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Clement B. Haupers Narrator

Thomas O'Sullivan and Elizabeth Knight Minnesota Historical Society

Interviewers April 3, 1981 CH: I don't trust him...I'd trust him if, in order to curb federal spending he would have a ten percent salary cut for the whole goddamn crew in Washington starting with himself. Then I'd believe him. TOS: A few less limousines help. Well, we brought along...brought along kind of a sampling of the WPA print collection we got recently. I'd like to ask you some questions about some of the artists and the processes involved and such. CH: Well, this of course, is a lithograph by Lynn Kepman. I have no idea whatever became of Lynn. He was a rather shy inhibited individual. I'm surprised that he got this much together. Because he was always afraid of what he was doing wasn't good enough. TOS: Hmmmm. CH: So that his production was limited. Stan Fenelle of course, was very versatile and a very prolific producer. We have some colored lithos of his, I think, they're in the Minnesota Museum collection. TOS: Yes. CH: But he is still living, how active he is, I don't know. And then this...Erle Loran well, his things are highly stylized as you can gather here. TOS: Yes. CH: And he left Minnesota and settled out in California, I don't know whether his still living or not. TOS: He became kind of a...something of an authority on art... CH: Yes, he wrote some books and some articles, and made some copies that were...if anything a little too perfect, "to be Cézanne." Erle was a very fastidious dresser, he was very elegant, he had a great sense of elegance, and I think he went to the California School of Arts and Crafts.

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But, I've lost all contact, I don't know whether he's amongst the living. At eighty-one, I'm sort of the overflow. Now, who have we got here? TOS: This is a fellow I want to ask you about, named Will Hausener... CH: I'm completely blank... TOS: I've recently run across some of his paintings owned by...he's dead now for ten years or so. And I've seen some of his paintings that are owned by a relative of his, including a mural that he did for the post office in St. Paul. But he never installed it in place. According to the family he got into an argument with the bureaucratic authorities...and never completed it. CH: Hmmmm. TOS: Any recollection of him? CH: No, not at all. You see the post office murals were a separate thing. They were done by the division of painting and sculpturing of the Treasury. And...oh...this chap's dead... TOS: Swanson? (Bennet Swanson) CH: Ben Swanson, yes. I knew him very well, in fact, we spent a winter in northern Minnesota cutting timber together. TOS: Hmmmm hum. CH: And Benny developed a serious problem with alcohol and he's long gone. EK: Why were you up north cutting timber? CH: Well, his father owned a section of land...and...we...we were both broke, and he said you can cut enough to pay the taxes and an equal amount for your pocket. So, we went up there in January and stayed until March. We would set a number. Fifty a day. EK: Yes. CH: And, our ritual was, in the morning we got we'd run outside bare naked and roll in the snow... EK: [Laughter] Wake up... CH: Then come in and have breakfast and then get busy. [Laughter] And this is another man, I don't know what became of John...he did some murals in Thief River Falls.

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TOS: John Socha? CH: Yes. TOS: Yes. A couple of other prints of his were scenes in Mexico. CH: Well, I don't know that he ever made any for the program that were made out of the country, so how they got in there, I wouldn't know...Mac LeSueur... TOS: Yes. CH: Well, he's in...ah... TOS: Arizona or something like that... CH: Yes...in Tucson...yes, this is fairly typical... TOS: A lot of these...a lot of the 1934 prints have a series of numbers on them...stamped, like from a stamp pad. 1732 on this one...Do you have any idea what that was? CH: Well, that was...it would probably mean that there was a total of thirty-two made and this was the seventeenth. No...that would be the number over here... TOS: Yes. CH: Yes. I have no idea what that would mean. TOS: Yes. CH: No idea whatever. How he got into the group I don't remember either, George Resler, oh, of course, he's long gone. This is not very typical...Glen Ranney, that's the one here. The other day, I picked up a bunch of his water colors, they're opening a gallery in Norwood. TOS: Yes. I met him. CH: And what's his mane Shl... TOS: Schletty. (George Schletty - Minnesota Historical Society Gift Shop Manager. CH: Schletty...yes...he's been on my neck for a bunch of stuff so I'd have to get off my dead duff and get busy.

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TOS: Hmm...there's a whole bunch by Alexander Oja... CH: Yes...ah..gosh, I didn't remember he did all those things. he has lived here with me for a while after Clara died. Then he worked with the Science Museum... TOS: What was the color process...was it like a lithographic process then? CH: Yes, it would have to be a multiple plate...a each...a plate for the separate colors. TOS: Hmmhm...so you'd have three, four plates for... CH: Yes, yes... you see some of these things were done when I was working in the Region and wasn't too aware of all that was going on in any one given place. TOS: Yes. CH: And I shagged around like crazy. Iowa...the always seemed to get into trouble. The administration there would call me in and then pass the buck, you see. The Regional office said so and so. TOS: Uh huh right...cover your rear... CH: And there was one lady down there, bless her memory, but she was the best buck passer. Spent more time running down to Des Moines then you can shake a stick at. And, there was another interesting community at the time...Iowa was dry, there was one hotel that had a little bar. And well, you can imagine. Of course, your truly has been dry for twelve years. But, it was done under compulsion, I felt that I had to do something so I went to Hazelden [Hazelden Foundation, chemical dependency treatment facility in Minnesota]. Because, I woke one morning and looked in the garage and said, "How the hell did that damn car get there?". I said, "Whoops baby look out". [Laughter] I don't think a guy ever does anything as drastic as that without having hit bottom, gotten scared... EK: Yes. CH: So, I'm not a prohibitionist, never was, but it's a number one problem. TOS: Yes. CH: So, I think the greatest bunk this nation ever made was the Eighteenth Amendment. Because all it did was put the economic power in the hands of the crooks. EK: Hm. Hm.

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CH: So, and right in the National office, Mabel Willibrant, she was in the Attorney's General's office and she had a company in California that was selling a wine brick. It was a dehydrated mess of grapes about the size of a building brick...[Laughter] and you would hydrate it in 'x' amount of water, let stand 'x' number of hours to ferment, and you had wine. [Laughter] So that was perfectly legal, so the whole thing was...that's why whenever the national Government gets off on a silly move, I think, "Oh shut up, you're never gonna' have any common sense out of it, so why bother?" TOS: Yes. EK: The wine... CH: Yes. TOS: How about...do you think the art projects when they ended, they kinda' run their course, or would you have wanted to see them continue? CH: Well, I think they could have continued...ah...you see, on what the hell, there was a gal that wrote for Harpers...one of the magazines, claimed that the project terminated because of the House Unamerican Activities Committee, now where she got that crazy notion I'll never know. Because what terminated them was Pearl Harbor. TOS: Uh huh. CH: It started as an emergency work relief, and the only reason we had any art activity at all was that Harry Hopkins who was a confidant of FDR, was keenly aware of the plight of the New York artists and he got the government to set aside some sums for the arts program and these sums were under the administration of the Washington Director and the State Directors had no authority over them. and that caused some friction too. Because, of course, it was looked upon as a nice way to political debts by appointing supervisor "x", "y' and "z" and down the line, but we all had to be professionals. And I don't think I'd ever gotten into it if I hadn't ah...worked with the State Fair and done other things prior to that. But, Holger Cahill and I got along just like that, and the inial program was written up by Increase Robinson of Chicago. She had, under state emergency relief, had developed a program for artists. We had a little program here under FDRA, but it was confined mostly to the classes. And I gave some lectures. Well, she had written up for about a dozen for the PWAP. The highly professionals. Well, when I saw the manual of procedures, on the flyleaf of which was stated, 'to maintain nd increase skills', I said, "now wait a minute, there a lot of people of our training. the advertising field had any number of them and that was pretty more of them." So I wrote up a project of four hundred, and Holger Cahill came storming out here and spent an afternoon in the cabin of the Covered Wagon. The Covered Wagon restaurant down on Fourth Street had a cabin inside which was air-conditioned.

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[Laughter] EK: The elite... CH: Yeah, so we took that over, he and I and we worked out this program because as a result we went not only from what we called 'fine art', we went out into visual aids. We did a three dimensional map for the School For The Blind. EK: Uh huh. CH: With the stars for the capital cities and isinglass for the water courses, because plastics were not around. And then... TOS: Yes, you had technicians as well as artists. CH: Sure and then we assigned some illustrators, commercial artists to the farm school, because Dr. Harvey was getting out a book on plant pathology. This one guy did nothing but draw diseased plants and bugs. And it nearly drove him bugs...but... EK: But it was a job. CH: But that was it. A side light, I don't know if it's pertinent, but I think maybe you'd find it interesting, to this was of course, that Franklin Roosevelt was not universally loved. In many quarters he was called that man. In fact, I was at a gathering early in the Roosevelt administration even before these programs came on and one person made a very derogatory remark, this was in connection with the bank holiday. And this man said, "Well, my dear young lady when you're stuck, you don't quibble over the color of the tow rope that pulls you out." And I thought, well, at least there's some sense there. Well, of course, once we got rolling ah...that was in '35 and I went looking for mural spaces. In fact, found a seventy-two foot corridor in a school in Sebeka and had Dick Haines (Richard Haines), who had just come out of the Minneapolis Art School do a inch scale of it for us. I let that hang over my desk for a while and I thought, now just a minute, you take that up there, seventy-two inches on seventy-two feet is gonna' look like a special delivery stamp on a legal envelope. You can't do that. So I got him to draw a twenty foot section, full scale in charcoal. Because I learned quite early, that you can't trust the powers of visualization to far. You got to have it. So, that worked out just fine. We had the color scale up there and everything, the superintendent said to me, there was a man standing in front with his hands behind his back scrutinizing it. He said, "There's the guy you gotta' sell." You see, the program was predicated on this,,,I mention this before...that the government paid the artists' salary, the beneficiary of the work had pay all other than labor costs. In this instance, it would mean room and board for this man for the length of time he'd have to live in the community. So, superintendent said to me, "There's the guy you'll have to sell.' so I went up to him and said, "How do you like it?" 'oh, he said, 'it's wonderful, but where did you

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get the pattern?" I felt like saying, take $2.98, Sears Roebuck, but... EK: I'm sure, he was buying wallpaper... CH: Well, I restrained myself and told him that the artist had read the story of his community and here was this and that and the other thing. Then, tell me more. Well, we ended up over at his house until two in the morning drinking bourbon. Talking about the visual sense and its function. So, it had one very good side effect in bringing the awareness of the visuals sense into areas that didn't have it. I made a deliberate effort to do as little in the cities as possible. Because I wanted to get out...because the cities had enough... EH: They had an opportunity... TOS: Yes. Did the ...do you think the prints, were they a way of getting things into people' homes? CH: Not people's homes, tax supported...some did slip out. TOS: Yes. CH: You see... TOS: They'd go in post office or government buildings... CH: No, they'd go into now, for instance, the board of education sponsored a lot...well, they'd pass then out amongst the schools. Now, that brings up another thing. Ah, not everybody could paint murals and even if they could, there weren't that many spaces available. So, we had a lot of easel pictures. And materials cost, say as for a sixteen - twenty might run five dollars or whatever have you. So, one day I went to the supervisor of arts for the St. Paul public schools, and I asked her if she would sponsor some easel pictures. She looked at men, she said, "Now, Mr. Haupers, if I could be sure, if I could be very, very sure those would do down as great art, I'd be all for it." I thought my God. So, I turned to her, I said, "Miss Swan, I doubt very much that Michelangelo when he lay on his back doing the Sistine ceiling, against his will, hopping mad at the Pope, had the slightest idea he was creating great art and that you in twentieth century would spend a lot of money to go to the Sistine and crane your neck contemplating the great masterpiece and when your neck got tired, you'd rent a mirror from the guard and contemplate the great work of art fragmentized while you bumped into your neighbor's backside." [Laughter] Well, we got...put some across...but we had to go to all kinds of lengths...because there was just that holding back. Because who's to say what's great? TOS: Yes. EK: That's a point...

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CH: In fact, and later on a noon...a newscast, I think it was Mike Douglas, had some western artists, cowboy artists, and the sums of money that they are collecting for those things... TOS: Hmmmm. CH: California is just crazy about them...hundred, thousands and on and on, so... TOS: Yes. CH: You know there in one other sidelight I wanted to bring up. We'd been operating about three years, this is '38. And I was invited to dinner at Elizabeth Quinlan's home. TOS: Who was she? CH: Young Quinlan store...Minneapolis? TOS: A kinda' patroness of... CH: Well, now wait a minute...sure...and Russell Plimpton from the art institute was there. Brenda Ueland, who wrote and her brother Rolf, a lawyer, oh the Intelligentsia of the Twin Cities. And I thought, now I wonder. As I told you Roosevelt was not admired by all. Well, during dinner, I was included in and out of the conversation, and it went quite casual. Then we went into the living room for coffee. Living room was a Florentine Palazzo. Then the guns came, "Now, Mr. Haupers, it's perfect nonsense to hire artists." I thought, now wait a minute - I said, "Miss Quilan, you support the art school, don't ...?" "Why , of course". I said, "In 1921 I went there for a short period, I found it was going to take me four years to learn what I learned in Paris in one. But, as I remember, a fourth year student who showed exceptional promise would be given a scholarship to Europe for finishing. Now, you've done that every year since. Now, if a student entering your four year course is a high school graduate, add one year for the European scholarship that brings that person into their mid-twenties. A third of an average lifetime. Now, by your training course here you have made this employment program necessary, cause and effect, the law of the cosmos." You could have heard a pin drop. So, there were a lot of side effects there. And, I think that's true, what is the point of training people to do something for which society has no use. TOS: Yes. EK: And a very romantic idea of what an artist was then going through (unclear) . CH: Well of course, let's put it this way, there are an awful lot who fool with it, but haven't go the guts to really work at it. It's a lonely business. And you have to really...well in my own case, it's some kind of an inner drive...I always wanted to draw, and put down what I saw, without any

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concept of whether I was gonna' make me any money or not. And how I got into all these other involvements is another story, but it didn't stop the painting, as you know if you saw that show I had at the Historical Society a while back. So, those of us who are motivated are gonna' persist. These programs help some with motivation, with not perhaps great enough...but who had something in comm...to contribute, because all these who are looking at them, there isn't a single on that is negative. At least I haven't found any. TOS: Yes. CH: So, that they fill a place...now, the pace of living today is such that you probably don't have very many visitor to a library or museum, but you do have some. And if you haven't got something to give them, what are you there for? TOS: And they won't come back. CH: No. So, I'm really pleased. Now do you have any more? TOS: Yes. I got some more here. Something I was wondering about did...did the equipment for producing the prints were they located in the arts center? CH: Sure. TOS: One place in the state? Presses etc...? CH: We had just a press in Minneapolis, and of course, some artists had their won...I had my own etching press in the basement here. TOS: Yes. CH: And woodblock you can print with very little... TOS: Yes. CH: But we had a litho press and we had a man-operated... TOS: An artist wouldn't necessarily pull their own prints, they might have master printer, you say? CH: Yes, that's right... TOS: Do you know...do you recall who that was? CH: Well, Joe Roach, he's long dead.

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TOS: Yes. CH: Then there was another man afterwards had...forgotten his name...then we also did a lot of silk screen. That lent itself to making posters for public agencies and some artists made some...I made a few myself. George Beyer had charge of that, I think he's still living in Minneapolis. But George last time I saw him he was not in too good shape. Although he's about ten years younger than I. TOS: Did the artists get any copies, say if he did an edition of twenty-five, did he get some personally for himself? CH: Yes, we let him have a couple. TOS: Yeah. Yes, what about materials, say if somebody wanted a particular kind of paper, you got a problem in those days to ...? CH: Not, particularly...a good printing papers have been available through New York if...oh, heavens... TOS: I mean as far as getting the money to pay for it. CH: That...let me see if I recall just how we managed that...we had some funds for other than labor costs. and then the beneficiaries of any work would contribute. TOS: Yes. CH: So that we had a little bit of a kitty there to play with. So we bought our own paper and all the equipment. TOS: Yes. Did you have kinda' of an evaluation process? So that, say if...say in this case, Walter Ginther did a ...something like this...would he...? CH: You mean was there a supervisor...yes... TOS: Right. CH: Yes...Stan Fenelle (Stanford Fenelle) had charge of the easel paintings of the prints. Because, or course, some might try to get by with nothing...we had very...no problems that way. I think most of them were so delighted to have an outlet that we pretty generally got the best of their efforts. So, that was never a real consideration.

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TOS: Yes. CH: Naturally, some are more prolific than others. TOS: How do you...I know...I guess from what you said earlier, so far as the numbers of people employed, Minnesota had...at least when you started off...a project of 400 a lot more than other areas... CH: Yes. TOS: How do you think the work stacked up to other regions in the country? CH: Oh, I think very well, because we participated in the national shows. We had a show at the World's Fair, a project work that was...you see, the World's Fair, I think the first one was '39 and they ran it again...I think...we were in the 1940 and I got my butt in a sling over that, but good, because we had a limited number we could take, and how to chose them. And I got accused of being nasty, some one person...but I left that in Cahill's hands. [Laughter] Because I had learned at the State Fair that it's a tricky business. In fact all the years I was out there, every year this would happen: 'you want me next to so and so to humiliate me.' EK: Oh...[Laughter] TOS: Right. CH: That was unfailing. And I developed one answer, 'that's just what she says about you.' [Laughter] But, what else would you say? Yeah. TOS: Did anything...anything get rejected on the grounds of subject matter? Sensitive ah...subject. CH: No, not really...there were some problems in some parts of the country where a social comment got a little out of hand. But we had no such problems here. Syd Fossum came the closest, but things were not that strong. He got us into problems in other areas. You see, as I mentioned before the flyleaf of the procedures manual said, "to maintain and increase skills". The end point was, get them off of this and get them on their own. So, early in the program we worked out a time schedule, so that an artist could go to New York and back, to try to make a dealer contact. By staggering the work hours at the beginning of one period, the end of another, there would be a five day gap. And Glen Ranney went and he made a contact it didn't prove too fruitful, but...then Syd Fossum came one day to the office and said he wanted to go to New York and make the trip and I told him what to do. But he ignored it, went and signed his work slip as though he were in Minneapolis. So the FBI come in. And, we have a nice day in Gunner Nordby's court. Mr. Fossum was accused of trying to defraud the Government. Well, fortunately shortly before, the modern museum out of one of our national shows had picked one of Syd's and

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bought it. And he had a sufficient professional standing. And I had to admit that the amount of work turned in was more then commensurate with the sums was received. But it was nip and tuck. TOS: Hmmmm. CH: Then, after we got him off, the FBI were on my butt...So... TOS: Do you think...were the art projects more closely scrutinized than if he'd...a...been a stone mason or something? CH: The writer's project perhaps and the theatre even more...the theatre finally went out in many areas. Ah...you see that brings up a moot question. To what extent is government sponsorship desirable? Because it always means that some bureaucrat with a longer nose than judgement is going to stick it in. Now, the history of the beaux arts of France is very significant in that great names of the Nineteenth, early Twentieth Century French painting was not beaux arts - lover boys. TOS: Yes. CH: They were kicked out. So, you can't make artists conform. In fact, if you check the history of revolution whenever a dictator takes over, the creative people are the first to either get their butt out or they are shot. By nature we are nosey. I often told my students, you can depict only that which you comprehend. And comprehension is the result of scrutiny plus analysis. Why does it appear thusly? With that kind of a mind at work you're not going to find easy compliance. No, the...whole pattern of pay by the hour caused problems, but it was the only way in which our society seems able to pay the compensation. So that it had many angles that were rather ridiculous. Ah...none too serious...had one situation...at the very beginning we had central workshops, then as it developed we let the artist work at their own studio and bring their work in once a week or once in a fortnight, or whatever. Well, one day the time keeper came up to my desk at the Minnesota Building Office and he said, "I think you should know your friend, so and so, comes in late and tells everybody that if he only put in one hour he wouldn't be paid for what he knows." I said, "Wait a minute, he's not my friend, you're talking about arrogant little so and so?" A little frenchman whose father was brought over by the Lohman Company because the father was an ecclesiastical tailor and so became naturalized here...well, I said you let me know next time he pulls that crap and I'll come down to the workshop and sure enough a few days later, so I went down. I told them I come five minutes to twelve so as not to infringe on their lunch. And I held up an assignment slip and I said, "Now all of you here are old enough not to sign anything you don't read. Now this assignment slip is a contract between you and your Government by the terms of which you agree that you time is worth a $1.10 an hour. And that you may work not more than 100 hours a month. It says nothing about how few hours. Now, if any of you are so goddamn rich you don't need the full 100 hours, please tell me and get your butt out because I have a waiting list as long as my arm." And so this guy got a short check. Then he

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went storming to the advisory committee and I was a son of a bitch. His mother called me up, she said, "It's high time," she said, (unclear - french) he's just as stubborn as his father." [Laughter] So, in retrospect, I must confess I had a hell of a good time. TOS: Sounds that way. CH: But I better shut up or they'll collect amusement tax. [Laughter] TOS: Who's on that...who's on that advisory committee you mentioned? CH: Well, that was made up of people interested in the arts. The museum people and some from the school system. TOS: Like the equivalent of the board of trustees then? CH: Well, in a sense...ah...yes, because they had to give nominal approval and we had no problems there. Only in this instance where this one individual decided that he was being misused. Well, he was misusing us. Because in retrospect when we say in terms of dollar ten cents an hour it seems like nothing. And yet in those days, it did buy something. Right now every time I go to the grocery store it seems I buy the same, but I pay more. TOS: Yes. CH: It's very noticeable in the last six months. TOS: Yes. CH: And it's rather jolting. So, I don't know where we're heading. But, get to be as old as I am, you are forced to conclude that human behavior is never rational. If it ever should be, look out...we're another dimension. [Laughter] But, to revert back here, you see, the only people that were in opposition really, were those who hated the administration. TOS: Yes...the federal administration? CH: Yes. But because Roosevelt was not universally popular. But. without his quick moves we might have landed in a much worse position than we did. And I think the reason we are in the position we are in today is that some of those policies were carried out a little too long. It's a little different society. But, I remain to be convinced that the present administration is going at the reductions in the right way. Because it seems to me that the way to do it is to cut the inital expense, and that's the cost of the government. TOS: Yes.

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CH: You're never going to get anybody to cut their own salary. EK: Yes. TOS: Along with...of course, you know when we think about the art projects, we think about the artists and their works etc., but imagine you must have had some support staff, clerical people and a lot of paper work. CH: Oh, yes, of course...well, not too much. You know, we had...well I had a secretary, we had a time keeper and then we also had a carpenter who would make equipment we would not need. And what you'd call some maintenance workers and we did have a graduated pay scale. The professional wage was $1.10 and then there was skilled that was ninety and then intermediate, so that the various degrees of skills could be taken care of. And there was always presure to move one to another, but... TOS: How would an artist move from one to the other? CH: Well, by their skill...if they'd worked well enough so that what they turned but was enough better that it had been, why...it could be graded up. It happened in a few instances, but not many. TOS: Was that geared to the, say the media, say a muralist made more than an easel painter? CH: Oh no...well, say muralist, he would be the professional way, whereas maybe some advertising layout man who was limited would make what they called a...ah...wait a minute...there's a professional and then the skilled. So there was that variation. TOS: You mentioned assignment slips as I guess, part of the mechanism of producing work... CH: Well, you see in order to be eligible for employment you had to be in need. Which meant the equivalent of being on welfare. And, that was another area where at the outset, there was confusion, because many were too damn proud. I know one sculptor in Minneapolis who later moved to Denver, and he's dead now. He was literally starving but he wouldn't admit it to anybody. And I just went over one day and...(phone rings) Oh, let that... TOS: Do you want me to get that for you? CH: If you don't mind, yes. (time lapse) CH: Wes Kramer they're running a gallery, that's part of their business. (Kramer Gallery, St. Paul) TOS: Yes.

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CH: Now, where were we? TOS: Talking about assignment slips and that sort of thing. Is that how you... CH: Oh, yes. I was mentioning that in order to work on any of those programs the individual had to be in need. Ninety percent of the employment had to come from those in need, and ten percent could be appointed as supervisory or for other skills. For instance, like myself, I was to do the promotions, build the thing, go and get the thing going, so that was sort of the top of the heap. TOS: Did you get any time to paint? CH: Not very much...least of all when I got to Washington. Well, the upshot was that I knew from my work at the Fair that there were a lot of guys who never thought such a program would develop, so they signed themselves in at the welfare office, 'white collar'. And I spent a whole day in Ramsey County, in the office and in Hennepin and one in St. Louis County in Duluth, going through the cards. Because I knew a lot of the people from their exhibitions and things of that sort. And that's how I was able to build this number. Because when you sign yourself in as white collar, why that could be anything, other than ditch digging. So...now, if there were ever to be anything comparable it's hard to know...just there has been a program to assist the arts, but, I'm a bit vague as to how it reaches out to the individual artists. The performing groups seem to gain by it. I did see a form for the individual artist to fill out, but it was so complex that it would miss a lot of them. TOS: Yes. CH: Because... TOS: Was that not a problem in...? CH: Yeah...I know...well, it's ridiculous...it wasn't as bad then, because of course, there wasn't as much to be done. But, the idea that before you can get a fellowship and all, you have to have four years of this and so many years of that, well, if you've got all that you don't need it. The bottom line for the creative artist is that the less formal education he has the better off he is. Because he's supposed to mirror his response to the excitement of living. And not to copy what was done before. And, so I have little patience with these four-year art courses. Because the mechanics...the technique can be taught in six months if you are attentive. Because all that consists of is taking your raw material...your pigments, intermix them and annotate it carefully so that you know what in hell you got. But very few have the patience. I've done a fair amount of teaching, one of the few who had the patience has made himself a big reputation doing what I call trash, but it's brilliant, that's Leroy Neeman, you know, his sporting prints and things.

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TOS: Yes. CH: But he dug into his color analysis and he was a damn good student. He used to pick my brains 'till I'd just pfff! We'd go out sketching together and what have you. But the basic technique is something that can be learned very quickly if you're interested. If you're not, what are you doing there? TOS: Do you think the...the...the art projects helped train new techniques like print making techniques? CH: Yes, well, those were not new, none of them. TOS: I mean new to an artist. CH: Well, yes some of the...or course, they had to help many of us. See, I had the good fortune of being Paris trained. And there you got a hold of everything. Right now, if I could find a good litho printer that isn't too expensive...there is one in Minneapolis...this a...Vermillion Press(Vermillion Editions Ltd., Minneapolis)...but they charge a fortune. So...I don't think I'll be doing much of it then...because that's fifteen dollars a print, you'd invest a tremendous amount before you got anything back. And I'm too old to give a damn. No, I don't know what to say because a program such as we're reviewing here concentrated attention and effort. Now, it's pretty well scattered. And most of them, I can honestly say, were so delighted to have something to do that they turned out their very best. TOS: Hmmm...how was that received by a...oh, people like the Miss Quinlan's etc, did they kind of look down their nose at you? CH: Well, at first, but after a while they have to. It's just like I told you about the supervisor of art at the St. Paul schools saying, if she was sure they were great, great artists, she'd be for it. She couldn't make up her own mind whether they were or not... EK: She wanted to be told she had a Michelangelo. CH: You know...I don't want to sound critical or cruel but she irritated me so that I ...oh well... TOS: Just thinking...looking at...oh say the picture by Lynn Kepman, of the three girls kind of reminds me somebody like say, Peggy Bacon, or somebody like that...little better known. Did the people working on the projects have sort of those better known artists as a... CH: Well, they had access to the publications... TOS: Models...

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CH: And to exhibitions... TOS: Did the different states or regional centers circulate their work to other parts of the country? CH: Yes. See, there isn't too great a difference here. TOS: Yes. CH: No, we exhibits...in fact, we set up what we called art centers where there were classes held and exhibitions, and out of it in some areas, permanent things grew. I think Cedar Rapids...but that was started by Ed Rowan under a grant...forget where that came from...that was before WPA. And he set up that Cedar Rapids thing, and then Dan Defenbacher did something of the same in Greensboro, North Carolina. We later on had him on our program as a promotional person, because someone had to get out amongst the school people and the politicians who had public buildings under their control and point out what was available. TOS: Did you get much feedback from say teachers out in the schools? Much response on... CH: Oh yes...oh yes... TOS: How they... CH: They were by and large very interested. I can't complain there. There, I'm reminded...the post office murals, of course, were done ah...in..(oh, Lady's having a little trouble..ah..hair balls, serves her right...she'll come through it ("Lady" the cat was choking)). No...ha...not too long ago they were going to enlarge the Hastings post office. And somebody decided to rip out the mural, and I got wind of it and sicced one of the communities noisiest females on it. She is very history minded, and it stayed. Because I stirred up Hazel and I called her one evening and I said, "You know they are gonna' tear that mural out?" And she said, "What?" Pfsst. So naturally there isn't too much respect now along that line. One of the weirdest things that happened...the Round Tower at Fort Snelling, when General Hodges was in charge there. And then memorabilia of Snelling and his Lady were in cases around there. Then in 1960, under a Federal Grant, the Historical Society decided to restore the Round Tower to its state of origin. And I didn't hear anything about it, by the way. But Syd Fossum wrote the newspaper, said they were jack hammering the mural off because the mural was done on plaster. And Syd wrote and said, what's the point, because you can't bring back the Indians. And they...the freeway routing was such that the Round Tower is not too accessible today. TOS: Yes. CH: So, when it comes to things that are historic, then you are faced with the question, is one date of greater promise and value than another?

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EK: And how do you choose? CH: Exactly, because was the very original use terribly important? Yes. Was it important to chronicle a cultural event in the 1930s, that was put into the same place? So...oh well. I don't think they will ever settle some of those things fortunately. TOS: Yes. CH: Because, if human behavior weren't variable, we'd have nothing to talk about. [Laughter] I've often wondered what became of Kepman, he was such a...what you might call a scared little rabbit. You've known people who've...they even in their physical appearance...the only way I can describe it...they seem not to be completely emerged. And, they are always afraid they're not going to do the right thing. And they are always a little afraid...ah...I had a number of people on the program like that who...there was one...she finally did some murals in Stillwater...she was so afraid that things weren't good enough, just drive herself up the wall. So, and of course, a lot of those murals have disappeared. That one in Stillwater, they rebuilt the school there, ripped it out. So, nothing is forever. And a lot of these prints and easel pictures now, I don't know how the library happened to get hold of these...because they were originally allocated to the Board of Education. TOS: It wasn't really clear why they had them which is one reason why they wanted to... CH: Yes, and you're form the Historical Society, huh? TOS: Yes. CH: How's my friend Nina (Nina Archabal, Deputy Director, Minnesota Historical Society)? TOS: Oh, she's doing well, she's running around like crazy, as always... CH: She reminds me so much of a woman in New York who used to come down to the Washington office. Her husband was Phil McMahon who had some position as art history teacher and I think he wrote some books that were rather interesting. But Audrey...everything was always catastrophic...she'd come tearing into the office...ah...coat tails flying...and so, we dubbed her the 'tragic muse on the run' and Nina is pretty much like that. [Laughter] Ah...we did have another contingency in this thing, and that is employment quotas and that would cause some difficulties, as to who would be dropped or who wouldn't and...a...one time there was word of a quota drop and it was only four people out of the whole group and it wasn't going to be too difficult. But, one little guy who knew he was going to be dropped he thought it would be a huge joke if he wrote the names of four people that were very serious, and this one woman had a heart attack.

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EK: Oh no. CH: Fortunately, Mable Ulrich who had charge of the writers department who was also a medical doctor, had her office right next to mine, in the same building, so we were able to take care of it. And this little guy came in and he said, "Oh, gee I thought it was kind of a joke." I said, "Mike, you better think things through a little more." He was most apologetic, I said, "I shall say nothing to anybody and you just keep it to yourself, but for God's sake grow up." TOS: Another artist I was just kind of curios about, I don't have any of the prints here but Marvel Midtby, unusual name, was it a man or a woman? CH: A guy. Duluth. And somewhere I have a painting of his that is highly stylized and someday the Duluth Art Association or whatever should have it. But, they've been rather indifferent to it and I've kept it around, it isn't handy or I'd get it out. Because it was highly stylized so that you were aware of the curve and things and the aerial bridge and all, but it was not literal visual at all. My recollection is that he was pretty much of a loner. TOS: Yes. CH: But now would be in his sixties, anyway. Have you any of his work? TOS: Ah...two or three prints by him. Of Duluth industrial scenes. Bob Brown was an important figure in your league wasn't he? CH: Yes, he did a number of interesting things. Bob was one of those that...he didn't qualify financially. So he got a certain amount of work by assigning him part time, just as we did with Cam Booth(Cameron Booth) and some other people. Poor Bob is he hadn't been so addicted to the bottle he wouldn't have had the tragic end he did. He was found frozen to death...the back of his apartment, didn't quite make it. Yeah... TOS: Some of the well known Minnesota Artists don't appear in the WPA collection, people like Cameron Booth and Clara Maris, and so forth. Were they... CH: Yes...well they...Clara never qualified, she had her own money, not very much, but some. And Cam Booth had work with the University. I had a...got a few of his things...the which we used in exhibitions. But, I know the Department on Interior wanted some artist to go to Alaska and we sent Art Kerrick(Arthur Kerrick) up and Cam was very disappointed that he couldn't go because he couldn't qualify. Because he wasn't on...in need. TOS: Yes. CH: Too bad, Cam had such an unexpected end...not too long ago either.

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TOS: Last year? CH: Yes. I didn't see a great deal of him, but ah...he was partly responsible for my getting involved with the State Fair and lot of these things. Because the State Fair, one year had no Minnesota work at all. TOS: Yes. CH: And so, I had just gotten back from Europe and there was a lot of rumpus and the Fair Board called a dinner at the Lowry Hotel. And, that went very well...tell us what to do? So, I had acquired some years before, work with the State Arts Society for a very short period, and organized two exhibitions and that was the sum total of my experience. But Booth sort of pushed me forward into that. And I teased him years later he said, "Well, I knew you could do it." That, of course, was eye-opening. Because two days after the appointment I get the letter, you see the Fair Board operates this way...each department is under the nominal direction of a board member. Those days it was primarily because you'd have free passes and there'd be jobs to dish out and so on. So I had a letter from a man named Hibbing, "hire no help without consulting me." So, I thought wait a minute. So I wrote back, "I must have the authority to hire my own right hand." So I went to the Fair Board people and I said, "I don't know anybody, but do you know some gal who would be good as a clerk and a desk person?" Well, we opened for the public with a preview on s Thursday night and the previous week, we'd be receiving exhibits Wednesday and Thursday and Friday and Saturday would be judging days and then Sunday, Monday and Tuesday would be catalogue and the catalogue would be printed on Wednesday, ready for the Thursday night opening. So, I wrote this man in Hibbing what the schedule was. Well, we started receiving exhibits and she was there and I was there and I started pushing paintings all around the walls of this place and a couple of boys came along and said, "You got a job?" And I said, "You're damn right." So, we got things going and Tuesday of the opening week, Mr. McEachon and his mob appeared. And he said, "What's the meaning of this?" I said, "You got my letter, the meaning of this is as of right now, Mr. McEachon, you can take this whole goddamn thing and shove it you know where, I am through." And I waltzed out. And some hours later, I called the office and they said, "You made your point." And I got a case of Irish whiskey. And we worked things out, but now if I had been at all concerned for the job, I wouldn't have dared that, but I didn't do, I'd do it. But over the years, I had a lot of fun out at the Fair Grounds, there. OH boy. One time we...Amy Semple McPherson, does that name mean anything to you people? The Los Angeles Evangelist? TOS: Oh, yes. EK: Yes. CH: She had just come back from Paris...she had a black lace hat and gauntlets way up to her sleeves, black gloves. And the publicity man gave her some of this candy fluff...you know that pink stuff...and here she tried to be dignified with that. Then there was a great big painting of a

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man stretched out asleep and the woman seated next to him nursing a child and she admired that so much...of course, she expected us to give it to her... [Laughter] yes. TOS: I imagine the Fair would be a pretty...pretty important show case for a ...say a young artist getting... CH: Oh, they're very good...oh heavens yes. It still is, and fortunately it's got a nice new building...for years they were under the grandstand. They threatened to a...do that actually one of the last years I was there, and I fought like hell. Went to a meeting and one person there, just about the time that the Art Institute had gotten a painting from Herschel Jones for which he'd paid $125,000 a Titian and that's a long time ago. And...ah...WPA had arranged underneath the grandstand a series of walls from pillar to pillar so we had kind of a zigzag gallery, and it was on the ground floor where everybody could see it. Well, it went over so well that the Board thought they could rent the space and shove us up stairs. And they did after, because I went to Washington and the man that followed me, if I say so myself, he didn't know how to fight. Because I sat in on a board meeting and I said...somebody said something about, what is the value of art anyway? I said, "when you can take five dollars worth of raw material, paint, canvas and a brush, add a brain and produce something that four hundred years later earns $125,000, you've got something that not one Poland China sow nor progeny can duplicate." And we kept the gallery. EK: Yes, and later years it did get shoved further and further upstairs. CH: I know, and now they've got a place all their own, it's very nice now. EK: Yes, it is. CH: But...oh, well... TOS: Is that a...is that common in the areas around here, say in other states around here, the state fair was a good strong arts program? CH: The Iowa one has a pretty good one, I don't know about the rest. Wisconsin, I understand, has. Because, I must confess they all come about the same time of year and if you're running one you haven't got time to visit others. Actually, from the preparation time and all, you're pretty busy. I used to put in twelve hour days and not think anything of it, and then at one period, I even did lectures in the gallery. That was...they had Dudley Crafts Watson from the Milwaukee Art Institute come up and do lectures when Maurice Flagg and his wife ran the department(Flagg was Director of Minnesota State Art Society CA1915). That was before I was...got involved, in fact, in 1925 I sent a painting I did in North Africa, The Fig Tree, and it won first prize and made the family think that maybe I wasn't wasting my time. And then, it was right after the Flagg's left that this man who ran an antique shop took over and had no Minnesota work at all, I think that was about '29 or so. I took over there in '31. So...It sill is, I think the best place for young people

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to show their work, because it's right on the ground floor and it's in an area, the grounds, where it gets a lot of traffic. And even though not everyone who walks in there is primarily interested, just the fact they are passing by, something will click. They are aware that this is something that's done in the State. I'm all for it, because when you sequest your things in marble hall museums, you automatically intimidate some people. There are some who just hesitate to go in. I'm...I don't think I'm wrong in that. EK: Oh, no, I think you're right. TOS: I agree with you. CH: So that if the State Fairs have a very big role to play...and after all why not, it's one of the things that's being done. Of course, that brings up another thing. Once in a while you get some smart-aleck who tries to force something on you that is an affront. I had one guy one time, I won't mention his name, he's still around...who brought in a crucifixion and it looked more like a strung up turkey. It was a...sort...quasi abstract. And I said, "Nothing doing. We're not going to offend the Christian community. We're not here for that." "Now," I said, "if you want to show it on the street level somewhere, I will rent the space for you, but you'll sit with it." That stopped it. Because on the condition that you stay right there all day long and get the comments of the people. No, it was really quite outrageous. Now, it's one thing to dramatize a crucifixion a gory, it's been done, and they can be, but this thing, I can't describe it to you, other than to say it looked like a partially viscerated turkey and a cross beam there, and just strung out. TOS: Did you have difficulties with the prurient interests, at the Fair occasionally? CH: Not too much...one year I had a nude in the fountain...a standing figure and then Swanson had set a painting of a gal with a Japanese Robe half on and half off, sort of lolling on a loveseat and a preacher came in raising hell. And, I said, "Well, if you believe in the Good Book, it says God make man in his image and likeness, what are you criticizing God for?" "Well" he says, "that...what about that figure there?" "Well, she's standing up," he said, "that other one, people see that, they think they can sit around like that." "Well," I said, "of course, they can't sit around like that out in the park, at home is the only place they can, so what are you objecting to?" [Laughter] No, on that score, you can get into no ends of hassle. Because on one occasion when I was doing some lectures for the State Arts Society, we had a...a...slides and lectures written by experts and one was on Renaissance Art and I showed it, I think it was in Austin where this happened. There was a slide of Michelangelo's "Creation of Adam". And after the lecture a woman came up to me, "I understand you're going to show this lecture to the high school tomorrow afternoon." She said, "I hope you don't show them the picture of that man." I pretended dumb. [Laughter] And then she went on and on, I said, "Madam, if you believe in the Good Book, you know that man is created in the image and likeness of God, and if you remember your New Testament, I think it is very clearly stated that material things don't enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Now when you go to meet your Maker, you're not going to be wearing that silly hat you got on your head here tonight." [Laughter] That stopped it cold. When you get into

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public relations positions, if you haven't got a good lusty sense of humor you better quit, because...But I always found interesting, and I think my own work, whatever you may have seen of it, reflects it. I've always been interested in people and their vagaries. So, I'm surprised at nothing, I can be annoyed at many things, shocked at some, but surprised, no. Because each one...sometimes it's done to dramatize itself, sometimes just to any somebody else, but there's always the feeling that each one has all the answers. And, that's...you see I lived for forty-two years with a woman whose philosophy was briefly this: "You've got to forgive the poor humans because no one really knows what it's all about." And when you digest that...because I have a feeling that we're part of a continuum of life the reasons for which we just can't grasp. I know some individuals that are great believers in re-incarnation, I said, "well, possibly, it accounts for a Mozart or an Edison, but why probe. If that's it, so what." But then when you try to formalize and pin down you always make a mistake because it's too elusive. In spite of all our knowledge, we are quite limited. When you think what high magnification does. That reminds me, I don't know where this was printed, but in some magazine a thirty thousand magnification of the eye of a fly and on the rim there was a tiny, tiny creature. TOS: Hmmmm. EK: Ummmm. CH: That was a pacer, and I've often thought to myself, how fortunate we are that our eyes do not have magnification powers or we'd scare ourselves to death. [Laughter] Now these things are going to the Historical Society collection, then? TOS: Yes. CH: Uh hum. Well... TOS: I think we'll...well we will have a group of them on view at the building on Mississippi Street in a month or so. CH: Well, I'm please that you have them because I think our own little Minnesota Museum of Art has been rather delinquent in a ...what they are doing for the local artists. Because while I was very pleased and highly flattered by the show that the Society put on for me, basically that should have been the problems of the Minnesota Museum. They missed the boat and Mr. Toscano(James Toscano, Director of Minnesota Museum of Science) knew it because he came to the opening and implied as much. And Mr. Fridley(Russell Fridley, Director, Minnesota Historical Society) knew it too. [Laughter] EK: He smiled... TOS: Yes, I think gloat might be closer...[Laughter] Russ must have a good lusty sense of

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humor, he has to have, think of the number of times they've tried to throw the Kenningstone Rune Stone on his desk. [Laughter] Now, but that show they put on, good grief, that cost a plenty, the whole setting...I was overwhelmed...and, TOS: Well, you're a pretty important part of Minnesota history yourself now...a little aware, I think. CH: Well so it seems, according to Nina, yes. I suppose any of us who do one thing well and stick with it, that we do make a place automatically, And I often consider myself, I know this past winter, I said before with this pneumonia attack. I haven't...I'm still not feeling quite up...I think to myself now wait a minute...you haven't got arthritis, and your brains are reasonably functioning, now shut up...[Laughter] Because it...I see no reason shy, I'd just like to stick around a bit longer to see just how much crazier they can become in Washington and still hold together. When I worked down there we used to call it the District of Confusion. And that was well thought...they have a tendency to get out of touch with he world at large. It's...a...I guess that's true of any capital city. But, they have some marvelous galleries there now. The National, the Freer and a...ah...Duncan Phillips House...and the Meyers Textile Museum. I haven't been there since they put that addition on to the National and I don't know, from the pictures, I don't feel too good about it...plastering an absolutely different type of architecture on to another, practically. They did it down here at the Children's Hospital and I always thought it looked like hell. Oh, and they did it at Hastings at the courthouse. But...oh, well. TOS: Well, I think we're going to have to... CH: Well, this has been more than...I hope that I have been of some use to you. TOS: Yes. Definitely, and very enjoyable too. CH: Good. [End of interview]

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