Eric Sloane enjoyed showing how he trained his dog “Spooky” to run on a dog mill to power a butter churn. Here Sloane is relaxing a bit at the dedication ceremonies of the Sloane-Stanley Museum and Kent Iron Furnace on Wednesday, May 28, 1969. From Wil Mauch’s newly published “Symbols of American Spirit : 50 Years of the Eric Sloane Museum”. We will be posting some history of the museum and how it came to be, leading up to the July 2, 2022 celebration to be held on the grounds of the Eric Sloane Museum in Kent.
A broadaxe to even symbolically cut down a tree? Eric Sloane should have known better! From left to right: Connecticut State Senator John A. Minetto, Don Davis, CEO of Stanley, Lt. Gov. Attilio R. Frassinelli, and Eric Sloane. Taken on 7 August 1968 during the groundbreaking ceremony for the soon-to-be-constructed Sloane-Stanley Museum of Kent, Connecticut.
From @wilmauch ‘s newly published “Symbols of American Spirit : 50 Years of the Eric Sloane Museum”. We will be posting some history of the museum and how it came to be, leading up to the July 2, 2022 celebration to be held on the grounds of the Eric Sloane Museum in Kent.
The Green Door, by Eric Sloane, N.A. Last one of these we have at Weather Hill. A scarce print struck in commemoration of the 1976 American Bicentennial, part of the I Remember America collection of paintings by the artist. This collection traveled to the former Soviet Union for exhibition. You can see that Eric was a master of interpreting light, color and shadow as they related to season and time. Not an easy thing to capture so convincingly as he does. As is often the case in paintings by the artist, there is a solidity and developed sense of security in the materials depicted and methods of construction. Eric saw continuity, solidity, a certain vernacular grace and artistry, and peace in much of his rural America. Here is Eric’s description of the piece, recorded in 1976:
“A door opening to outside summer is always a framed greeting. This door, a mate to the painting No. 1, was in the same stone barn and was built of horizontal and vertical slabs of virgin pine, ‘deadened’ together with hand-wrought nails. ‘Dutch doors’ were designed to keep out animals, but the effect of the top half being open and the bottom shut, transforms the door into a window. Like the barns they were attached to, they should be called German rather than Dutch; the man who made this barn and its door was named Ludwig Wiess; his initials and date he arrived from Germany – 1746 – were carved into the other side.”
53 Years ago this month, the Sloane-Stanley Museum opened it’s doors to the public. We will continue to post some history of the museum and how it came to be, leading up to the July 2, 2022 celebration to be held on the grounds of the Eric Sloane Museum in Kent. Eric Hatch, Chairman of the Connecticut Historic Commission, and 5 year old John Hopson Nisbet II, during the dedication ceremony of the Sloane-Stanley Museum (as it was then called) on 28 May 1969. Photo from Wil Mauch’s “Symbols of American Spirit: 50 Years of the Eric Sloane Museum”.
53 Years ago today, Eric Sloane welcomed a large crowd to the dedication ceremonies of (what was then called) The Sloane-Stanley Museum and Kent Iron Furnace on Wednesday, May 28, 1969. We will be posting some history of the museum and how it came to be, leading up to the July 2, 2022 celebration to be held on the grounds of the Eric Sloane Museum in Kent.
“Clouds, so to say, were indigenous to my soul. I did not begin to notice them. I did not learn to love them. I have always loved them.” – William A. Quayle
I used the quote above, with permission, in my new book “Ellie and the Clouds”. Quayle’s “A Book of Clouds” was a stunning revelation to me.
Invitation for the dedication of the Eric Sloane studio wing, 23 May 1986. The first paragraph is a quote pulled from Eric’s 1969 dedication speech for the opening of the (then called) Sloane-Stanley Museum of Kent, Connecticut. From the collection of@wilmauch. Learn more about how the Friends of the Eric Sloane Museum supports and promotes the legacy of Eric Sloane through a robust partnership with the Eric Sloane Museum by visiting us at www.friendsoftheericsloanemuseum.org.
From@wilmauch: “Here is a fantastic postcard that features an illustration by Eric Sloane, N.A. sent to me by my good friend and fellow Sloane enthusiast Randy Castellini. You can see that the illustration mimics the type of illustrations that Eric was creating for air fields like Roosevelt Field and Newark Airport. The postmark on the verso of 1940 confirms what we have suspected is the era of these maps. Recall that it was at the Roosevelt Field Inn where Eric Sloane hung one of his first cloudscapes, to which a friend asked him, ‘Who is going to buy a large painting of just the clouds?’ – Sloane had the last laugh, as it was Amelia Earhart who purchased the painting.” Learn more about how the Friends of the Eric Sloane Museum supports and promotes the legacy of Eric Sloane through a robust partnership with the Eric Sloane Museum by visiting us at www.friendsoftheericsloanemuseum.org.
Eric Sloane painted this stunning cloudscape mural in the office of the President of Morton Salt, 1958. Photo courtesy of Wil Mauch, from his biography of Eric Sloane. Learn more about how the Friends of the Eric Sloane Museum supports and promotes the legacy of Eric Sloane through a robust partnership with the Eric Sloane Museum by visiting us at www.friendsoftheericsloanemuseum.org
