Life of a Painter," by David R. Beasley.
Biographical materials are on reel 5461.
Correspondence is between Spohn and his colleagues, including two letters from Alexander Calder, eight letters from Mark Rothko, and twenty-eight letters from Clyfford Still.
See Appendix for an alphabetical list of correspondents from Series 2.2.
Correspondence is on reels 5461-5470.
Reel 5461
Reel 5462
Reel 5462
Reel 5463
Reel 5464
Reel 5465
Reel 5465
Reel 5466
Reel 5467
Reel 5468
Reel 5468
Reel 5469
Reel 5470
Business records primarily consist of Spohn's general accounting records, account books, banking records, contracts, inventories of artwork sold, records of support from the Lannan Foundation, records concerning Spohn's house in Taos, and miscellaneous receipts for healthcare, travel, art supplies, photographic services, and shipping. This subseries also includes documents concerning the companies managed by Spohn's father, John H. Spohn, and the patents and estate papers of Spohn's brother, John H. Spohn, Jr. These can be found at the beginning of the subseries.
Business records are unfilmed.
This subseries contains miscellaneous notes and writings and includes 188 notebooks, address lists, a card file of book titles, Spohn's "Subject Location," "Index and Date," and "School of Visual Arts" files, and two typescripts by other writers. The miscellaneous notes and writings, and the notebooks, are concerned with various topics, often intermingled, such as teaching notes; lists of names, books, and groceries needed; financial records for art supplies; Spohn's thoughts on philosophy and art; dietary advice; annotated studies and calculations concerning the "trisection of an arbitrary angle"; notes for his unpublished literary work "The Book," (sometimes entitled "The Actual Book" or "The Truth Book"); and brief and incomplete drafts written either for writing class assignments or for "The Book."
Files on the School of Visual Arts contains class schedules, grade sheets, and 37 notebooks of class assignments, records of student grades, notes for lectures, lists of books for teaching, writings about teaching, and notes on art supplies for class.
Notes and writings are unfilmed unless noted otherwise.
Reel 5470
Reel 5470
Reel 5470
Reel 5471
Reel 5471
Reel 5471
Reel 5471
Artwork consists of 557 drawings, including 27 undated drawings of Washington D.C., and 14 sketchbooks.
Artwork is on reel 5472.
Printed material consists of clippings, exhibition announcements and catalogs for Spohn and others, exhibition prospectuses, reproductions of artwork, calendars of events, programs, brochures, books, and miscellaneous printed material.
Printed materials are on reels 5472-5474.
Photographs are of Spohn and his family, colleagues, studio, house in Taos, exhibition installations, and artwork. There are also photographs of San Francisco, including six views of damage done by the 1906 earthquake. Colleagues pictured in the photographs include Marion Karnes, Urban Neininger, Jeanne Reynal, Louis Ribak, Alfred Rogoway, and Maurice Sievan.
Photographs of artwork for projects by Spohn picture the following: an entrance hall mural for Officers Club, San Francisco (undated); a cartoon for copper repousee sculpture for Carmel, California, Volunteer Fire Department (1936); a cartoon for copper repousee sculpture for Castro Valley Community Center (1937); a mural for Montebello, California, post office (1938); and a mural for Los Gatos Union High School (1939).
Photographs are on reel 5474.
Artifacts consist of four military pins from Marion Karnes.
Artifacts are unfilmed.
The addition includes nine notebooks of notes and writings on art, class assignments, telephone calls and appointments, plans and procedures, an index for the history and location of paintings, and financial records.
The addition is unfilmed.