Writings by Dorothy Liebes
name: label: Collection Creator
content: Liebes, Dorothy
setName: label: See more items in
content: Dorothy Liebes papers
label: See more items in
content: Dorothy Liebes papers / Series 4: Writings
unitdate: label: Date
content: 1920-circa 1971
dataSource: label: Archival Repository
content: Archives of American Art
identifier: label: Identifier
content: AAA.liebdoro, Subseries 4.1
objectType: label: Type
content: Archival materials
scopecontent: label: Scope and Contents note
content: This subseries includes notes, drafts, and manuscripts of published and unpublished articles and short writings; notes, drafts and the manuscript for an unpublished autobiography; and an outline, notes and partial draft of an unpublished book, with the working title "Design and Weave" which Liebes worked on intermittently from the 1950s on. 

Drafts of the autobiography are an illuminating source of information about Liebes's artistic and professional development, and the degree to which individuals she worked with impacted her career. Liebes credits Frank Lloyd Wright, Samuel Marx, Rebecca Dunphy, William Pahlmann, and many others, with helping to advance her career and her artistic vision and the manuscript includes notable memoir writings on
Frank Lloyd Wright and other. The autobiography was written with the assistance of Relman Morin, and notes include records of interviews Morin conducted with her as they worked together on the manuscript. 


Also found here are drafts, text, photos, and bibliographical material for an Encyclopedia Britannica entry on tapestry which Liebes was commissioned to revise in 1959, as well as correspondence and printed material related to research she conducted while working on the project. 


Four folders of typescripts of Liebes's speeches provide summaries of her evolving ideas about color, textiles, and design. Speeches include those given at industry events, award acceptance ceremonies, professional design association events, educational events, and more. 

One group of notes on index cards includes photos, sketches, and notes on textiles and fabric designs in various geographic and cultural regions; other cards appear to contain primarily notes for lectures, and writings on fabric and textile designs, methodologies, and related subjects. The first two folders contain sets of cards that appear to be related and sequential, but the bulk of the cards were not in a discernible overall order, and have been left in the order in which they were found to preserve any context between adjacent cards. 


A student paper written by Liebes in 1920 is in the form of a notebook with handwritten notes, sketches, and samples of techniques.