Here, they range from Alexander Jackson Davis's designs for country estates along the Hudson to Frank Furness's Beaux Art commissions for New York and Philadelphia, Louis Sullivan's filigree grillwork for the Chicago Stock Exchange Building, and the early Modernist innovations of Frank Lloyd Wright and Greene and Greene. First conceived as a four-year project that would terminate with the opening of the Meier building in 1983, the Crawford Collection continues to grow. Its mission is unchanged from 1979, when Catharine Gross Farnham and then director Gudmund Vigtel proposed to Crawford that the High Museum stake its reputation on historically and artistically superior American objects made between 1825 and 1917. Accompanying the exhibition is a scholarly catalogue, also by Peirce. Extensively researched and beautifully produced, the 464-page color volume illustrates 227 objects.
Meticulous entries offer a historical overview for each object.
Equally interesting are the book's footnotes, which document sources, provenance and extensive correspondence among Peirce, Hanks, their colleagues at other institutions, and the many antiques dealers who have contributed to this collection. The High Museum has made great progress in naming the participants in this complex enterprise, and has laid the groundwork for further study. The High Museum of Art is at 1280 Peachtree Street in midtown Atlanta.