Wood, Beatrice
Biography
Beatrice Wood (1893-1998) was born on March 3, 1893 in San Francisco and raised in New York City. The daughter of affluent socialites, Wood studied painting at the Julian Academy and acting at the Comédie Francaise in Paris at the age of 18. Upon her return to New York, she joined the French Repertory Company and in 1916, befriended the artist Marcel Duchamp and the writer and diplomat Henri Pierre Roché. The three founded and published the short-lived little magazine The Blind Man, one of the earliest manifestations of Dada in Americirca Through Duchamp, Wood met the art collectors Walter and Louise Arensberg, artists Man Ray, Francis Picabia, and Charles Sheeler, and the poet Mina Loy. Wood became a regular participant in the frequent gatherings of intellectuals, artists, and writers at the Arensbergs' West 67th Street apartment. With Duchamp's encouragement, Wood returned to drawing and painting, submitting a work to the 1917 exhibition of the Society of Independent Artists.
Wood relocated to Montreal in 1919 to continue her acting career and there she married Paul Renson, a theater manager. She soon annulled the marriage and returned to New York City. Around 1926, Wood moved to Los Angeles and then to Hollywood, California, where she renewed her friendship with the Arensbergs. In 1938, she married Steve Hoag, an engineer. By all accounts the marriage was not a happy one, yet the couple lived together until his death in 1960. In 1948, they relocated to Ojai, California to be near the Indian sage Krishnamurti, the leader of the Theosophical Society, to which Wood had belonged since 1923.
Wood first became interested in ceramics in 1933 after purchasing a set of luster-glaze plates at an antique store. She soon enrolled in a pottery course in the Adult Education Department of Hollywood High School. She later studied briefly with the Austrian ceramists Gertrud and Otto Natzler. For the next sixty years, Wood supported herself creating and selling pottery and in 1956 she opened her own studio. At first, she concentrated on dinner sets, but by the mid-1970s she began to specialize in more elaborate, decorative bowls, vases and chalices with complex luster glazes. Wood continued to work at her potter's wheel until two years before her death in 1998 at the age of 105.
Found in 191 Collections and/or Records:
Correspondence from Marcel Duchamp to Walter and Louise Arensberg, 1953 May 15
Correspondence from Marcel Duchamp to Walter and Louise Arensberg [copy].
Correspondence from Marcel Duchamp to Walter and Louise Arensberg, 1940 July 16
Correspondence from Marcel Duchamp to Walter and Louise Arensberg [copy].
Correspondence from Ruth Calder to Katharine Kuh, 1949 March 18
Correspondence from Ruth Calder to Katharine Kuh, Curator of Gallery of Art Interpretation at the Art Institute of Chicago.
Correspondence from Walter and Louise Arensberg to Edward Reston, circa 1940s
Correspondence from Walter and Louise Arensberg to Edward Reston.
Correspondence from Walter Arensberg to Alexander H. Tiers, 1952 October 7
Correspondence from Walter Arensberg to Alexander H. Tiers.
Correspondence from Walter Arensberg to Beatrice Wood, 1928 June 21
Correspondence from Walter Arensberg to Beatrice Wood.
Correspondence from Walter Arensberg to Fiske Kimball, 1952 October 7
Correspondence from Walter Arensberg to Fiske Kimball, Director of the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
Correspondence from Walter Arensberg to Fiske Kimball, 1952 October 7
Correspondence from Walter Arensberg to Fiske Kimball, Director of the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
Correspondence from Walter Arensberg to Lindley Bynum, 1945 June 2
Correspondence from Walter Arensberg to Lindley Bynum, Office of the President at the University of California, Los Angeles.
Correspondence from Walter Arensberg to Milton Wichner, 1953 January 28
Correspondence from Walter Arensberg to Milton Wichner.
Additional filters:
- Type
- Archival Object 189
- Collection 2
- Subject
- correspondence 76
- Philadelphia, United States 35
- photographic prints 32
- New York City, United States 31
- Hollywood, United States 30
- negatives (photographs) 14
- Ojai, United States 13
- Ojai Valley, United States 8
- notes 8
- memorandums 6
- Chennai, India 5
- Santa Barbara, United States 5
- agreements 5
- clippings (information artifacts) 5
- Coney Island, United States 4
- Los Angeles, United States 4
- catalogue cards 4
- chronologies (lists) 4
- invitations 4
- museum records 4
- lists (document genres) 3
- Cambridge, United States 2
- Pasadena, United States 2
- gelatin silver prints 2
- interviews 2
- Arcachon, France 1
- Beverly Hills, United States 1
- Buenos Aires, Argentina 1
- Chicago, United States 1
- Houston, United States 1
- Kolkata, India 1
- London, England 1
- Michigan, United States 1
- Milan, Italy 1
- Paris, France 1
- Ridgefield, United States 1
- White Plains, United States 1
- brochures 1
- envelopes 1
- exhibition announcements 1
- fliers (printed matter) 1
- press releases 1
- proposals 1
- research notes 1
- writings (documents) 1 ∧ less