Exuberance on Paper: The Drawings of Gaston Lachaise

"The Lachaise Foundation is pleased to present from its collection a selection of never-before-published drawings of Gaston Lachaise, which make their debut in the historic buildings of the New York Studio School, the site of Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney's studio and the first Whitney Museum (1931). The Studio School has, since its inception under Mercedes Matter and for the last 27 years under Dean Graham Nickson, placed great importance on the art of drawing. That Lachaise drawings have returned to the walls of the first Whitney, now a school for artists, is magical.

These elegant drawings, which have "the same flow of movement, the same serene power as his stones," to quote Gilbert Seldes, should transport whoever stands within these hallowed halls, to a place of pure art. Lachaise never taught, believing he could not teach what should come naturally. Yet in these drawings lies his teaching."

          - Paula Hornbostel