"The Tree of Life," Hannah
Cohoon, 1854.
The Shakers' Private
Art
PITTSFIELD, MASS. - Hancock Shaker Village presents the first
major exhibition to explore the spiritual meaning and social
context of Shaker gift drawings, an inspired and little
understood body of drawings, largely created by women, that in
the middle decades of the Nineteenth Century captured on paper a
fervent outpouring of Shaker religious belief.
": The Shakers' Private Art" highlights Hancock Shaker Village's
own collection of gift drawings, which has not been seen as a
whole in over a decade. With fewer than 200 gift drawings extant
in public and private collections throughout the world, the
Hancock collection is notable for 25 drawings of exceptional
quality, range, and scale. In consideration of conservation
requirements, the village plans to exhibit these works-on-paper
only on a rotating basis following the nine-month-long showing of
"."
"Shakers disapproved of art, yet in the peak years of their
ministry produced a great legacy of elaborately rendered
drawings," says Lawrence J. Yerdon, director of Hancock Shaker
Village. "This seeming contradiction, as well as other aspects of
Shaker life, can now be explored in exhibition form at the
village, with the much anticipated opening of the $2.5 million
Center for Shaker Studies and its two fine new galleries."
The Center for Shaker Studies is made possible through major
grants from the Kresge Foundation, National Endowment for the
Humanities, Massachusetts Cultural Council, the Florence Gould
Foundation, the Fitzpatrick family, and other generous donors.
The center is the culmination of Hancock Shaker Village's $4.5
million Simple Gifts campaign. "" is funded in part by the
Massachusetts Foundation for the Humanities.
As the gift drawings in the Hancock collection were created by
women, "" aims to shed new light on the lives of the seven
"instruments" represented. While members of the United Society of
Believers in Christ's Second Appearing (as the Shakers called
themselves) strove for equality between the sexes, they followed
traditional and separate roles. The fruits of women's labor - in
the kitchen, laundry, and sewing room - did not have the same
longevity as did the furniture, woodenware, and architecture
produced by Shaker men.
"A Type of Mother Hannah's Pocket Handkerchief," Polly Jane
Reed, 1851.
Drawings were not part of daily life or the products of men's
work and most were kept privately by the Ministry. These drawings
were taken out of storage for special occasions and interpreted
as religious works. Shakers themselves destroyed many in the
later decades of the Nineteenth Century. For these and other
reasons, most major exhibitions of Shakers artifacts have tended
to focus on the products of men's work.
"Although gift drawings may look simple to the contemporary eye,
they emerged from complicated circumstances, and bore complex
meanings for the Shakers," says Sharon Duane Koomler, curator of
the collection. "Ironically, these are works that do not conform
to what we today may think Shaker 'should look like.'" She
continues, "The word Shaker has come to summon up the adjectives
'plain' and 'simple.' Yet gift drawings are colorful, bold, and
painstakingly ornamented, and reveal a variety of worldly
influences. One of our goals in this exhibition is to dispel the
notion that Shakers were untouched by outside American life."
Koomler points to fraktur, Masonic art, patterned textiles, fancy
embroidery, and even graveyard stone carvings as influences on
Shaker gift drawings. The pen-and-ink "spirit writings," "heart
blessings," and ink-and-watercolor drawings on view in the
exhibition show a dizzying array of symbols and motifs, from
trees, flowers, fruit, birds, hearts, and wreaths to angels,
crowns, palaces, trumpets, and lyres.
A highlight of the exhibition will be the most famous of all gift
drawings, Hannah Cohoon's boldly colored red and green fruit tree
entitled "Tree of Life" (1854). Reflective of the less familiar
works on view are two sacred sheets created by Semantha Fairbanks
in 1843. Fairbanks recorded the messages she received in "spirit
writing," setting them down in all directions on the page in
ornamental, even obsessive, flourishes of a flowing black and
blue monochrome script.
Exhibited for the first time in "" is a small blue pen-and-ink
drawing called "Dove with Rings" (no date) by an unidentified
instrument. The work was found tucked inside a Shaker song
manuscript donated to Hancock Shaker Village in 1978. As
testimony to a remarkable outpouring of the spirit, seven
heart-shaped, pen-and-ink paper cutouts by Polly Jane Reed will
be displayed. Reed received loving messages for many of her
brethren and sisters from Shakers who had gone on before, and
transcribed these blessings onto hearts for as many as 148
Shakers in 1844.
"A Little Basket Full of Beautiful Apples," Hannah Cohoon,
1856.
Providing a broader context for the gift drawings is a selection
of artifacts from Hancock's permanent collection of nearly 20,000
objects. These include hand drawn maps, landscape paintings, and
color drawings of village views - including a map of the Church
family's buildings and grounds at Hancock from 1820; a fine
12-foot trestle table made of cherry; and fancy embroidery, music
manuscripts, and examples of the special blue and white apparel
worn to worship meetings in the Nineteenth Century.
"The legacy of gift drawings emerged, flourished, and largely
disappeared in 25 years, the historical equivalent of a blink of
the eye. But it was no accident, for this period, from 1837 to
1860, was unique to Shaker history as a time of unparalleled
internal revival. Shakers themselves called these decades the
'period of Mother Ann's Work' or the 'New Era,'" explains Yerdon.
Marked by whirling trances, visions, and spirit possessions, this
period of spiritual awakening waxed a generation after the last
of the founding Shakers died. Succeeding generations, who had
never known the Shaker founder and visionary Mother Ann Lee
(1736-1784) welcomed this connection to their spiritual source.
The Shakers' New Era bequeathed another great cultural legacy
aside from gift drawings - that of Shaker gift songs, which
number in the tens of thousands.
": The Shakers' Private Art" is the inaugural exhibition in
Hancock Shaker Village's new $2.5 million facility, the Center
for Shaker Studies. The exhibition will be mounted in the
permanent gallery for gift drawings and the adjacent Beatrice O.
Chace Gallery for changing exhibitions.
Besides providing much needed exhibition space, the Center for
Shaker Studies also provides collections management space and the
Lawrence K. and Amy Bess Miller Library, a research library and
reading room housing some 10,000 primary and secondary materials
including original Shaker manuscripts, ephemera, photographs,
graphics, and maps. The new center will offer greatly expanded
amenities to the public, including an orientation theater
(showing videos closed captioned in English, French, Spanish,
Japanese, and German); an enlarged museum shop and restaurant;
and a group tour orientation area. Designed by Orcutt Association
of Yarmouth, Maine, the center expands the village's facilities
by nearly 20,000 square feet.
Hancock Shaker Village is a living history museum set in 1,200
acres of scenic woodland, fields, and meadow in the Berkshire
Hills. Comprising 20 Shaker buildings utilized by the Church
Family of the Hancock community from 1783 to 1960, the village
houses the largest collection of Shaker artifacts available to
the public at an original Shaker site. Some 20,000 objects, of
which half are displayed in the village's historic buildings,
include examples of furniture, personal items, textiles,
woodenware, baskets, and tools representative of every aspect of
Shaker life.
Through October 22, Hancock Shaker Village is open 9:30 am to
5 pm daily on a self-guided basis. From October 23 through late
May 2001, the village is open from 10 am to 3 pm daily for hourly
guided tours. For information, 800/817-1137.
