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PHILLIPS MEMORIAL GALLERY
1600 TWENTY-FIRST STREET
WASHINGTON, D.C.

DUNCAN PHILLIPS,Director
C. LAW WATKINS, Associate Director
ELMIRA BIER, Manager of Publications

May 28, 1935

Mr. Arthur G. Dove,
Geneva
New York.

Dear Arthur Dove:

Since your new pictures came from An American Place I have been enjoying them at every possible moment. You had a great year and they mark a definite advance. The Electric Peach Orchard has been invited to the Cleveland Museum but I had it sent here so that I could see it in the Gallery before it went to Cleveland. I like it better than ever. If I had any doubt about Red Sun it vanished. when I saw it again. My thought was perhaps there was too much weight in the great globe which defied the laws of gravitation and which would make the painting top heavy. But I find that whether this is true or not the emotion of almost primitive sun worship is so sincere and so compelling that it makes criticism irrelevant. The writer E. M. Benson was here the other day and we enjoyed your pictures together. I brought out Red Barge to see with the others and we were both profoundly impressed by its grandeur of design and richness of color. But, to my dismay, I observed for the first time that there is a cracking all over the darks which is not even gradually but rather rapidly reducing the richness of tones with the tiny white lines. Even if this cracking decreasing the beauty of the surface. I hope that you will tell me that the cracking parts can be repainted. What shall I do about it? Shall I send it to you at Geneva? I value the painting far too much to give up as it is in many ways your masterpiece but if it is possible for you to rejuvenate it with paint that does not crack I would feel very happy. I hope this does not mean of your richest passages suggest that a tincture of black has been mixed with the other colors. So far none of the new pictures show any cracking nor are there any cracks in the Tree Trunks of last year. I mention this as you will know the different ways in which they were painted and avoid in your further practice whatever may have been responsible for the cracking of Red Barge. You once asked me to send back the Golden Storm brcause some one here had noticed that there was evidence of tarnishing. But this splendid example of your earlier work seems to me as fine as ever and I have a special place for it in my house where it looks its best, opposite a window. If there is any tarnishing I do not mind it. You must come to Washington next fall and bring Mrs. Dove. We are anxious to meet you for we feel that we have come to know[signature] through your intimate self expression