Whitney Halstead papers, 1920-1982

Biographical material consists of resumes and notes concerning Halstead's career.

Personal correspondence consists of letters concerning Halstead's activities outside of his tenure at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Included are three letters from Jim Nutt, one of which is illustrated.

The diary contains notes concerning Halstead's daily thoughts rather than a record of daily activities. It also contains references to Jim Nutt. The travel journals contain notes concerning his travels to Europe and to Peru.

This series contains records of Halstead's teaching activities at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, including inter-departmental correspondence, minutes of meetings, reports, a scrapbook concerning the 1965 faculty strike, clippings, school publications, exhibition catalogs, and photographs.

Notes include notebooks pertaining to various art history topics, including the art of primitive cultures, Impressionism, Dadaism and Surrealism, American art, collage and assemblage, ceramics, and photography. Other notebooks contain reproductions of examples of late 19th century art and illustrations of primitive art styles. An index card file contains notes for art history lectures and bibliographic entries. Also found are six audiocassettes recordings of African, Native American, and Oceanic music. Writings include typescripts on various art history topics written for publications, including Artforum and the Chicago Daily News. There are also typescripts concerning individual artists, including Roger Brown, Ed Paschke, Kerig Pope, Christina Ramberg, and Barbara Rossi.

Artist files contain biographical material, correspondence primarily discussing exhibitions and sales of art work, notes, writings, printed material, and photographs pertaining to painters Jim Nutt and Joseph E. Yoakum.

Miscellaneous printed material documenting the exhibitions and art-related activities of the Hyde Park Art Center of Chicago.

Exhibition files contain correspondence, notes, writings, photographs, and printed material pertaining to miscellaneous exhibitions. The file for the "Two Artists" exhibition contains a photograph of Pauline Simon.

Art work includes sketchbooks, loose sketches, collage books, and prints by Halstead, several antique engravings, and miscellaneous drawings and art photographs by others. Art photographs are by Jerome Aronson, Ken Josephson, Ceil London, Tom Palazzolo, Charles Reynolds, and Roger Vail.

Photographs are of Halstead, his friends and colleagues including Jack Burnham, Claes Oldenburg and Karl Wirsum, Arts Club exhibitions, works by Chicago artists, and artists from primitive times through the 20th century including Al Boutin, Christo, John Henry, David Reif, and Marguerite Weber. There are also several hundred slides of Halstead, art work, miscellaneous activities with friends and students, subjects for art work including plants and animals, exhibitions, and views of Chicago and New York.

Printed material consists of clippings and booklets written by Halstead about the Japanese prints and the culture of the American Southwest as it pertains to the collections of the Art Institute of Chicago.