Oral history interview with Everett Ellin
odd: label: General
content: Originally recorded on 5 sound discs. Reformatted in 2010 as 6 digital wav files. Duration is 5 hrs., 6 min.
name: label: Interviewee
content: Ellin, Everett
label: Interviewer
content: Kirwin, Liza
acqinfo: label: Provenance
content: This interview is part of the Archives of American Art 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 administrators.
creator: label: Interviewee
content: Ellin, Everett
label: Interviewer
content: Kirwin, Liza
bioghist: label: Biographical / Historical
content: Everett Ellin (1928-2011) was an art dealer, art administrator, and consultant of Diana, Tex. Liza Kirwin is an AAA collector in Washington, D.C.
physdesc: label: Extent
content: 78 Pages (Transcript)
unitdate: label: Date
content: 2004 April 27-28
dataSource: label: Archival Repository
content: Archives of American Art
identifier: label: Identifier
content: AAA.ellin04
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 Everett Ellin conducted 2004 April 27-28, by Liza Kirwin, for the Archives of American Art, in Washington, D.C.
label: Scope and Contents
content: Ellin speaks of his childhood and early education in Chicago; taking an aptitude test in high school and learning that he had multiple aptitudes; attending the University of Michigan and earning a BSE in Mechanical and Industrial Engineering; earning a law degree at Harvard Law School; his tour as an Air Force officer and tenure as law clerk to the Chief Justice of the California Supreme Court; working at Columbia Pictures as house legal counsel; serving as aid for the vice president at William Morris Agency; studying acting; Hollywood in the 1950s; opening his own gallery, the Everett Ellin Gallery, in Los Angeles, in 1957-1958; his marriage to painter Jane Jacobs; working for French & Company, in New York in 1959, as director of the contemporary gallery; Clement Greenberg's role at French & Company; opening his second gallery in Los Angeles, the Everett Ellin Gallery, Inc., 1960-1963; artists he has shown including Bruce Beasely, Jasper Johns, Arshile Gorky, David Smith, and others; represented working for Marlborough Gallery, in New York, as director, 1963-1964; organizing the Jackson Pollock retrospective at Marlborough Gallery in 1964; being hired by Harry Guggenheim as public affairs officer of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum and his promotion to assistant director; travel to Peru to help organize an exhibition of Peruvian ceramics for the Guggenheim; founding the Museum Computer Network (MCN) and establishing a base of operations at the Museum of Modern Art with support from the Mellon Foundation; early MCN planning meetings; and his vision for the future of MCN. He recalls artists Lee Krasner, Morris Louis, Robert Motherwell, Barnett Newman, and others; collectors Frederick Weisman, Edward G. Robinson, Milton Sperling; museum professionals Rene d'Harnoncourt, Thomas Messer, Lawrence Alloway, Frank O'Hara, Walter Hopps, and others.