Jan Butterfield papers, 1950-1997

Recordings in this series are mostly interviews of artists conducted by Butterfield between 1971 and 1987. Also found are slide talks, class discussions, and lectures given by artists, which are assumed to have been recorded by Butterfield in most cases. Artists of the United States who are associated with the Light and Space movement in sculpture are highly represented, as well as artists of the new crafts movement and contemporary West Coast artists in particular. Also among the recordings are recorded performances by John Cage, Joe Goode, Newton and Helen Harrison, Jim Roche, and George Greene.

Butterfield's interviews were mainly conducted for specific writing projects, either for articles, reviews, published artist interviews, catalog essays, or books Butterfield was writing. Some interviews were conducted over the phone. Some recordings are editing sessions in which Butterfield consults with her subjects during the editing process for a specific article or interview to be published. Multiple, extensive interviews are found with artists Sam Francis and Robert Irwin. A few interviews conducted by others are found, including a radio interview of Henry Hopkins regarding the Clyfford Still bequest to SF Moma, interviews by Henry Hopkins of Joe Goode, Philip Guston (in a recording of a public Q&A), Walter Hopps (with Jan Butterfield), and possibly Milton Resnick, and an interview with Ursula Schneider conducted by Lorri Surrihan. A transcript is found for the interview by Henry Hopkins with Walter Hopps. Additional transcripts, usually highly edited from the recorded version, are found among the published interviews in the Writings series. Most of the lectures found in this series take place in Texas and California, including multiple lectures that took place at the Berkeley Art Museum, the Northwood Experimental Artists Institute in Dallas, Texas, and the San Francisco Art Institute. In all, the series contains 107 sound tape reels, 97 cassettes, and 1 videoreel.

Panel discussions include two notable recordings that Butterfield seems to have acquired from Milton Resnick during his solo exhibition at the Fort Worth Art Center in 1971. These include a 1959 appearance of Edward Dugmore and Milton Resnick at Southern Illinois State University, and a 1961 debate between Ad Reinhardt and Milton Resnick which later became known as "The Attack," held at "The Club" in New York City. Also found are recordings of a 1976 conference at UCLA entitled "Space and Place" which included talks by Lloyd Hamrol, Richard Serra, Robert Irwin, and others.

Interviews, lectures, and performances are filed in alphabetical order by their subject's name, and multiple recordings for a single subject are filed chronologically under his or her name. Recordings listed in this series are interviews conducted by Jan Butterfield unless otherwise indicated in the folder listing. Often physical tapes contained multiple recordings, and where an additional recording of a different subject is found on a single physical tape, it is noted with the main entry for that tape, and cross referenced under the additional artist's name alphabetically in the item list. Panel discussions are arranged chronologically at the end of the series.

Additional artist interviews conducted by Michael Karp in the early 1990s are found in the Pacific Enterprises files of series 3, Project files. Additional sound recordings are also found in the Waterfront Project files of series 3, the Lapis Press files of series 3, and in series 7, sound and video recordings.

This series contains handwritten and typewritten drafts, notes, research, correspondence, photographs of works of art, and other documentation related to Butterfield's book projects, articles, catalog essays, and publicity writings.

The most extensive project in this series is Butterfield's book , represented here in multiple drafts, galleys, photographs of works of art, editorial correspondence, records related to later exhibitions of the artists represented in the book, and records of an exhibition of artist portraits created for the book by the photographer James McHugh. Extensive files of photographs of works of art by the artists included in the book are also found in the photographs series. Note that the first two drafts in the series bear earlier titles, , and , but are the same work.

Book projects on the artists Fletcher Benton and Leonard Cutrow are also documented in this series in correspondence, business records, photographs of works of art, and scattered typescript and printout draft writings. Butterfield does not take an author credit for these projects, but she seems to have been involved in their editing and production to different degrees. A book on outdoor sculpture in San Francisco by Warren Radford is found in draft form and appears to have been edited by Butterfield. The draft is filed at the end of the series under "writings by others".

Articles by Butterfield found in this series are mostly in the form of typescript drafts, some hand-corrected. Photocopies of Butterfield's published articles are filed with Printed Materials. Articles about artists or galleries are arranged by the subject's name. Other articles are listed in the series by title.

Many of the files relating to catalog essays by Butterfield contain extensive documentation related to the artist subjects, including multiple drafts, photographs of works of art, and research gathered about the artist or subject matter in the form of printed materials, artist biographies and CVs from galleries, notes, and correspondence. The file for Richard Shaw also contains an interview transcript, presumably for the 1981 interview by Butterfield found In the Interviews series.

Some of Butterfield's work as a publicist for artists and galleries is filed under publicity writings, which include drafts of press releases, exhibition reviews, photographs of artwork, research, and occasionally correspondence with the artist. A large amount of material is found related to Peter Erskine's project "Secrets of the Sun" (1992) including two videocassettes (VHS). An additional videocassette (VHS) is found with publicity writings for the artist Anne Labirola.

Many of the writings are based on recorded interviews that can be found in series 1, Interviews and Lectures. A variety of material related to Butterfield's work on books published by Lapis Press is found in series 3, Project files, which also contains additional publicity writings by Butterfield. Extensive writings by others on the artist George Herms are found in series 4, Personal Business Records. Many of Butterfield's writings that appeared in print are found in series 5, Printed Materials. Additional photographs of works of art by the artists about whom Butterfield wrote are found in series 6, Photographs.

This series contains records relating to major projects overseen by Butterfield, including a catalog of artworks held by the corporation Pacific Enterprises, a cross-disciplinary project overseen by Butterfield at the San Francisco Art Institute called the Waterfront Project, and a publishing company for which Butterfield served as managing editor called Lapis Press.

The series is arranged as 3 subseries.

This series contains records relating to Butterfield's sale and appraisal of artworks, correspondence relating to her writing and publicity work for artists, other records relating to her career including detailed resumes, and a few personal records relating to her family, friends, finances and health. Also found is 1 sound cassette from Butterfield's answering machine containing incoming messages and some phone conversations from the early 1980s.

Correspondence files also contain many enclosures, including contracts, postcards, photographs of works of art, and printed materials. The file on the Los Angeles Cultural Affairs Commission contains extensive writings and other documentation relating to the sculptor George Herms, the subject of an exhibition at the municipal art gallery, Barnsdall Park.

A copy of the periodical , which has records in this series, is found in series 5, Printed Materials. Additional press releases are also foundin seris 5, Printed Materials.

This series contains articles published in magazines, newspapers, journals, and other art-related publications, as well as exhibition catalogs, posters, plans for installations and exhibition spaces, a disassembled scrapbook, and special print publications. Many of the articles and clippings exist in photocopy only.

Any printed material containing writings by Butterfield is filed at the beginning of the series under "Articles by Butterfield." A bound collection of article photocopies is found at the beginning of the series, followed by early articles Butterfield wrote for Texas papers between 1970-1972. Individual articles by Butterfield are then filed by artist's name, or by the title of the article if the subject was not a single artist. Clippings have a few files arranged by subject, but most clippings are filed chronologically. A few clippings files also contain press releases. Most of the articles are about specific artists, galleries, museums, and other art world stories. Exhibition catalogs are arranged alphabetically by artist or by exhibition title for group shows. Additional exhibition catalogs are found in the Writings series, among Butterfield's drafts of catalog essays and publicity writings. An exhibition program for Tony Labat is filed under "Articles by Butterfield."

Exhibition posters are for Ferus Gallery from 1963 and Robert Hudson at Moore College in 1978. Plans include two floor plans of installations by James Turrell, one axonometric view of an unidentified installation, and two elevation drawings of P.S.1 in Queens, New York. Publicity files are arranged by subject and contain multiple types of printed material such as press releases, clippings, exhibition catalogs, and announcements. Readings for "Issues in Contemporary Art" contains photocopied articles used by Butterfield to teach a college course of that name.

Special publications include magazines and other printed matter which Butterfield collected or contributed to, including two issues of the program for the Artists' Soapbox Derby at the San Francisco Museum of Art and a 1978 guide to art spaces published by the Los Angeles Institute of Contemporary Art.

Additional printed materials are found in series 2, Writings, series 3, Project files, and series 4, Personal Business Records.

This series contains photographs of Butterfield's friends, associates, and family, her travels to China and Greece, and her wedding to Henry Hopkins. Photographs of people include artists Philip Guston, Ed Kienholz, Henry Hopkins with Clyfford Still, Robert Irwin, Robert Rauschenberg, and a group photograph for the Los Angeles Magazine feature, "LA Art in the 1960s," the published version of which is found in series 5, Printed Materials. The bulk of this series consists of photographs of works of art, arranged by artist, with a few photographs of exhibitions at the end of the series.

Most of the photographs are either prints or slides, but some negatives and contact sheets are also found. Most are of unknown origin or were taken by others, except for the photographs of Philip Guston, and photographs of works of art by Michael Brewster, Ron Davis, Robert Irwin, and Ed Ruscha, which are credited Jan Butterfield.

Additional photographs are found in series 2, Writings, and series 3, Project Files.

This series contains 4 videocassettes (VHS) and 1 sound cassette with art-related recordings. Videos include (1992); (circa 1988), about a work of the same title by Peter Erskine; documentation of three multimedia installations by Judit Hersko including , , and , and a documentation of performances and experiments with light entitled by Seth Riskin (1987-1995). The sound cassette is an acoustiguide for the 1990 Edward Ruscha exhibition at the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art. A single unlabeled cassette containing what appears to be a band rehearsal is also found.

Most of the sound recordings in the collection are found in series 1, Interviews and Lectures. Additional audio recordings are found in series 3, Project Files. Additional video recordings are found in the Publicity subseries of series 2, Writings, and in the correspondence subseries of series 3, Personal Business Records.