Dec 01, 2011 - Sale 2263

Sale 2263 - Lot 60

Unsold
Estimate: $ 800 - $ 1,200
(ART.) Archive of artist Percy Ives's extramarital correspondence. Approximately 46 letters from Ives to Blanche Dewey (several of them more than twenty pages) and several pages of partial letters, dated 1901 to 1904 or undated, various sizes and conditions, some soiled, a few with minor dampstaining; with related papers. Detroit, MI, 1887-1924 and undated
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Additional Details

Percival Seaman Ives (1864-1928) was a successful American portrait artist who spent most of his career in Detroit. While married to Elise Caron, he wrote this long series passionate letters to Michigan divorcée Blanche Dewey from 1901 to 1904. A typical letter begins "Dear Blanche, everlasting type of the eternal feminine, strong and seductive, I would write of all things carnal, of lust omnipotent." Ives only rarely alludes to the illicit nature of their affair, as in this 18 January 1901 letter: "We do not live openly as lovers. This is a source of pain that does not grow less with time, but aggravates even more each day." Ives also discusses his commissions and his work, as in this undated letter: "I worked until eleven and then went to the Art Museum to talk with Griffith about the proposed Trustee portrait. The thing is definite enough so that I will begin a composition. . . . This is the biggest opportunity that has come my way."
Also included in this lot are 7 letters to Blanche from her second husband, an affluent physician named George W. Augustin, all dated 1924; and 3 notebooks kept by Ives in England in 1887 while researching the Druids. These papers were all purchased many years ago from the contents of the Augustin homestead in Laurens, NY.