By: Youheng Zhong

A museum curator, college professor, collector, and author. Four careers, one life, one dream. The dream? Bring American art to the eyes of the public.

On June 6th, the art world mourned the loss of John Wilmerding, an influential figure in promoting American art, a revered collector, and an esteemed professor who passed away at the age of 86 due to complications of congestive heart failure.

Before the 1960s, American art was almost unknown to the world and severely underappreciated. It had no distinct identity, and American artists often made their art with European conventions, making American art’s identity muddled with European art, which was much more famous. There were little to no sources, courses, or exhibitions on American art. In fact, if anyone wanted to read the entire bibliography of American art, it was possible to finish it over a single summer. Today, that would be physically impossible, thanks to John Wilmerding.

John Wilmerding was born on April 28th, 1938, in Boston and grew up on Long Island in New York. His father was a banker and yachtsman. When he grew up, John Wilmerding attended Harvard, initially planning on studying American Literature. While he was there, one of his friends recommended him an introductory art history class, called Darkness at Noon because it was held in the basement of the campus art museum. “When the lights went out, there was this world of visual images that struck a nerve with me instantly, and the realization early on that you could look at facades or a ground plan — it didn’t matter from where or when — and suddenly a whole culture came to life. That was the experience that set me on the track.” says Mr. Wilmerding.

During his life, John Wilmerding was a museum curator, college professor, and author. Throughout all these careers, he helped bring to light the importance of American art and established it as a subject worthy of serious study — just like European art. As an author, he wrote and published more than 20 books on American art, including “American Masterpieces: Singular Expressions of National Genius” (2019), which is a collection of essays on the great works of American art and design. During his time as a museum curator, he curated “American Light: The Luminist Movement, 1850-1975”, one of the most important exhibitions of American art over the last 50 years, at the National Gallery in 1980. This exhibition helped bring mid-19th century American landscape painting to a wider audience. When he became a professor at Dartmouth and Princeton, he taught art history, teaching new generations the importance and culture of American art.

Mr. Wilmerding’s ultimate accomplishment, says art critic Paul Richard, was having “shown the public something we have not seen before.” And he has indeed accomplished that, as today, American art is just as recognized as its European counterparts.
That is John Wilmerding’s legacy.

Sources:
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/14/arts/john-wilmerding-dead.html
https://www.wsj.com/arts-culture/fine-art/john-wilmerding-1938-2024-3961f8df