THOMAS EAKINS - AUTOGRAPH LETTER SIGNED 12/07/1886 - HFSID 348072

THOMAS EAKINS
Ten months after being dismissed from teaching for using a male model in a women's drawing class, the artist signed this handwritten letter explaining that requests for instructional casts must be addressed to the director who fired him
Autograph Letter Signed: "Thomas Eakins", 1¾ pages, 4½x8. Philadelphia, 1886 December 7. To Mr. Frank M. Cowles. The letter is placed on a smaller frame with a hinge, allowing for a plaque featuring the letter's full message in a plaque behind it. In Full: "Those casts of which you speak were made from my dissections at the Pennsylvania Acad. Of the Fine Arts while I was a professor there. I am no longer connected with the institution, so I would advise you to address Mr. Edward H. Coates who is chairman of the committee on Instruction. His address is 116 Chestnut St. Philadelphia. The old arrangement was that they should be furnished to any art student or art institution at cost price which varies somewhat. My remembrance is that the whole set came to about 11 or 12 dollars. My delay in answering your note was caused by a seeming possibility that I should have seen Mr. Coates myself, which however I did not find time to do." THOMAS EAKINS (1844-1916), one of the greatest realist painters of the 19th century as well as a sculptor and teacher, wrote this rare letter during a pivotal, troubling period in his life. Ten months earlier, he had resigned under duress as Director at the nationally recognized Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts in Philadelphia. His insistence upon using nude models for the study of anatomy led to increasing conflict with the conservative Academy and its Chairman of the Committee on Instruction, EDWARD M. COATES. Eakins, who had been named Professor in 1878, had included the dissection of animals and cadavers as part of his course work, often forming detailed casts of the more revealing aspects. The instructional casts were sometimes offered for use and sale to other art teachers and schools. To achieve more realistic results, however, Eakins abandoned the use of such casts for live anatomical study by 1882. When he removed the loincloth from a male model during a woman's drawing class, Chairman Coates demanded his resignation. Despite protests and the withdrawal of Academy students, the school stood firm, and the spurned Eakins became withdrawn, diverting his art to portraiture. His fascination with the human form of both sexes continued throughout his life, as shown in his work Lightly soiled. 2 pinhead-size holes beneath lower horizontal fold. Frame lightly chipped. Otherwise, fine condition. Framed to an overall size of 39¾x21½.