HENRY CLEWS, JR. 1876-1937 born April 23, 1876, New York City, USA |
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Henry Clews Jr. was born April 23rd, 1876 in New York City, the son of Henry Clews and of Lucy Madison Worthington of Kentucky.
The childhood of Henry Clews Jr was spent in New York City and in Newport, R.I. His early education was obtained at Cutler's School, Westminster School, and Groton. He graduated from Amherest College in 1889, attended Columbia University and went abroad to study at the Universities of Lausanne and Hannover.
"Upon his return to New York he entered his father's banking firm, but after several months decided against banking as a profession and embarked forthwith upon his career as a self-taught painter and sculptor. For the next few years Clews divided his time between his studios in Montmartre and East 19th Street, New York." - Exhibition of Sculpture by Henry Clews, Jr., The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1939
Between the years 1903 and 1914, seven exhibitions of Clews paintings and sculptures were held in New York City. "An instinctive sense of form, unsatisfied by painting, led Clews to try his hand at sculpture. Still working quite alone, in a Montmatre studio in Paris he produced enough pieces to show at New York in 1909. There were small heads in marble and bronze, some of them, such as The Absinthe Drinker, studies of types rather than true portraits." - Henry Clews, Jr. Sculptor by Beatrice Gilman Proske; Brookgreen, S.C., 1953
From 1914 on, except for occasional visits to America, Clews spent the remainder of his life abroad. "During the First World War Clews stayed in Paris, living first in a studio on the Rue Hégésippe Mareau, Montmartre, then in the house that had formerly belonged to the French sculptor Bartholdi on the Rue d'Assas. In these terrible years his experience of suffering humanity and his disgust with those who made capital of war and its victims so distressed htis spirit that he decided to find a quiter atmosphere in which to live. A first marriage had ended in divorce, but in his second wife, Marie Elsie Whelen, he found an understanding companion who surrounded him with a climate favorable to the growth of his genius." - Henry Clews, Jr. Sculptor by Beatrice Gilman Proske
In 1918 Henry Clews bought a medieval fortress located on a promontory overlooking the Cote D'Azur, just west of Cannes, in Southern France. The castle, originally erected by the Villeneuve family during the fourteenth century, was destroyed and rebuilt eight times before its purchase by the Clews. They rebuilt the two ancient towers, dating to the Roman and Saracen periods; replaced the modern house by one more in keeping with the older structure; and designed the gatehouse, cloister, portals and terraces to reflect Clews‘ eclectic, neo-medieval fancy. Marie Clews created four acres of walled formal gardens, which separate the Château from the village of La Napoule.
The Château de la Napoule remained Clews' home and studio until his death in 1937. "In this refuge the sculptor devoted himself rigorously to the exposition of his concepts, both in words and in sculpture. Locked in his studio, he spent the morning writing and the afternoon modeling and directing the work of his stonecutters. . . for relaxation there were the beautiful gardens panned by his wife, enlivened by white pigeons and peacocks, swans, and a marabou.">
In 1923, Clews published his only book, Mumbo Jumbo, (Boni and Liveright, N.Y. 1923) - a satirical drama with anti-semitic overtones.
Henry Clews, Jr. died on July 28, 1937 and was buried in an ancient tower of The Château de La Napoule.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art organized an exhibition of 29 sculptures by Clews from May 8 through August 27, 1939 - the first exhibition of his work since 1914. See the following articles/reviews of this exhibition:
La Napoule Art Foundation
The La Napoule Art Foundation (Association d'Art de La Napoule in France) is recognized as a not-for-profit organization sponsoring international, multidisciplinary programs as an avenue for cultural exchange, in particular between France and the United States. The Artists-in-Residence Program, exhibitions, conferences, seminars and performances held at the Château de La Napoule, serve to promote creative exploration and exchange among persons of diverse disciplines and backgrounds. Incorporated in the State of New York as well as France, the Foundation was established in 1951 by Marie Clews to preserve the works of her husband, the sculptor Henry Clews (1876-1937), and to ensure the continued use ofthe Château as an art center. The Château de La Napoule provides an environment conducive not only to individual creativity, but also to artistic collaboration. La Napoule Art Foundation
Brookgreen Gardens "In 1931, Brookgreen's founders, Archer and Anna Hyatt Huntington, founded Brookgreen Gardens, a non-profit 501(c)(3) corporation, to preserve the native flora and fauna and display objects of art within that natural setting. Brookgreen is one of the country's leading cultural and educational institutions and a National Historic Landmark. Within it's more than 9,000 acres are the Lowcountry History and Wildlife Preserve, the Huntington Sculpture Garden and the Center for American Sculpture."
Tim Glenn: Whistling Doves
Choreographic research has taken Tim Glenn abroad to the Fondation d'Art de La Napoule, France, Amsterdam School of the Arts, Kobe, Japan, and a number of European countries as a member of the Nikolais and Murray Louis Dance Company. As a visiting researcher at the Chateau de La Napoule, Glenn collected historical information and media, which was used in the production of a full evening of multimedia dance theater, Whistling Doves.
Related online articles:
OTHER:
"ONCE UPON A TIME"
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"With his wife and a menagerie of white flamingoes, peacocks and deer, Clews devoted the next 18 years to restoring the castle and peopling it with the sculptured demons and familiars of his visions. On archways he carved scaly sea monsters, on columns, beak-nosed gargoyles, while from every niche and shadow leered the grotesque beings of Clews labeled gods, jinns, ogs and wogs. Over them all, at the entrance to the castle, he chiseled the motto Once Upon a Time."
He was strange . . but had enormous class. . . Clews liked his "art" very much and his guests were compelled to compliment him about his "oeuvre". The "beau-monde" that visited him generally was more aristocratic than bohemian. We have an interesting testimony by a German diplomat, Count Harry Graf Kessler, also an "art connoisseur" and maecenas, who was their neighbour. About a dinner he had once he reports in his "Tagebucher 1918-1937" that when he entered the chateau he characterises it as "Kino-Mittelalter" where the couple waits to welcome the guests. 'The welcoming was astounding,' remembers the count, 'Henry Clew in white trousers and a sort of scarlet red, silk embroidered tunic going until the knee, his very beautiful wife as Queen of the Night, in black with golden stars. Behind them three white dressed footmen, hands on their trouser-seam and behind the lackeys two splendid white bulldogs looking like large Chinese statues'. Kessler seems satisfied with the cuisine and champagne, Clews talked a lot about Nietzsche in an intelligent way, but Kessler is sure (he doesn't know why but he "feels" it), that they were all filmed in that gothic dining-room all evening. . ."
". . . Clews would curl anyone's hair. Half the characters in his satirical drama" are described as "New York Jews" trying to pass themselves off as something else, usually members of the European nobility. I think what's getting Clews' ass is a suspicion that all the modernist stuff he hates (he likes Keats and Shelley) is being forced on the world by "New York Jews" who want to undermine society. Many people who didn't like psychoanalysis took note that Freud was Jewish, and the idea took off from there--that modernism was just another of those Jewish plots. I was a bit surprised Liveright would publish this stuff, but I guess it was regarded as OK in 1923." - 
Mrs. Clews continued the restoration of La Napoule until 1951 when she announced that The Château de La Napoule, had been chartered by New York State as a museum and art center and as a memorial to her husband.
"Perhaps the most enigmatic sculpture in the [Brookgreen Sculpture Gardens] collection, The Thinker, both repels and attracts its viewers. Clew's satirical artistic commentary dealt with all aspects of American society: religion, education, government, the military, the family, love and even art. His fascination with evil and its reflection in his sculpture was most well received by the public. The base panel of a blowfish being attached by a group of neddle fish represents the perennial struggle between the artist, puffed up with creative ideas, and the public's stabbing criticism of his work. Clews was by far the American sculptor whose work was not directly related to that of August Rodin in its symbolism and presentation."
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