B. R. Isaacs
P.O. Box 1530,

P.O. Box 1530,
DURBAN.

BUSINESS ADDRESS:
FRYSTARK HOUSE,
240b UMBILO ROAD,
DURBAN.
PHONE 355915.

PRIVATE ADDRESS:
148 PRINCESS ALICE AVENUE,
DURBAN,
SOUTH AFRICA.
TELEPHONE 358484.

8th April, 1974.

Dr.Henry A.Kissinger,
Secretary of States,
2201 C Street N.W.,
Washington D.C.20520,
United States of America.

Dear Dr. Kissinger,

Firstly I would like to take the opportunity of congratulating
you and your wife on your recent marriage and sincerely hope
that you will both be blessed with many years of good health and
happiness together.

Having read hundreds of articles about your life and achievements,
I trust that you will be granted the time necessary to achieve
the various goals you have set yourself personally and also in
your official capacity. I am enclosing herewith a cartoon which
appeared in the local press and as a married man, hope that you
will appreciate the sense of humour which appeals to me as a
married man of many years.

I am enclosing herewith the TIME dated April 1st 1974 and 24th
November, 1973 wherein the feature story has been written about
your achievements and status in the world forum. I would greatly
appreciate it if you could personally autograph the covers and
return them to me.

With best wishes for the future and hoping that you can bring
peace to this confused world.

PHILIP H. ISELIN
198 PORTAUPECK AVENUE
OCEANPORT, NEW JERSEY

July 2, 1976

The Honorable Henry Kissinger
Secretary of State
Washington, D.C.

Dear Mr. Secretary:

Much as I am looking forward to my trip to Canada and to the Olympics, I am now somewhat disappointed all the arrangements have been made. This means Mrs. Iselin and I are unable to accept your kind invitation to luncheon on the sixteenth, the day of our departure. We both thank you very much for your thoughtfulness and we certainly regret having to miss the opportunity to see you again and join in honoring the Chancellor of West Germany.

I know your schedule is much heavier than mine, but we would be delighted if you and Mrs. Kissinger could find the time to visit us at Monmouth Park. We race until November 13 and I feel sure you both would enjoy staying at our very comfortable guest house, attending the races and possibly going to the beach. We hope you will be able to take such a break and we welcome you at any time.

PHI:b

NEW YORK JETS FOOTBALL CLUB, INC.

595 MADISON AVENUE
NEW YORK, NEW YORK
10022

PHILIP H. ISELIN
PRESIDENT

November 13, 1976

Dear Dr. Kissinger:

In answer to a newsman's question about your
plans for the future I heard you say that you would con-
sider professional football, specifically a berth as
quarterback.

Although we have not received your formal ap-
plication I want you to know we have a slot open for a
qualified person. A quarterback must travel, both on the
field and off, and in that respect there is no question
about your qualifications. We surely can meet your
salary requirements since, as you know, our present #12
is paid much more than the President of the United States.
We can assess your other talents when training camp opens
on July 7, unless you prefer a private try-out which can
be arranged.

We look forward to hearing from you.

With kindest personal regards,

PHI:b

DEPARTMENT OF STATE

ACTION MEMORANDUM

S/S

7625455

November 30, 1976

TO: The Secretary

FROM: S/P - Winston Lord

Broadway Hank

The New York Jets picked up your comment to a reporter about considering a future in pro football and have written offering you a try-out as Joe Namath's replacement.

In the event you wish to accept, we have asked L to draw up a proposal for a no-cut contract under which the Jets would provide a fur-lined Manhattan pad with ceiling mirror, use of Hugh Hefner's 707 to and from games, and free knee operations. We will also require the Jets to buy out the option of the Dallas Cowboy's cheerleaders and install them at Shea Stadium as your personal entourage. I am prepared to serve as your agent and press spokesman for 15% of the gross plus panty-hose and movie tie-ins -- and a try-out for myself at tight end.

In the event you wish to decline, we have prepared a reply at Tab A.

Attachments:

Tab A - Letter of regret.

Tab B - Letter from New York
Jets Football Club, Inc.

S/P:CHill

ext. 21140:11/30/76

EMBASSY OF THE
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

Port-au-Prince, Haiti

September 18, 1974

The Honorable Henry A. Kissinger
The Secretary of State
Washington, D. C. 20520

Dear Henry:

I hope that as you plan your Latin American travels over
the next several months you will keep in mind that you always
have a warm welcome with us. We can offer you a guest suite
with its own entrance, a pool, tropical gardens, sunshine, and
Sheila's paintings to restore your faith in art. Where else
can you get a deal like that?

With best regards, as always,

Sheila Isham:
Paintings 1969—1973

February 9—March 10, 1974
Corcoran Gallery of Art
Washington, D.C.

## Introduction

In presenting this exhibition, the Corcoran Gallery recognizes the distinctive achievements of Sheila Isham as a painter spanning a period of many years in Washington and abroad. Trained in Berlin at the Hochschule fuer Bildenden Kuenste, Sheila Isham has through her travels to Russia, Asia, and Europe developed an approach to art that, in recent years, has increasingly reflected the interaction between her painterly calligraphy and a highly personal way of seeing.

The exhibition affords an opportunity to study the gradual development of her painting over the past five years. She has produced an arresting and luminous body of work. These paintings reveal the search of a highly sensitive and responsive artist for an idiom embracing the creative tensions of East and West.

I have known Sheila Isham for some years and have found her impressive both as a painter and as a person. Her vibrant personality has enriched the Washington art scene. Toward other artists she has been unfailingly encouraging, helpful, and a source of inspiration. Although she has traveled and exhibited widely throughout the world, she remains closely involved with Washington. Her exhibitions at the Jefferson Place Gallery have attracted much interest, and examples of her work are in many Washington collections.

The Gallery is indebted to the many who have made this exhibition possible: the collectors, for their generosity in loaning the paintings;

Edward Fry, for writing an essay which gives a valuable insight into the painter and the paintings; the Fischbach Gallery, for kindly helping in the production of the catalogue; and the Gallery staff, whose work makes such exhibitions possible. Special thanks should go to Frances Fralin, my Curatorial Assistant, who has helped coordinate the exhibition. Most of all, I wish to acknowledge the efforts of the artist herself, for Sheila Isham has worked hard to make the exhibition a success.

Roy Slade
Director,
Corcoran Gallery of Art

Sheila Isham

After more than a decade of quiet and persistent development, Sheila Isham has reached a level of realisation in her art that is exemplary for its fusion of image and intention. Her present achievements—the orchestration of complex and subtly modulated color in paintings of monumental scale—are totally satisfying as perceptual experiences within the realm of high romanticism. One would be tempted to situate this work wholly within the normal range of post-painterly abstraction; and there one would indeed find the requisite common denominators of scale, approximate flatness, spray technique, indefiniteness of imagery, and a generally high-key, almost neo-rococo palette and sensibility. A Washington context, with its indigenous tradition of color painting as seen in Louis, Noland, Davis, Gilliam, and numerous others, would seem to confirm this supposition. Yet to the degree that such painters are involved with a self-consciousness of style, of formal and conceptual issues concerning the process and medium of painting itself, Isham's work demands a far different context for its full apprehension; the relation of intention and content to form in her art has more affinities with Rothko and Still than with Frankenthaler or Noland.

This art is the conjunction of a certain intention with a stylistic mode capable of expressing that intention. The intention is not and never has been style as an end in itself, and therefore Isham's paintings can be understood only partially in the context of '60s color painting. This divergence is evident in her earlier drawings and prints and their explorations of Chinese calligraphy, culminating in her illustrations for the *I Ching*. Here the artist's efforts were clearly directed toward detachment, meditation, and purification of consciousness; her approach was the exploration of images that could serve as analogues and catalysts for non-discursive thought, particularly for inwardly concentrated, timeless states of being. This search inevitably reached the circle as the image of maximum centripetal focus for psychic energy, for thought released from the contingencies of action; and the circle became the endpoint of the artist's calligraphic development.

By the later 1960's Isham had enlarged her search for the meditative, non-discursive image by shifting from calligraphic drawing to pure color. The paintings that resulted from this shift were at first of delicate, high-keyed hues, possessed infinite yet indefinite space, and were of uniform density throughout the pictorial field; significantly, among the most successful of these early color paintings were several executed in tondo format, a direct continuation of the meditative calligraphic circle.

The evolution of Isham's work during the past three years has proceeded rapidly toward a fusion of all elements. Scale has expanded, and the handling of sprayed color has become ever more sophisticated in the unity of diversities. The non-discursive image, once calligraphic and often circular, has become co-extensive with the pictorial field as a whole, and thus the entire painting functions as a single meditative and iconic image. A further metamorphosis within her original intentions has also emerged in recent work, notably in smaller studies and in prints: the calligraphic image is reappearing, now completely translated into purely coloristic (but not gestural) terms. A fusion of these coloristic, meditative signs with the overall iconic function of the color field has already been achieved in the most recent paintings; and the artist is presently accomplishing this fusion at higher and higher levels of psychic, and consequently formal, complexity.

Edward F. Fry

[L]

June 4, 1974

Dear Mr. Iwanoff:

Secretary Kissinger asked that I thank you for your photographs and kind letter. You did a lovely job to catch the Secretary and his children in such a relaxed moment--- something that I'm sure you know is very rare. The pictures are truly an unusual momento.

May I add also that I know the Secretary appreciated the thoughts expressed in your letter very much.

With best wishes to you and your family.

Mr. James Thomas Iwanoff
3216 Ettrick Street
Los Angeles, California 90027

JAMES THOMAS IWANOFF

3216 ETTRICK STREET
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA 90027

April 16, 1974

The Honorable Dr. Henry Kissinger
Secretary of State
Washington, D.C.

Dear Mr. Secretary,

I was recently admiring the photos that are enclosed within
this letter. As an amateur photographer I must confess that
they are one of my prize possessions. Rightfully so, I thought
you might enjoy them. These three shots were taken last August
while you were staying at the Western White House.

Let me reassure you that these pictures have not been circulated
to any sort of agency. I have kept these as personal gifts and
show them only to family friends and relatives.

May I also comment on how satisfied I myself, along with my
family truly admire and appreciate the effort and work you are
putting in your job as Secretary of State. America is blessed
with a man of your talents and is proud of its heritage of
which you are maintaining.

Once again, hope you find these enjoyable. All the best to you.