Guide to the Saidie A. May Papers, ca. 1880 - 2002, bulk 1924 - 1972
MS.4

 Series 1. Art Collection   (.42 linear feet, 1 box).

Scope and Contents note

Series 1, Art Collection, contains correspondence, lists, notes, research materials and other documents relating to Mrs. May's art collections. The Baltimore Museum of Art staff created a significant portion of this material after Mrs. May's death.

The Bequest subseries contains copies of Mrs. May's will, correspondence between the executors of her estate and the BMA, and several lists of items in the bequest.

The Members' Room for Modern Art subseries consists of materials relating to the planning and opening of the room in 1941. It contains a copy of the blueprints for the room, a few receipts for decorations, the Board of Trustees' recommendations for the room, and copies of the transcription of André Masson's talk, "Origines du Cubisme et du Surréalisme," given at the opening. An exhibition checklist from a 1947 exhibition in the room is also included.

The Saidie A. May Young People's Art Center subseries contains photocopies of transcripts of the speeches given at the opening of this room in 1950. Speakers included Bartlett Hayes, J. G. D. Paul, and Philip B. Perlman. The location of the original transcripts is unknown.

The Research for 1972 Catalog subseries contains notes, drafts and correspondence relating to the 1972 publication, Saidie A. May Collection. The correspondence includes letters to friends and acquaintances of Mrs. May such as Theodore Schempp, Alfred Jensen, and Daniel Henry Kahnweiler regarding biographical information needed for the catalog's essay. Jensen's reply is notable in that it describes the circumstances surrounding the purchases of several pieces in her collection, talks about where he met Mrs. May, her friendships with several other artists, and her interest in Surrealism.

The Lists of Gifts and Loans subseries contains receipts from the BMA to Mrs. May for items she donated or loaned and Mrs. May's lists of items she gave. Her notations about purchase dates, prices, and sources can be found on many of the lists made during her lifetime. A small amount of correspondence is attached to the receipt for Mrs. May's gift of Emmanuel Vaviano's Fish construction relating to its damage in transit. The subseries also contains a chronology of May Collection loans dating to around 1933. Other lists of art purchases can be found in the Financial Papers series.

The Exhibitions subseries contains a detailed forty-page list of the objects in an exhibition of the May Collection, probably in September 1940 as well as a draft of the labels for the drawings in the 1950 exhibition of the collection.

The Objects subseries contains material about specific objects in the May Collection. Much of it was created by BMA staff. The Jewelry folder contains note cards and copies of Registrar's Office file cards for jewelry in the Collection. The Vase Carpet folder contains correspondence relating to Mrs. May's purchase of an Ispahan rug for the Renaissance Room and its display at the museum. The material relating to the Renaissance Room includes evaluations by various experts about the quality of the objects in this area of the collection, suggestions for the "improvement" of the room, tracings of the stained glass windows, lists of labels, and label copy. The Reference Queries and Notes folder contains miscellaneous notes about objects in the collection such as the gates to the May Gallery.

The Clippings subseries contains photocopies of clippings from newspapers and magazines relating to Mrs. May's donations and exhibitions of works from her collection. Most date from the 1930's and 1940's and come from the Baltimore Sun, though a few have no information about the source. The location of the originals is unknown.

 Series 2. Financial Papers   (.42 linear feet, 1 box)

Scope and Contents note

Series 2, Financial Papers, contains documentation relating to Mrs. May's art purchases from 1919 until her death. A large part of the material consists of receipts and invoices from art dealers. This material is first divided into American Museums and Galleries and Foreign Galleries. Those dealers from whom Mrs. May purchased numerous items are filed separately. A few general receipts for book purchases are filed at the end of the subseries.

Cancelled checks that were found attached to invoices or correspondence have been retained with them rather than in the Cancelled Checks and Check Register Pages subseries. Mrs. May's notes (often unrelated) can be found on the reverse of some of the items in this series.

Three check register pages and a list of art purchases from 1941 were found in the Art of Africa, Asia and the Pacific Islands Department files in 2010 and were added at the end of the Financial Papers series.

 Series 3. Correspondence   (.63 linear feet, 2 boxes)

Scope and Contents note

Series 3, Correspondence, contains correspondence between Mrs. May and various museums, galleries and artists mostly relating to her purchases of artworks and their exhibition and donation to museums. A large amount of the correspondence relates to Mrs. May's dealings with the Baltimore Museum of Art, particularly her donations of the Renaissance Room and the Members' Room for Modern Art and the particulars of their installations. Because of Mrs. May's great interest and involvement in the BMA, these letters also provide information about exhibits, lectures and other events unrelated to her collection. They also illuminate Mrs. May's interests, activities, health, and aspects of her personality. Duplicate copies of all the correspondence relating to the Renaissance Room are filed at the end of the BMA correspondence in date order.

The correspondence between Mrs. May and André Masson, though not extensive, is important for its evidence of the relationship between them. In particular, there are several letters from Masson to Mrs. May about her assisting him and his family in leaving the dangers of France during World War II to come to America. Masson also wrote to her about his work on paintings, books and other publications and discussed the sale of some of them.

The majority of the Museum of Modern Art correspondence consists of photocopies of correspondence held by the Archives at MoMA. For further information about this material, contact MoMA.

The correspondence to BMA Curator Gertrude Rosenthal contains letters from Mrs. May that tend to include more personal information than those written to other staff members at the BMA because she and Rosenthal had a friendship that went beyond their working relationship. A few letters from Alfred Jensen after Mrs. May's death and her obituary are included. The folder also contains a "memory portrait" found by Gertrude Rosenthal among her papers that is titled "To a Memory Portrait by A. J." The envelope is addressed to Mrs. May and A.J., presumably, Alfred Jensen.

The material from the Pierre Matisse Gallery consists of transcriptions of letters to and from Mrs. May in the 1940's that are held by the Pierre Matisse Gallery Archives at the Morgan Library in New York. Eric Zafran, curator at the Wadsworth Athenaeum, created the transcriptions in the course of his research for the 2002 exhibition, "Impressionism to Surrealism: Selections from the Collections of Dr. Claribel and Etta Cone, Saidie Adler May, and Blanche Adler." For further information about this material, contact the Morgan Library.

Where invoices or receipts were enclosed with letters, they have been retained in this series rather than the financial papers series.

 Series 4. Photographs   (.42 linear feet, 1 box)

Scope and Contents note

Series 4, Photographs, contains photographs of works in Mrs. May's collection, several of the rooms she donated to the BMA, artists, and Mrs. May herself.

Notable are the photographs of Mallorca, which according to the documentation found with them, were photographed by Mrs. May. Several photographs have notations in pencil about the location on the reverse. The images show the landscape and people around the Mediterranean island.

Also significant are the photographs of the Renaissance Room, some of which are marked with information from the auction of William Randolph Hearst property at which Mrs. May bought the room. Other photographs in the folder are of the room as installed in the museum. Mrs. May's notations are on the back of some, detailing the objects pictured and where they were acquired.

 Series 5. Paintings 

Scope and Contents note

Series 5, Paintings, contains three copies by Mrs. May of paintings in the Louvre. The material came to the Archives from the Registrar's Office rolled, sealed in plastic and placed in boxes. To prevent any possible damage, the plastic was not opened at the time of processing to verify any of the information on the labels. Several other paintings by Mrs. May are in the art collection of the Baltimore Museum of Art.

 Series 6. Ephemera 

Scope and Contents

Series 6, Ephemera, contains Saidie May's suitcase used for travel to Spain, France, and Chile, probably in the 1920s and 1930s.