Caroline Speare Rohland

Caroline Speare Rohland
circa 1930
Born Caroline Melvina Speare
(1885-04-15)April 15, 1885
Chelsea, Suffolk County, Massachusetts
Died June 12, 1964(1964-06-12) (aged 79)
New York City, New York
Nationality American
Occupation artist
Years active 1915-1995
Known for pastels of the Southern United States

Caroline Speare Rohland (April 15, 1885 – June 12, 1964) was an American artist and muralist who created three post office murals, as part of the art projects for the New Deal's Section of Painting and Sculpture. In addition to the three murals, Rohland has works in the permanent collections of the Library of Congress, The Honolulu Academy of Art, the New Mexico Museum of Art and the Whitney Museum of American Art.

Early life

Caroline Melvina Speare was born on April 15, 1885 in Chelsea, Suffolk County, Massachusetts to Edith (née Burgess) and Lewis Robinson Speare.[1][2][Notes 1] She studied at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts and then at the Art Students League of New York[5][4] under the instruction of John Sloan and Kenneth Hayes Miller.[6] Then she studied with Andrew Dasburg, before making her way to the artists' community of Woodstock, New York. In 1915, she met and married fellow art student Paul Rohland, with whom she moved to a nearby community of artists known as "The Maverick", founded by Hervey White.[5][4]

Career

From 1927, Rohland exhibited at the Whitney Studio Club, the precursor to the museum. In that year, she was part of a three-woman show which included Gertrude Tiemer and Georgina Klitgaard and which ran for nearly three weeks.[7] In 1929, she and her husband both participated in a circus-themed exhibition in New York City, timed to correspond with a Barnum and Bailey show[8] and the following year, she Rosella Hartman and the Croatian sculptor, Dujam Penić were featured at the Whitney Gallery.[9] From the opening of the Whitney Museum of American Art in 1931, Rohland was a fixture, appearing in biennial shows until 1942. She was most known for her pastels, which had both contemporary style and sensual surfaces, often dealing with southern themes.[6][10]

In the 1930s, Rohland was hired as one of the Works Progress Administration (WPA) artists. She painted idealized southern scenes,[11] such as the 1939 portrayal of Cotton Pickers installed in the post office of Bunkie, Louisiana.[12] In 1941, she painted Spring for the post office in Sylvania, Georgia. The scene was of a farm family and a field hand carrying out daily labors on the farm. Though many locals, black and whites alike appreciated the painting, in the 1980s, the local NAACP chapter had the painting removed as being insensitive in its depiction of the African-American farm hand. In 1995, the canvas was found wadded up in a closet of the post office and was restored. It is now in the permanent collection of Georgia Southern University on loan from the federal government.[13][14] In 1942, Rohland won the commission to paint the post office mural for Fulton, New York. Father LeMoyne Trying to Convert the Indians on Pathfinder Island was an oil on canvas depicting another typical WPA theme, Native Americans interacting with Europeans. The post office was placed on the National Register of Historic Places for Oswego County, New York in 1989.[15][16]

When the WPA project ended around 1943, the Rohlands moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico.[17] She continued to have success and was selected in 1943 for an exhibit at the Museum of Fine Arts with her traditional southern themes.[18] In 1944, her water color Modern Death was chosen to be in the 55th annual exhibit at the Chicago Art Institute, her pastel Oh, What a Beautiful Morning was chosen for the Santa Fe Art Museum and she had several paintings in the permanent collection of the Whitney.[19] A collection of a variety of her works, including oils, pastels and water colors were featured at the Santa Fe Fine Arts Museum in 1945.[20] Both she and her husband participated in the 1945 Fiesta Art Exhibit of Santa Fe[21] and that same year her works were included in a showing at the Johnson-Humrickhouse Museum, which had selected them from a 1943 Library of Congress Exhibit.[22]

Rohland's husband died in 1949, and the following year, she returned to the Woodstock artists colony.[23][24] By the late 1950s, she had expanded into photography and participated in a showing at the Woodstock Gallery in 1959, featuring photographic works.[25]

Death and legacy

Rohland died June 12, 1964 at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City after a lengthy illness.[26] Rohland has works in the permanent collections of the Library of Congress in Washington, D. C., the Honolulu Academy of Art, the New Mexico Museum of Art in Santa Fe and the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City.[4]

Notes

  1. ↑ Some sources give the birth date of April 20, 1885 in Boston,[3][4] but the birth record confirms April 15th in Chelsea.[1]

References

Citations

Bibliography

  • Clough, F. G. (April 11, 1929). "Woodstockers in Gotham Circus". Kingston, New York: The Daily Freeman. p. 9. Retrieved 10 March 2017 – via Newspapers.com.
  • Fogel, Jared A.; Stevens, Robert L. (Fall 2001). "The Canvas Mirror: Painting as Politics in the New Deal". OAH Magazine of History. Oxford, England: Organization of American Historians by Oxford University Press. 16 (1): 17–25. ISSN 0882-228X. JSTOR 25163482.
  • Hughes, Edan Milton (2002). Artists in California, 1786-1940: L-Z. Sacramento, California: Crocker Art Museum. OCLC 679898223.
  • Kiehl, David W. (1997). Between the wars: women artists of the Whitney Studio Club and Museum. New York City, New York: Whitney Museum of American Art. OCLC 224832667.
  • Larson, Dorothy Jane (September 8, 1945). "Society-Clubs". Santa Fe, New Mexico: The Santa Fe New Mexican. p. 2. Retrieved 11 March 2017 – via Newspaperarchive.com.
  • Lowe, John (2005). Bridging Southern Cultures: An Interdisciplinary Approach. Baton Rouge, Louisiana: Louisiana State University Press. ISBN 978-0-8071-3031-5.
  • Tiano, Lisa (September 21, 1959). "Outstanding Photographic Exhibition at The Gallery". Kingston, New York: The Daily Freeman. p. 11. Retrieved 11 March 2017 – via Newspapers.com.
  • "Boston passenger lists, 1891-1943". FamilySearch. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration. November 27, 1903. NARA Series T843, Roll 68. Retrieved 10 March 2017.
  • "Caroline Rohland in Chicago Art Exhibit". Santa Fe, New Mexico: The Santa Fe New Mexican. June 9, 1944. p. 4. Retrieved 11 March 2017 – via Newspaperarchive.com.
  • "Caroline Speare Rohland". The Annex Galleries. Santa Rosa, California. 2015. Archived from the original on April 9, 2016. Retrieved 10 March 2017.
  • "City of Chelsea, Massachusetts Births, 1841-1915: Carolina Melvina Spear". FamilySearch. Boston, Massachusetts: Massachusetts Archives. April 15, 1885. p. 261. Retrieved 10 March 2017.
  • "Ellis Paints Magnificently Landscape of the Mexicos; Other Exhibits at Art Museums by Bakos, Rohland". Santa Fe, New Mexico: The Santa Fe New Mexican. July 17, 1943. p. 3. Retrieved 11 March 2017 – via Newspaperarchive.com.
  • Exhibition of Paintings by Gertrude Tiemer, Caroline Speare Rohland and Georgina Klitgaard (Report). New York City, New York: The Whitney Studio Club. January 7, 1928 – via New York Heritage digital collections.
  • "Fiesta Art Exhibit". Santa Fe, New Mexico: The Santa Fe New Mexican. August 31, 1945. p. 13. Retrieved 11 March 2017 – via Newspaperarchive.com.
  • "In the Colony". Santa Fe, New Mexico: The Santa Fe New Mexican. June 19, 1943. p. 3. Retrieved 11 March 2017 – via Newspaperarchive.com.
  • "Mrs. Caroline Spears Rohland". Kingston, New York: The Daily Freeman. December 31, 1964. p. 18. Retrieved 10 March 2017 – via Newspapers.com.
  • "Museum Finds Art Treasure Close to Home—in a Closet". Cedar Rapids, Iowa: The Gazette. October 22, 1995. p. 208. Retrieved 11 March 2017 – via Newspaperarchive.com.
  • "National Register of Historic Places Inventory-Nomination Form: Historic United States Post Offices in New York State: 1858 to 1943" (PDF). Washington, D. C.: National Park Service. October 5, 1988. Retrieved 11 March 2017. PDF only viewable with the edge browser.
  • "New Exhibit of Prints on Display at Museum". Coshocton, Ohio: The Coshocton Tribune. January 15, 1945. p. 61. Retrieved 11 March 2017 – via Newspapers.com.
  • "Paintings by Caroline Speare Rohland". Brooklyn, New York: The Brooklyn Daily Eagle. February 16, 1930. p. 61. Retrieved 11 March 2017 – via Newspapers.com.
  • "Paul Rohland (1884-1949)". The Annex Galleries. Scottsdale, Arizona. 2015. Archived from the original on March 10, 2017. Retrieved 10 March 2017.
  • "Post Office Mural–Fulton, NY". The Living New Deal. Berkeley, California: Department of Geography, University of California. 2010. Retrieved 11 March 2017.
  • "Recent News of Woodstock". Kingston, New York: The Daily Freeman. December 24, 1931. p. 3. Retrieved 11 March 2017 – via Newspapers.com.
  • "Rohland's Work Opens in Post-Season Show". Kingston, New York: The Daily Freeman. September 14, 1950. p. 19. Retrieved 11 March 2017 – via Newspapers.com.
  • "Sales are Announced". Kingston, New York: The Daily Freeman. August 21, 1950. p. 12. Retrieved 11 March 2017 – via Newspapers.com.
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