Collection is open for research.
Permission to publish material from Meeting Minutes of the Art League of Philadelphia and Diary of Art League Member Elsa Marie Hofheinz must be obtained from Special Collections, Virginia Tech.
Researchers wishing to cite this collection should include the following information: Meeting Minutes of the Art League of Philadelphia and Diary of Elsa Marie Hofheinz, Ms2013-097, Special Collections, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, Va.
This collection was purchased by Special Collections in 2013.
The processing, arrangement, and description of the Meeting Minutes of the Art League of Philadelphia with Manuscript Diary of Art League Member Elsa Marie Hofheinz was completed in May 2014.
Elsa Marie Hofheinz Wurtz (1912-2012) became the secretary for the Art League of Philadelphia in 1944. Elsa was enthusiastic about art from a young age as evidenced from her high school journal. She was a cartoonist for her school's newspaper and her diary contains many sketches and doodles. Little is known about Elsa's later life outside of the Art League, but it is known that she met her husband Charles Wurtz through the Art League.
The Art League of Philadelphia aimed to present and promote the work of member artists, both male and female. Their work included painting, watercolors, ceramics, photography and a variety of printmaking techniques. The League held exhibitions of members' work, lectures, and studio classes. Many members were graduates of art institutions including the Pennsylvania Museum and School of Industrial Art, the Pennsylvannia Academy of the Fine Arts, the Woodmere Art Museum, and the Barnes Foundation.
In 2015, the following biographical information was submitted by family of Elsa Wurtz. This and additional information from the family has been included with the collection:
A Philadelphian, Mrs. Wurtz was awarded a four-year scholarship to Moore College of Art. She designed greeting cards for Norcross in New York City before learning to read blueprints and then illustrating them for Fleetwings (an aircraft supplier or manufacturer outside Philadelphia) during World War II.
Early in her career, she painted in watercolor and exhibited at numerous venues, including the Rittenhouse Square Clothesline Exhibit. As time went on, she painted Impressionistic works in acrylic. She also created silkscreen art, prints, and worked in stained glass.
Her future husband always said that he picked out his mother-in-law and married her only single daughter. Elsa preferred to put it that she picked out her father-in-law (a fellow member of the Art League) and married his only single son!
This collection contains a book of minutes from the meetings of the Art League of Philadelphia from October 21, 1936 to October 21, 1947 as recorded by the League's secretaries over those years. The Art League of Philadelphia aimed to present and promote the work of member artists, both male and female. Their work included painting, watercolors, ceramics, photography and a variety of printmaking techniques. The League held exhibitions of members' work, lectures, and studio classes. Many members were graduates of art institutions including the Pennsylvania Museum and School of Industrial Art, the Pennsylvannia Academy of the Fine Arts, the Woodmere Art Museum, and the Barnes Foundation. The minutes record plans for upcoming events, the group's monthly monetary balance, and yearly lists of members.
The collection also contains the diary of Art League member Elsa Marie Rupp Hofheinz from 1928. Elsa Hofheinz later became Art League secretary in 1944. Her diary details her comments on fashion, her experiences learning to drive, her daily activities at school and around the house, as well as her artistic endeavors. The diary also contains many of Elsa's doodles.
The collection is in its original order.