Rediscovering the Art of Victoria Hutson Huntley

During the 1930s and 1940s, Victoria Hutson Huntley (1900 – 1971) was one of America’s leading lithographers. She produced more than 100 lithographs and a small number of intaglio prints from 1930 until her death. Major museums across the country purchased her work, as did many collectors. Her work can be divided into three periods, based on her earlier life in the North, her residence in Florida (1946 – 53) and her return North. This exhibition represents all three. It also shows her different areas of interest: landscape, human figures and close-up views of the natural world. Nature, especially the Everglades, was a common theme during her time in Florida, where she created many lithographs of bird life.

Her work fell out of fashion near the end of her career, when the art world embraced abstraction and trended away from realism. This exhibition shows her strengths as a meticulous artist, who often revisited subjects and deserves to be rediscovered.

This first group of works includes prints Huntley made in the 1940s, before she and her family moved to Florida. “Sleeping Calf” reflects her work in intaglio (in-TAL-ee-oh), a relief-printing process. “Dawn Came” lends itself to a variety of optimistic interpretations about light overcoming darkness. “Vermont Covered Bridge” shows her skill in rendering complex structures and handling light. “White World” reflects her love of winter and snow. Note how the lines formed by the trees on the right point to a small house and barn.

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Huntley’s interest in the human figure is evident in this group of lithographs. In “Babe in Arms,” a woman looks down tenderly at a child sleeping in her arms. Huntley’s own daughter was born in 1925. “Old Fiddler Dreams” shows the contents of the main figure’s thoughts by directing our eye to the dancing pair toward which his instrument points. “On the Top,” in contrast, pictures three young people who do not visually relate, perhaps showing the tendency of adolescents toward self-absorption. The girl looking toward the viewer may be Huntley’s daughter.

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The center of attention in this print is two figures skating, toward whom many of the other figures look. Their identity is left to the viewer’s imagination. Who do you think the skating pair might represent? How many people are looking at them?

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These images show Huntley’s interest in architecture. “Lower New York” shows a view through the window of a friend’s office on the 26th floor on Lower Broadway. In the distance is Liberty Island, which may be important for symbolic purposes. The painting shows a gift for rendering architectural complexity, although the human figure and dog in the foreground suggest a novice painter.

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“Interior” and “The Stairway” show Huntley’s tendency to render her immediate surroundings. “Interior,” an early prize-winning lithograph, depicts her dining room in an old farmhouse in Caldwell, New Jersey. It shows her skill in drawing complex objects. As the door in “The Stairway” is of the same style, it likely pictures the same house. One source identifies the young girl climbing the stairs as Huntley’s daughter. The location of the other print is not known but may be nearby. Huntley wraps this circular scene with tree branches.

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Huntley was interested in botanical compositions and made many of them. She often isolates the forms as in “Petunias with Butterfly.” “Indian Pipes” shows a more exotic plant, a parasite that can dwell in darkness because it does relies on the photosynthesis of other plants. “Moonlight on the Mountain” is a landscape with fir trees on either side of rocky ground. Light streams through the dark cloudy sky.

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In 1946, Huntley and her husband moved to the outskirts of Orlando, Florida, to take teaching positions at Rollins College. At first Huntley did not like the warm and humid climate, but she decided to take advantage of the semi-tropical locale by depicting its fauna and flora. With the aid of grant money, she was able to visit the Everglades on several occasions, which provided subject matter for numerous lithographs. Two here show Cuthbert Rookery, a nesting place for wading birds. Many are low-horizon landscape vistas, with sawgrass at the bottom and egrets in the sky. One is a swamp scene with moss-hung trees. Yet another highlights the distinctive form of the roseate spoonbill.

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Huntley depicted other scenes of Florida besides those focused on birds. She stated that she loved storms. “Tropical Storm” records the beginning of a hurricane on the St. Johns River near her home. The strong diagonal lines of the dark clouds contrast with the verticals of palm trees and small, vulnerable human figures. “The Enemy” shows a raccoon, likely in the Everglades. The title is appropriate from a wading bird’s perspective because raccoons eat their eggs.

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Huntley found her imagery for these lithographs of reclining deer in the Ocala Forest Preserve. She wrote that they were “drawn at high noon when sunlight filters through dense shaded forests where trees are heavy hung with moss.” She also visited Sanford Zoo to study these creatures. They appear to have found cooler temperatures and camouflage in the darkness of the forest.

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The Flame Bird is a nickname frequently applied to the roseate spoonbill because of the bright pink of its feathers. Huntley learned color lithography from a trip she made to the University of Georgia the same year she made this print. Artist Francis Chapin taught her this complex process in which each stone holds a different color. The Ocklawaha River scene, sometimes titled “Florida Fairyland,” is an enchanting scene. Huntley highlights an egret in a dark forest of moss-hung trees.

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In June 1948, Huntley made a trip to Charleston, South Carolina, to study bird structure with experts at the Charleston Museum. Two lithographs resulted. “Charleston #1” presents one of the city’s many ornate cast-iron gates and fences. It also emphasizes light in the shadows projected on the pavement. Behind the gate, we see a courtyard, a statue and column, a double-portico house and a plain tall building. The scene is loosely based on the courtyard of the Fireproof building (County Records Building) seen from Meeting Street. “Charleston #2” features the small figure of a black flower lady sitting at the base of South Carolina Society Hall. The scene is significant as a scenario of racial exclusion as the woman would undoubtedly not have been able to enter the front door of that building.

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These works date from the last period of Huntley’s life and work, from 1953 to 1971. She and her husband moved back north, partially due to an illness (possibly amoebic dysentery) that she contracted in Florida. “Steel” reflects her renewed interest in industrial subjects and detailed realism. Overall, this period was one of declining productivity due to her health and the general artistic trend toward abstraction. We see the influence of the latter in several of these works. “Monument” magnifies a section of an architectural structure, obscuring its actual purpose. We only see sections of column forms that suggest support. “Frieze” abstracts four leaping horses against a dark background contrasting with flowing, cloudlike light.

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