110 300
185
●
LOCKE, ALAIN.
Archive including correspondence and art from his col-
lection.
Group of 9 letters, 2 programs, a typed poem titled “The Wise” given to Locke
by the poet Countee Cullen, and four pastel and charcoal portraits by Esther Zoline, all
given to Maurice Russell by his mentor and lover Alain Locke. 14 x 10; 12 x 16; 20 x 16
and 23
1
⁄
2
x 17
1
⁄
2
inches respectively; all are handsomely framed, the first three identified with
a small typed note affixed to the reverse “given to me by Alain Locke” and dated 1952;
another small piece of paper bears Locke’s Greenwich Village address.
SHOULD BE SEEN
.
New York, circa late 1920’s to 1952
[8,000/12,000]
ALAIN LOCKE
(1885-1954),
PAINTER
,
ART HISTORIAN
,
EDUCATOR
,
PHILOSOPHER AND
ACKNOWLEDGED
“
DEAN
”
OF THE HARLEM RENAISSANCE
met Maurice Russell when Russell
was one of his students. The two became close, and later became lovers. The letters here are friendly;
Locke shows concern for Russell and his studies, and makes suggestions for books he should read,
encouraging him to do better at school. Locke was not at all well at this time and mentions a stay at
the Mayo Clinic. The typed poem “The Wise” signed and dedicated to Locke by Countee Cullen,
was titled “The Wise” for many reasons, but mostly because Locke was mentor to many of the
Harlem Renaissance figures.
The four portraits were given to Russell by Locke a couple of years before his passing. They depict key
African American women writers Zora Neale Hurston, Georgia Douglass Johnson, Jessie Redman
Faucet and possibly Dorothy West, all in the forefront of the Harlem Renaissance.