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Nov. 17th
XXXXXXXXXXXX
October 27th, 1942
Dear Dr. Rothenstein:
I have often thought of you and your dear family during the very hard months you went through, and I hope that you are all well. I have to say that it made me suffer to read that the Tate Gallery had been badly damaged, but I was delighted to see that your activities were continuing and that you had made important acquisitions. I don't know whether you are aware that I reached the United States in October 1940 after retreating from Paris to the South and later having spent a nerve-wracking time while still in France during a period when conditions were far from being as bad as they are now.

I hope that the private report I am giving you about activities here will interest you and perhaps even amuse you. Two shows opened recently: one, a Surrealist exhibition for the benefit of the Franco-American War Relief, in which the public was shown some very interesting productions of Surrealism from its beginning up to the present -- from a very simplified Picasso, a piece of cloth affixed to a canvas and pierced with a big, wooden knitting pin (the amazing part of that framed picture is that it has relief and depth); to the last work of Max Ernst, called Surrealisme et Peinture, a kind of multi-bodied bird also multi-headed,one of the necks terminating in a kind of very well drawn hand holding a brush and painting. The other show, was really the opening of a new museum. I am sure you remember Peggy Guggenheim who at one time lived in London. She is the founder of the above-mentioned museum, the decoration of which is absolutely worth your coming over to see - which I would greatly appreciate. It has nothing to do with the way you show your pictures in the Tate Gallery. Most of the pictures are not framed and some of them hang against a curved wall. The most original thing about the gallery is the following: imagine three pieces of rope held together on the ceiling and on the floor. In about their middle, they are separated by rigid bars and on these hang the pictures. This ensemble, which naturally pivots, repeated a certain number of times in the length of the room creates a feeling of separation and is one of the most unexpected things I have ever seen. The pictures she shows are very well chosen and some of them of really very high quality - all cubists or surrealists.

Please let me know whether I can do something for you in the United States. Although the market is still very small over here, there are alight indications which give me hope that it will pick up in the near future, and we are, as always, on the lookout for very fine French 19th century pictures.

I haven't heard from Sir Kenneth Clark in ages and I am also wondering what has become of Sir William Burrell. If you have a few minutes to spare, do drop me a line. In the meanwhile, please remember me to your family, and with my best wishes,

Very sincerely yours,

(Georges E. Seligmann)
Dr. John Rothenstein
The Tate Gallery
Millbank, London S. W. 1