The Art Students League Of New York – 150 Stories Book
The 150 Stories Book: Lives of the Artists at the League
An Interview With Michael Hort Of Earth Enterprise In NYC
150 Stories: Lives of the Artists at the League is a groundbreaking anthology featuring 150 artists who have studied or taught at the renowned art school since its founding in 1875, illuminating the broader artistic legacy of those who have passed through its studios.
Unlike conventional institutional histories, 150 Stories is an artist-centered collection of essays by nearly 140 contributing scholars, critics, artists, and curators, that focuses on the often-overlooked period of early artistic formation, offering closely observed portraits of artists in development.
From Georgia O’Keeffe to Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko to Louise Nevelson, Ai Weiwei to James Little, the Art Students League has been a major force in shaping American art. Created in 1875, at the dawn of New York’s influence in the international art scene, a small group of tenacious artists broke off from the National Academy of Design. The Academy had been influential on the development of American art in the 19th century, but the young founders of the League, influenced by the work of European modernists, found the Academy’s instruction to be too conservative—and ultimately unsympathetic to their new ideas about what art could be and accomplish.
The League 150 Anniversary Book Project: Q&A
Q: So what exactly was this project about?
A: These are a collection of 150 stories about the lives of the art students at the League.
Q: Are these biographies of artists who participated? Are some of them very famous?
A: Yes, some of them are very, very famous.
Q: Do you have a book or reference material about them?
A: Unfortunately, I don’t have a book. But we did decide together who would be featured.
Q: How did you decide who to include? Did they find you, or did you know somebody who helped you get to print it? Or did they come to you directly?
A: It was years ago—I couldn’t say exactly, but we’ve been printing for them for about ten years. They’re a long-time customer, though we’d never done their art before.
Q: So who decided to do these 150 stories as a homage to the effort? Is this a compilation of stories that happened over the 150 years? Are these all new, or did you go back to commemorate?
A: A lot of it was new, but I’m sure they took information from older sources.
Q: Let’s use Helen Far Sloan as an example. Was this particular story written 50 years ago, or was it just written now?
A: It was rewritten now, for sure.
Q: How many copies did they do, and how many pages?
A: 3,000 copies and it has Gold gilding as well.
Q: And the cover art—how is the cover done?
A: It’s foil and debossed and sold retail for $250 per book.
Q: What were some of the challenges that you needed to overcome to get this to work?
A: The main challenge was there was a lot of back-and-forth time to get this thing done. It was like having to be a full time project manager—they wanted it done by one time, the due date would take us through that anniversary, and then more chnages were made and we still had to meet the delivery schedule.
Q: I got you. So what types of corrections were you making? What kind of corrections were being done—were they changing text only?
A: Mostly text.
Q: Were they happy with the final product?
A: “Beautiful Books, Fabulous Job!” –JJ Loonam –Director of Communications
Interviewer: Very impressive! Nobody else could pull this off except Earth Enterprise and Michael Hort!
