Link to ManshipArtists.org website

MANSHIP

THE PAST MEETS THE PRESENT

When Paul Manship built his home and studio in Lanesville he laid the foundation, without realizing it, for an artistic legacy that lives on today.

Paul Manship, Prometheus Fountain, 1934, Rockefeller Center, New York

The Manship Artists Residency property (MARs), a rare survival from a former time, was once at the center of an important art community that hosted some of America’s greatest visual, performing, and literary artists. This spectacular property was the summer residence and studio of Paul Manship, perhaps best known as the sculptor of the Prometheus Fountain at Rockefeller Center, New York City. In order to protect this local treasure, the founders of the Manship Artists nonprofit established a model that the National Trust for Historic Preservation praised for being “relevant, forward thinking, and sensitive,” acknowledging that “often the best way to preserve a place is to use it.” Manship Artists is continuing the legacy of the Manship family of artists and the artists who have historically come to Cape Ann to seek community and inspiration while living and working here with artist residencies and public programming.

“The unique beauty of the Manship property

inspired me to take risks with my creativity.”

- Susan Termyn, Outside @ Manship 2020 Artist

THE MANSHIP FAMILY OF ARTISTS

Paul Howard Manship (1885-1966)

Paul Manship is among the most famous American artists of the first half of the 20th century. He was the youngest fellow ever awarded a Prix de Rome in 1909 – the highest honor accorded artists at the time. Considered the pioneer of American Art Deco, Manship returned from his fellowship at the American Academy in Rome to become the most sought-after sculptor in the United States, defining the cultural landscape of America for over two decades. His work is all over New York City and among the most prized possessions of major museums worldwide. Several of his works are owned by the Metropolitan Museum of Art and his Celestial Sphere, a Memorial to Woodrow Wilson, is on the grounds of the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland.

Paul Manship, Prometheus, plaster model, about 1933

John Paul Manship, Untitled, 1979, Private Collection

John Paul Manship (1927-2000)

Paul's son John created his own residency abroad as an itinerant painter, traveling throughout Europe following his graduation from Harvard in 1948. He settled in Rome for a time and later New York City and Gloucester, MA at the Manship property. John was a prolific painter, often painting two or three paintings a day. He described himself as a "portraitist of places" and was especially fond of painting his Cape Ann surroundings. Following his father's death, his wife Margaret encouraged him to also take up sculpture.

Margaret Cassidy Manship (d. 2012)

Margaret Cassidy won an international sculpture contest that offered her a three-year fellowship at the Villa Schifanoia in Fiesole, Italy. While there she became the protégé of master sculptor Antonio Berti, with whom she studied and assisted for eight years while working on a sculpture for St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome and other major monuments in Italy. Berti and Paul Manship introduced Margaret and John. Primarily a sculptor, Margaret also developed new techniques for working with stained glass. She was an avid archivist as well.

Margaret Cassidy Manship, Mother and Child, Private Collection

Isabel Natti, Squam Woods, Courtesy Worth Point

Isabel Natti (1946-2011)

An artist and activist, Isabel was a true Lanesville native, growing up next to her grandparents Manship property and across the street from her Uncle Eino Natti, a member of the Folly Cove Designers (FCD). Throughout her life, Isabel pursued her passion for science and art in ways that often brought them together. She apprenticed with FCD Sarah Elizabeth Holloran and carried on the tradition of this historic guild at her teacher’s shop in Rockport’s Whistlestop Mall for decades.

Elizabeth "Chou Chou" Manship Solomon (1921-2019)

"Chou Chou," the daughter of Paul Manship, served as a WAC in World War II and as an illustrator for the base newsweekly. She married Will Solomon, an Army Sergeant whom she met in New Guinea during the war. The couple would eventually settle in California, where they raise their family. Chou Chou spent a few vacations East at her family's summer residence in Lanesville. Like her siblings, she was naturally talented. She studied art at the Art Students League in New York, and much later at Sacramento State College. Her paintings show the tension of movement in bodies -- expressing their three-dimensionality was important to her.

Elizabeth Solomon, Puffins, March 2008, Private Collection

View across Manship Quarry, 1945, Lanesville

Virginia Lee Burton Demetrios + Leon Kroll in the Manship Parlor, about 1946, Lanesville

Paul Manship, Standing on the Foundation of his Barn Studio, 1945, Lanesville

“It is always a gift to be able to paint in magnificent surrounds, particularly where so much intense creative work has been and continues to be done and the spirit is palpable." - Peter Herbert, Outside @ Manship 2020 Artist

A HAVEN FOR ARTISTS

Gifford Beal (1879-1956)

View of the Congregationalist Church, 1943

Cape Ann has long been a haven for artists. For at least 175 years artists have been attracted to this coastal region for its special light, for the topography and its characteristic New England architecture, and for the raw authenticity of its working community and lively waterfront. Sculptor Paul Manship started summering in Rockport and Gloucester in 1940. He and his family became so enamored of the locale, of the local people, and of the opportunity to spend time with his fellow visiting artist friends from NYC that Manship determined to purchase a former granite quarry and develop an idyllic setting for his family’s summer residence and his studio. In 1944, Manship acquired just over 15 acres with a stunning view of the Lanesville Orthodox Congregational Church steeple across the quarry in the heart of this Finnish, fishing village in Gloucester.

Michael Stoffa (1923-2001)

View of Manships, July 23, 1980

Manship worked with his architect friend Eric Gugler to design the house and buildings so that they seemed as if they had been here for a hundred years. They devoted particular attention to the landscape, balancing the natural with the manmade. Manship created distinct “rooms” to show off his sculpture and left other areas wild for much of the year in order to ensure that the native flora and fauna flourished. This aesthetically stunning natural setting has been home for three generations of the Manship family of artists. The nonprofit Manship Artists Residency + Studios purchased the property from the estate of Paul’s daughter-in-law, Margaret Cassidy Manship to ensure that this historic and environmentally-significant site could host today’s and future generations of artists while continuing the legacy of working artists creating community on Cape Ann.

“It is a beautiful place to paint, and

it feels good to be in a place steeped in Cape Ann tradition.”

- Outside @ Manship 2020 Artist

Photo credits: Tishman Speyer - Bart Barlow Photographer; The Paul Manship Family Papers; Worth Point; The Solomon Family.

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