Art and Artifacts

Pierre Bonnard (1867-1947), lithograph "Femme Assise dans sa Baignoire." Gift of Hugh Chapman, 1985.

"Le Cuirassier" by Belgian printmaker Henri Evenepoel (1872-1899).

The fine collections of art and artifacts at Haverford find their niche within the expanding role of art at Haverford and the needs of our far-flung researchers. The photography collection contains approximately 3,000 images created by more than 100 artists. Some of the outstanding artists represented in the collection are: Berenice Abbott, Ansel Adams, Diane Arbus, Eugene Atget, Edouard Boubat, John Bullock, Julia Margaret Cameron, Edward Curtis, Roy DeCarava, Harold Edgerton, Walker Evans, Lewis Hine, Andre Kertesz, Dorothea Lange, Jacques Lartigue, Lisette Model, August Sander, Eugene Smith, James Van DerZee and Carl Van Vechten.

Other works of art include hundreds of art prints by such artists as Cezanne, Hiroshige, Kandinsky, Miro, Piranesi and Picasso and paintings by Cornelius DeMann Delft, Egbert van Heemskerk, Maxfield Parrish and Charles Willson Peale as well as works of sculpture and artifacts both ancient and modern.

Quaker photographs, silhouettes, drawings and paintings depicting Quaker individuals, Friends Schools and Colleges, Meetinghouses and miscellaneous groups constitute some of Haverford’s Quaker-specific art holdings and support new research into Quaker aesthetics.

While the number of artifacts at Haverford is currently intentionally limited, three collections are described here. The first is a collection of some 25 Greek artifacts, primarily vases, the earliest dating to ca. 1300 B.C. The second, about 200 items, has its origins in the Middle East, the result of a dig at Beth Shemesh, then Palestine, under the direction of Haverford Prof. Elihu Grant. Finally, there is a collection of several hundred miscellaneous items that includes everything from china plates to an Indian peace pipe, from Haverford College banners to the eyeglasses of T. Wistar Brown.