Oral history interview with James and Beth Arient
odd: label: General
content: Originally recorded on 3 sound cassettes. Reformatted in 2010 as 6 digital wav files. Duration is 4 hr., 29 min.
name: label: Interviewee
content: Arient, James, 1946-
label: Interviewer
content: Blum, Betty
label: Interviewee
content: Arient, Beth, 1946-
label: Names
content: Camp, Jeffrey Thomas, 1944-
label: Names
content: Dawson, William, 1901-1990
label: Names
content: Finster, Howard, 1916-2001
label: Names
content: Webster, Derek, 1934 - 2009
topic: label: Topic
content: Art -- Collectors and collecting -- Illinois -- Chicago -- Interviews
label: Topic
content: Folk art -- Collectors and collecting -- United States
acqinfo: label: Provenance
content: These interviews are part of the Archives' Oral History Program, started in 1958 to document the history of the visual arts in the United States, primarily through interviews with artists, historians, dealers, critics and others.
creator: label: Interviewee
content: Arient, James, 1946-
label: Interviewer
content: Blum, Betty
label: Interviewee
content: Arient, Beth, 1946-
bioghist: label: Biographical / Historical
content: James Arient (1946-) and Beth Arient (1946-) are folk art collectors from Chicago, Illinois. James Arient is a dentist.
physdesc: label: Extent
content: 213 Pages (Transcript)
unitdate: label: Date
content: 1988 April 27-29
dataSource: label: Archival Repository
content: Archives of American Art
identifier: label: Identifier
content: AAA.arient88
objectType: label: Type
content: Collection descriptions
label: Type
content: Archival materials
label: Type
content: Pages
label: Type
content: Sound recordings
label: Type
content: Interviews
genre_format: label: Genre/Form
content: Sound recordings
label: Genre/Form
content: Interviews
scopecontent: label: Scope and Contents
content: An interview of James and Beth Arient conducted 1988 April 27-29, by Betty Blum, for the Archives of American Art.
label: Scope and Contents
content: The Arients describe their backgrounds and talk about their initial interest in art and early collecting, their philosophy of collecting, their discovery of Eskimo sculpture and their first awareness of folk art. They comment on meeting Howard Finster and their subsequent relationship with him, Finster's relationship with collector Jeff Camp, the marketability of folk art, a 1987 exhibition of part of their collection at Northern Illinois University Art Gallery, and folk art patronage. They recall William Dawson and Derek Webster.