Sharrer, Honoré Desmond, b. 1920

Illustrator, Muralist, Painter
Calif., N.Y., Charlottesville, Va. (Show Bio)

Honoré Sharrer papers, ca. 1927-2002

10.3 linear ft.

Biographical information; correspondence; photographs; writings and printed material regarding painter Honore Sharrer. Biographical information includes a chronology, résumés, and brief biographical statements. Correspondence includes letters from Lincoln Kirstein, George Tooker, Peter Blume, May Stevens, Gregory Gillespie, Betty Goodwin, Sharrer's husband Perez Zagorin, her son Adam, her daughter-in-law Mary Carpenter, and others; letters from Sharrer to her mother, artist Madelene Ellen Poland, her grandmother Honoré Sachs, and others; and correspondence with art galleries including the Forum Gallery, Inc., Terry Dintenfass, Inc., and M. Knoedler & Company. Photographs are of Sharrer, her family, friends, houses, and works of art.

Also included are two photographs of works of art by Lester Burbank Bridaham as well as photographs taken and collected by Sharrer as source material. Writings are about Sharrer and include a mock-up of an unpublished book "One White Christmas," written by Honoré Sachs and illustrated by Sharrer. Works of art include studies for paintings and illustrations and other preliminary drawings. Printed material includes newspaper clippings; notes and printed material on frames and painting materials; exhibition catalogs and announcements, including a copy (inscribed by Sharrer) of the catalog for Fourteen Americans, a show which was shown at the Museum of Modern Art in New York in 1946; clippings of published illustrations by Sharrer; and miscellany. Also included are two small paintbrushes (size 00 and 000) used by Sharrer in the 1990s, which are similar to ones she used to paint Tribute to the American Working People, her most well-known work. Also included is a small binder of information compiled by the artist's husband that lists all extant works by Sharrer belonging to him and his son, Adam Zagorin, as of December 6, 2007. The paintings and drawings in this collection will be donated and / or loaned to museums around the country.

Donated 2006 and 2007 by Perez Zagorin, Sharrer's husband.

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