The National Arts Club is a

501(c)(3) A 501(c)(3) organization is a United States corporation, trust, unincorporated association or other type of organization exempt from federal income tax under section 501(c)(3) of Title 26 of the United States Code. It is one of the 29 types of 50 ...

nonprofit and members club on Gramercy Park,

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

. It was founded in 1898 by

Charles DeKay Charles Augustus de Kay (July 25, 1848 – May 23, 1935) was a linguist, poet, critic, and fencer. He was a son of George Coleman De Kay, a naval officer. He graduated from Yale College in 1868. He was best known for founding the National Sculp ...

, an art and literary critic of the ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

'' to "stimulate, foster, and promote public interest in the arts and to educate the American people in the fine arts". The National Arts Club has several art galleries, and hosts a variety of public programs in all artistic areas including theater, literature and music. Although the club is private, many of its events are free and open to the public. Since 1906 the organization has occupied the

Samuel J. Tilden House The Samuel J. Tilden House is a historic townhouse pair at 14-15 Gramercy Park South in Manhattan, New York City. Built in 1845, it was the home of Samuel J. Tilden (1814–1886), former governor of New York, a fierce opponent of the Tweed R ...

, a landmarked Victorian Gothic Revival"National Arts Club Designation Report"

New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission The New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) is the New York City agency charged with administering the city's Landmarks Preservation Law. The LPC is responsible for protecting New York City's architecturally, historically, and cu ...

(March 15, 1966)

brownstone Brownstone is a brown Triassic–Jurassic sandstone that was historically a popular building material. The term is also used in the United States and Canada to refer to a townhouse clad in this or any other aesthetically similar material. Type ...

at 15 Gramercy Park, next door to The Players, a club with similar interests. The National Arts Club allows members access to a Gramercy Park key. The Tilden House was designated a

New York City landmark The New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) is the New York City agency charged with administering the city's Landmarks Preservation Law. The LPC is responsible for protecting New York City's architecturally, historically, and cu ...

in 1966,, p.86 and declared a

National Historic Landmark A National Historic Landmark (NHL) is a building, district, object, site, or structure that is officially recognized by the United States government for its outstanding historical significance. Only some 2,500 (~3%) of over 90,000 places listed ...

in 1976. It is located in the

Gramercy Park Historic District Gramercy means 'many thanks'. It is derived from the French term , meaning 'big thanks'. The term may refer to: Places in the United States * Gramercy, Louisiana * Gramercy Park, a private park and neighborhood in New York City * Gramercy Park, ...

History

A group of friends, all of them involved in architecture, art, or civic affairs, discussed the possibility of a new kind of club that would embrace all the arts. The establishment of the Club came at a time when American artists were increasingly turning to their own nation rather than exclusively to Europe as a center of work and creativity. Significantly, the club would offer full membership for women at the onset, reflecting their accomplishment in the arts. WestParlor

While the group was working out an organizational plan,

, the literary and art critic of the ''

'' for 18 years, returned from a diplomatic post abroad. An inspired organizer and entrepreneur, he sent letters to men and women of importance in the New York area as well as in metropolitan areas across the country. The response was so enthusiastic that the club was able to apply to Albany for its charter in 1898. With the application went a list of the officers, Board of Trustees, and members totaling more than 1200. The list included such collectors as

Henry Frick Henry Clay Frick (December 19, 1849 – December 2, 1919) was an American industrialist, financier, and art patron. He founded the H. C. Frick & Company coke manufacturing company, was chairman of the Carnegie Steel Company, and played a major ...

William T. Evans William T. Evans (1843 - November 25, 1918) was an American art collector. Life He was born in Ireland, and grew up in Scotch Plains, New Jersey. He studied architecture at the New York Free School. He was President of the Mills & Gibb, and Mill ...

, Benjamin Altman,

Jules Bache Jules Semon Bache (November 9, 1861 – March 24, 1944) was an American banker, art collector and philanthropist. Early life Julius Bache was born to a Jewish family in New York City. His father, Semon Bache é Bach(1826–1891), emigrated ...

and

Henry Walters Henry Walters (September 26, 1848 – November 30, 1931) was noted as an art collector and philanthropist, a founder of the Walters Art Gallery (now the Walters Art Museum) in Baltimore, Maryland, which he donated to the city in his 1931 will f ...

. Though not a charter member, J. Pierpont Morgan joined the Club early in its development and later was made an Honorary Vice President. Among the artists of the period, earlier charter members, or those joined in the early days of the club were

Frederic Remington Frederic Sackrider Remington (October 4, 1861 – December 26, 1909) was an American painter, illustrator, sculptor, and writer who specialized in the genre of Western American Art. His works are known for depicting the Western United State ...

William Merritt Chase William Merritt Chase (November 1, 1849October 25, 1916) was an American painter, known as an exponent of Impressionism and as a teacher. He is also responsible for establishing the Chase School, which later would become Parsons School of Design. ...

Robert Henri Robert Henri (; June 24, 1865 – July 12, 1929) was an American painter and teacher. As a young man, he studied in Paris, where he identified strongly with the Impressionists, and determined to lead an even more dramatic revolt against A ...

, and

George Bellows George Wesley Bellows (August 12 or August 19, 1882 – January 8, 1925) was an American realism, American realist painting, painter, known for his bold depictions of urban life in New York City. He became, according to the Columbus Museum of Art ...

. The club's first home was a brownstone on West 34th Street. Commerce, meanwhile, was moving up from downtown, and the neighborhood of brownstones was changing.

Spencer Trask Spencer Trask (September 18, 1844 – December 31, 1909) was an American financier, philanthropist, and venture capitalist. Beginning in the 1870s, Trask began investing and supporting entrepreneurs, including Thomas Edison's invention of the ele ...

, its treasurer, was asked to find the club a new home. He found that 14 and 15 Gramercy Park South, the former home of

Samuel Tilden Samuel Jones Tilden (February 9, 1814 – August 4, 1886) was an American politician who served as the 25th Governor of New York and was the Democratic candidate for president in the disputed 1876 United States presidential election. Tilden was ...

, was on the market. Legend has it that he was so afraid that some other buyer would also find it that he put down some money of his own to bind the bargain. In 1906, the club acquired the

. During the 2006 restoration of the Tilden mansion's stoop, the Brazilian New York City artist

Sergio Rossetti Morosini Sergio Rossetti Morosini (born 1953) is a Brazilian-American Scholar, artist and author of Venetian extraction who served as Brazil's Cultural attaché in New Orleans and is dedicated to preserving the Atlantic Forest and restoring the art in st ...

has now sculpted a bust of

Michelangelo Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni (; 6 March 1475 – 18 February 1564), known as Michelangelo (), was an Italian sculptor, painter, architect, and poet of the High Renaissance. Born in the Republic of Florence, his work was insp ...

above the front door on the building's façade. In 2018, Ben Hartley, an arts administrator, was appointed executive director of the club.

Members

The National Arts Club is one of the few private clubs that has admitted women as full and equal members since its inception. Among the distinguished painters who have been members are

Leon Dabo Leon Dabo (July 9, 1864 – November 7, 1960) was an American tonalist landscape artist best known for his paintings of New York, particularly the Hudson Valley. His paintings were known for their feeling of spaciousness, with large areas of the ...

Edward Charles Volkert Edward Charles Volkert (1871–1935) was an American Impressionist artist best known for his colorful and richly painted impressionist landscapes. His trademark subject was that of cattle and plowmen. His style is noted for its impressionist u ...

, Richard C. Pionk,

Chen Chi Chen Chi (1912–2005) was a renowned Chinese-American painter who lived and worked for much of his career in the United States. Chi was born in Wuxi, Jiangsu, China in 1912. He taught painting at the Wu Pen and Huai Chiu high schools for girls ...

Larry Rivers Larry Rivers (born Yitzroch Loiza Grossberg) (1923 – 2002) was an American artist, musician, filmmaker, and occasional actor. Considered by many scholars to be the "Godfather" and "Grandfather" of Pop art, he was one of the first artists ...

Louise Upton Brumback Louise Upton Brumback (January 17, 1867 – February 22, 1929) was an American artist and art activist known principally for her landscapes and marine scenes. Her paintings won praise from the critics and art collectors of her time. Writing ...

Cecilia Beaux Eliza Cecilia Beaux (May 1, 1855 – September 17, 1942) was an American society portraitist, whose subjects included First Lady Edith Roosevelt, Admiral Sir David Beatty and Georges Clemenceau. Trained in Philadelphia, she went on to study in ...

Will Barnet Will Barnet (May 25, 1911November 13, 2012) was an American artist known for his paintings, watercolors, drawings, and prints depicting the human figure and animals, both in casual scenes of daily life and in transcendent dreamlike worlds. Bi ...

Everett Raymond Kinstler Everett Raymond Kinstler (August 5, 1926 – May 26, 2019) was an American artist, whose official portraits include Presidents Gerald Ford and Ronald Reagan.Augustus Saint-Gaudens Augustus Saint-Gaudens (; March 1, 1848 – August 3, 1907) was an American sculptor of the Beaux-Arts generation who embodied the ideals of the American Renaissance. From a French-Irish family, Saint-Gaudens was raised in New York City, he trave ...

Daniel Chester French Daniel Chester French (April 20, 1850 – October 7, 1931) was an American sculptor of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, best known for his 1874 sculpture ''The Minute Man'' in Concord, Massachusetts, and his 1920 monume ...

Anna Hyatt Huntington Anna Vaughn Hyatt Huntington (March 10, 1876 – October 4, 1973) was an American sculptor who was among New York City's most prominent sculptors in the early 20th century. At a time when very few women were successful artists, she had a thrivi ...

and

Paul Manship Paul Howard Manship (December 24, 1885 – January 28, 1966) was an American sculptor. He consistently created mythological pieces in a classical style, and was a major force in the Art Deco movement. He is well known for his large public com ...

. Many renowned literary figures, including

Robert William Service Robert William Service (January 16, 1874 – September 11, 1958) was a British-Canadian poet and writer, often called "the Bard of the Yukon". The middle name 'William' was in honour of a rich uncle. When that uncle neglected to provide for hi ...

in 1910,

W. H. Auden Wystan Hugh Auden (; 21 February 1907 – 29 September 1973) was a British-American poet. Auden's poetry was noted for its stylistic and technical achievement, its engagement with politics, morals, love, and religion, and its variety in ...

Mark Twain Samuel Langhorne Clemens (November 30, 1835 – April 21, 1910), known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American writer, humorist, entrepreneur, publisher, and lecturer. He was praised as the "greatest humorist the United States has p ...

and

Frank McCourt Francis McCourt (August 19, 1930July 19, 2009) was an Irish-American teacher and writer. He won a Pulitzer Prize for his book ''Angela's Ashes'', a tragicomic memoir of the misery and squalor of his childhood. Early life and education Frank Mc ...

have been members. The National Arts Club is proud of its early recognition of new media art forms, like photography, film and digital media, and counts

Alfred Stieglitz Alfred Stieglitz (January 1, 1864 – July 13, 1946) was an American photographer and modern art promoter who was instrumental over his 50-year career in making photography an accepted art form. In addition to his photography, Stieglitz was kno ...

as one of its early members. Musicians

Victor Herbert Victor August Herbert (February 1, 1859 – May 26, 1924) was an American composer, cellist and conductor of English and Irish ancestry and German training. Although Herbert enjoyed important careers as a cello soloist and conductor, he is be ...

and

Walter Damrosch Walter Johannes Damrosch (January 30, 1862December 22, 1950) was a German-born American conductor and composer. He was the director of the New York Symphony Orchestra and conducted the world premiere performances of various works, including Geo ...

were members, as were architects

Stanford White Stanford White (November 9, 1853 – June 25, 1906) was an American architect. He was also a partner in the architectural firm McKim, Mead & White, one of the most significant Beaux-Arts firms. He designed many houses for the rich, in additio ...

, George B. Post, and

Downing Vaux Downing Vaux (November 14, 1856 – May 15, 1926) was an American landscape architect. Vaux was one of the eleven founding members of the American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA) in 1899. Career Born to Calvert Vaux, a noted architect ...

. George B. Post served as the first President of the National Arts Club. The membership of the National Arts Club has included three

Presidents of the United States The president of the United States is the head of state and head of government of the United States, indirectly elected to a four-year term via the Electoral College. The officeholder leads the executive branch of the federal government and ...

Theodore Roosevelt Theodore Roosevelt Jr. ( ; October 27, 1858 – January 6, 1919), often referred to as Teddy or by his initials, T. R., was an American politician, statesman, soldier, conservationist, naturalist, historian, and writer who served as the 26t ...

Woodrow Wilson Thomas Woodrow Wilson (December 28, 1856February 3, 1924) was an American politician and academic who served as the 28th president of the United States from 1913 to 1921. A member of the Democratic Party, Wilson served as the president of ...

and

Dwight Eisenhower Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower (born David Dwight Eisenhower; ; October 14, 1890 – March 28, 1969) was an American military officer and statesman who served as the 34th president of the United States from 1953 to 1961. During World War II, ...

along with Senator

William A. Clark William Andrews Clark Sr. (January 8, 1839March 2, 1925) was an American politician and entrepreneur, involved with mining, banking, and railroads. Biography Clark was born in Connellsville, Pennsylvania. He moved with his family to Iowa in 1 ...

Permanent collection

As of 2019, the club holds a permanent collection of 660 works of art including paintings, sculptures, and other works on paper. Artists represented in the collection include

Daniel Putnam Brinley Daniel Putnam Brinley (March 8, 1879 – July 31, 1963) was an American muralist and painter. He was born in Newport, Rhode Island, the son of Edward Huntington Brinley and Rebecca Maitland Porter Brinley. Brinley spent his childhood at his parent ...

Charles Courtney Curran Charles Courtney Curran (13 February 1861 – 9 November 1942) was an American painter. He is best known for his canvases depicting women in various settings. Biography Curran was born in Hartford, Kentucky in February, 1861, where his father ...

Daniel Garber Daniel Garber (April 11, 1880 – July 5, 1958) was an American Impressionist landscape painter and member of the art colony at New Hope, Pennsylvania. He is best known today for his large impressionist scenes of the New Hope area, in which he o ...

Philip Leslie Hale Philip Leslie Hale (1865–1931) was an American Impressionism, American Impressionist artist, writer and teacher. His work was part of the Art competitions at the 1932 Summer Olympics#Painting, painting event in the Art competitions at the 1932 ...

Gari Melchers Julius Garibaldi Melchers (August 11, 1860 – November 30, 1932) was an American artist. He was one of the leading American proponents of Naturalism (art), naturalism. He won a 1932 Gold medal from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. Bio ...

William McGregor Paxton William McGregor Paxton (June 22, 1869 – 1941) was an American painter and instructor who embraced the Boston School paradigm and was a co-founder of The Guild of Boston Artists. He taught briefly while a student at Cowles Art School, wher ...

, Robert Spencer,

Harry Willson Watrous Harry Willson Watrous (17 September 1857 – 10 May 1940) was an American artist who received an academic education in France. His paintings included genre scenes, stylized figural works, landscapes, nocturnes, portraits, religious subjects, and ...

Robert Vonnoh Robert William Vonnoh (September 17, 1858 – 28 December 1933) was an American Impressionist painter known for his portraits and landscapes. He traveled extensively between the American East Coast and France, more specifically the artists c ...

, Everett Longley Warner,

, Homer Boss,

F. Luis Mora Francis Luis Mora (July 27, 1874 – June 5, 1940) was a Uruguayan-born American figural painter. Mora worked in watercolor, oils and tempera. He produced drawings in pen and ink, and graphite; and etchings and monotypes. He is known for his pain ...

Eugene Speicher Eugene (Edward) Speicher NA (April 5, 1883 – May 11, 1962) was an American portrait, landscape, and figurative painter. He was one of the foremost realists of his generation who closely upheld the mantle of his mentor, Robert Henri. Biography ...

Jerry Farnsworth Jerry Farnsworth (1895–1983) was an American artist. He was born in Dalton, Georgia and studied at the Corcoran School of Art under Charles W. Hawthorne. During 1942 and 1943 he was the Artist-in-Residence at the University of Illinois. Farnsw ...

, Lamarr Dodd, Birge Harrison,

Paul Cornoyer Paul Cornoyer (1864–1923) was an American painter, currently best known for his popularly reproduced painting in an Impressionist, tonalist, and sometimes pointillist style. Born in St. Louis, Missouri, Cornoyer began painting in Barbizon styl ...

Malvina Hoffman Malvina Cornell Hoffman (June 15, 1885July 10, 1966) was an American sculptor and author, well known for her life-size bronze sculptures of people. She also worked in plaster and marble. Hoffman created portrait busts of working-class people and ...

Lee Lawrie Lee Oscar Lawrie (October 16, 1877 – January 23, 1963) was an American architectural sculptor and a key figure in the American art scene preceding World War II. Over his long career of more than 300 commissions Lawrie's style evolved through ...

, Victor Brenner,

, Peter Cox, Gary Erbe, Diana Kan,

Kendall Shaw George Kendall Shaw (March 30, 1924 – October 18, 2019) was an American painter who was based in New Orleans, with a career spanning a number of art styles—ranging from abstract expressionism to pop art to minimalism to pattern and design ...

, and

Lois Dodd Lois Dodd (born 1927 in Montclair, New Jersey) is an American painter. Dodd was a key member of New York's postwar art scene. She played a large part and was involved in the wave of modern artists including Alex Katz and Yvonne Jacquette who exp ...

. In keeping with its goal of supporting research in American art, the club frequently loans works from the collection to scholarly exhibitions presented by institutions and galleries such as the

Florence Griswold Museum The Florence Griswold Museum is an Art Museum at 96 Lyme Street in Old Lyme, Connecticut centered on the home of Florence Griswold (1850–1937), which was the center of the Old Lyme Art Colony, a main nexus of American Impressionism. The Museum is ...

; the Thomas Walsh Gallery,

Fairfield University Fairfield University is a private Jesuit university in Fairfield, Connecticut. It was founded by the Jesuits in 1942. In 2017, the university had about 4,100 full-time undergraduate students and 1,100 graduate students, including full-time ...

; the Trout Gallery,

Dickinson College , mottoeng = Freedom is made safe through character and learning , established = , type = Private liberal arts college , endowment = $645.5 million (2022) , president = J ...

; the

Society of Illustrators The Society of Illustrators is a professional society based in New York City. It was founded in 1901 to promote the art of illustration and, since 1959, has held an annual exhibition. History Founding The Society of Illustrators was founded on ...

, New York; and Berry-Hill Galleries, New York. In 2019, the club partnered with the Google Cultural Institute to make many pieces from the collection available online.

Medal of Honor

Since the early 1900s, the club has awarded its prestigious Medal of Honor to exemplary leaders in their respective artistic fields. Recipients of the award include

WH Auden Wystan Hugh Auden (; 21 February 1907 – 29 September 1973) was a British-American poet. Auden's poetry was noted for its stylistic and technical achievement, its engagement with politics, morals, love, and religion, and its variety in ...

Anthony Burgess John Anthony Burgess Wilson, (; 25 February 1917 – 22 November 1993), who published under the name Anthony Burgess, was an English writer and composer. Although Burgess was primarily a comic writer, his Utopian and dystopian fiction, d ...

Eudora Welty Eudora Alice Welty (April 13, 1909 – July 23, 2001) was an American short story writer, novelist and photographer who wrote about the American South. Her novel ''The Optimist's Daughter'' won the Pulitzer Prize in 1973. Welty received numero ...

Tennessee Williams Thomas Lanier Williams III (March 26, 1911 – February 25, 1983), known by his pen name Tennessee Williams, was an American playwright and screenwriter. Along with contemporaries Eugene O'Neill and Arthur Miller, he is considered among the thre ...

Norman Mailer Nachem Malech Mailer (January 31, 1923 – November 10, 2007), known by his pen name Norman Kingsley Mailer, was an American novelist, journalist, essayist, playwright, activist, filmmaker and actor. In a career spanning over six decades, Mailer ...

Saul Bellow Saul Bellow (born Solomon Bellows; 10 July 1915 – 5 April 2005) was a Canadian-born American writer. For his literary work, Bellow was awarded the Pulitzer Prize, the Nobel Prize for Literature, and the National Medal of Arts. He is the only wr ...

Allen Ginsberg Irwin Allen Ginsberg (; June 3, 1926 – April 5, 1997) was an American poet and writer. As a student at Columbia University in the 1940s, he began friendships with William S. Burroughs and Jack Kerouac, forming the core of the Beat Gener ...

John Updike John Hoyer Updike (March 18, 1932 – January 27, 2009) was an American novelist, poet, short-story writer, art critic, and literary critic. One of only four writers to win the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction more than once (the others being Booth ...

Marguerite Yourcenar Marguerite Yourcenar (, , ; born Marguerite Antoinette Jeanne Marie Ghislaine Cleenewerck de Crayencour; 8 June 1903 – 17 December 1987) was a Belgian-born French novelist and essayist, who became a US citizen in 1947. Winner of the ''Prix Fem ...

Iris Murdoch Dame Jean Iris Murdoch ( ; 15 July 1919 – 8 February 1999) was an Irish and British novelist and philosopher. Murdoch is best known for her novels about good and evil, sexual relationships, morality, and the power of the unconscious. Her fi ...

Philip Roth Philip Milton Roth (March 19, 1933 – May 22, 2018) was an American novelist and short story writer. Roth's fiction—often set in his birthplace of Newark, New Jersey—is known for its intensely autobiographical character, for philosophicall ...

Salman Rushdie Sir Ahmed Salman Rushdie (; born 19 June 1947) is an Indian-born British-American novelist. His work often combines magic realism with historical fiction and primarily deals with connections, disruptions, and migrations between Eastern and Wes ...

Arthur Miller Arthur Asher Miller (October 17, 1915 – February 10, 2005) was an American playwright, essayist and screenwriter in the 20th-century American theater. Among his most popular plays are '' All My Sons'' (1947), ''Death of a Salesman'' ( ...

Margaret Atwood Margaret Eleanor Atwood (born November 18, 1939) is a Canadian poet, novelist, literary critic, essayist, teacher, environmental activist, and inventor. Since 1961, she has published 18 books of poetry, 18 novels, 11 books of non-fiction, nin ...

Toni Morrison Chloe Anthony Wofford Morrison (born Chloe Ardelia Wofford; February 18, 1931 – August 5, 2019), known as Toni Morrison, was an American novelist. Her first novel, ''The Bluest Eye'', was published in 1970. The critically acclaimed '' So ...

Nadine Gordimer Nadine Gordimer (20 November 192313 July 2014) was a South African writer and political activist. She received the 1991 Nobel Prize in Literature, Nobel Prize in Literature in 1991, recognized as a writer "who through her magnificent epic writin ...

Tom Wolfe Thomas Kennerly Wolfe Jr. (March 2, 1930 – May 14, 2018)Some sources say 1931; ''The New York Times'' and Reuters both initially reported 1931 in their obituaries before changing to 1930. See and was an American author and journalist widely ...

Chinua Achebe Chinua Achebe (; 16 November 1930 – 21 March 2013) was a Nigerian novelist, poet, and critic who is regarded as the dominant figure of modern African literature. His first novel and ''magnum opus'', ''Things Fall Apart'' (1958), occupies ...

Don DeLillo Donald Richard DeLillo (born November 20, 1936) is an American novelist, short story writer, playwright, screenwriter and essayist. His works have covered subjects as diverse as television, nuclear war, sports, the complexities of language, per ...

Joyce Carol Oates Joyce Carol Oates (born June 16, 1938) is an American writer. Oates published her first book in 1963, and has since published 58 novels, a number of plays and novellas, and many volumes of short stories, poetry, and non-fiction. Her novels '' Bla ...

, Martin Amis,

John Ashbery John Lawrence Ashbery (July 28, 1927 – September 3, 2017) was an American poet and art critic. Ashbery is considered the most influential American poet of his time. Oxford University literary critic John Bayley wrote that Ashbery "sounded, in ...

Leonard Bernstein Leonard Bernstein ( ; August 25, 1918 – October 14, 1990) was an American conductor, composer, pianist, music educator, author, and humanitarian. Considered to be one of the most important conductors of his time, he was the first America ...

Alice Tully Alice Bigelow Tully (September 14, 1902 – December 10, 1993) was an American singer of opera and recital, music promoter, patron of the arts and philanthropist from New York. She was a second cousin of the American actress Katharine Hepburn. ...

, Avery Fisher, Amyas Ames and the

New York Philharmonic The New York Philharmonic, officially the Philharmonic-Symphony Society of New York, Inc., globally known as New York Philharmonic Orchestra (NYPO) or New York Philharmonic-Symphony Orchestra, is a symphony orchestra based in New York City. It is ...

Frederica von Stade Frederica von Stade OAL (born June 1, 1945) is a semi-retired American opera singer. Since her Metropolitan Opera debut in 1970, she has performed in operas, musicals, concerts and recitals in venues throughout the world, including La Scala, th ...

Benny Goodman Benjamin David Goodman (May 30, 1909 – June 13, 1986) was an American clarinetist and bandleader known as the "King of Swing". From 1936 until the mid-1940s, Goodman led one of the most popular swing big bands in the United States. His co ...

Isaac Stern Isaac Stern (July 21, 1920 – September 22, 2001) was an American violinist. Born in Poland, Stern came to the US when he was 14 months old. Stern performed both nationally and internationally, notably touring the Soviet Union and China, and ...

James Levine James Lawrence Levine (; June 23, 1943 – March 9, 2021) was an American conductor and pianist. He was music director of the Metropolitan Opera from 1976 to 2016. He was terminated from all his positions and affiliations with the Met on March 1 ...

Plácido Domingo José Plácido Domingo Embil (born 21 January 1941) is a Spanish opera singer, conductor, and arts administrator. He has recorded over a hundred complete operas and is well known for his versatility, regularly performing in Italian, French, ...

, Itzhak Perlman,

Paddy Moloney Paddy Moloney ( ga, Pádraig Ó Maoldomhnaigh; 1 August 1938 – 12 October 2021) was an Irish musician, composer, and record producer. He co-founded and led the Irish musical group the Chieftains, playing on all of their 44 albums. He was parti ...

Byron Janis Byron Janis (born March 24, 1928) is an American classical pianist. He made several recordings for RCA Victor and Mercury Records, and occupies two volumes of the Philips series ''Great Pianists of the 20th Century''. His discography covers rep ...

Ilse Bing Ilse Bing (23 March 1899 – 10 March 1998) was a German avant-garde and commercial photographer who produced pioneering monochrome images during the inter-war era. Biography Background and early life Bing was born to a wealthy Jewish famil ...

Manuel Alvarez Bravo Manuel may refer to: People * Manuel (name) * Manuel (Fawlty Towers), a fictional character from the sitcom ''Fawlty Towers'' * Charlie Manuel, manager of the Philadelphia Phillies * Manuel I Komnenos, emperor of the Byzantine Empire * M ...

John Szarkowski Thaddeus John Szarkowski (December 18, 1925 – July 7, 2007) was an American photographer, curator, historian, and critic. From 1962 to 1991 Szarkowski was the director of photography at New York's Museum of Modern Art (MoMA). Early life and ca ...

Inge Morath Ingeborg Hermine Morath (; 27 May 1923 – 30 January 2002) was an Austrian photographer. In 1953, she joined the Magnum Photos Agency, founded by top photographers in Paris, and became a full photographer with the agency in 1955. Morath was the ...

, George Kalinsky, R. Buckminster Fuller,

I.M. Pei Ieoh Ming Pei
– website of Pei Cobb Freed & Partners ( ; ; April 26, 1917 – May 16, 2019) was ...

Daniel Libeskind Daniel Libeskind (born May 12, 1946) is a Polish–American architect, artist, professor and set designer. Libeskind founded Studio Daniel Libeskind in 1989 with his wife, Nina, and is its principal design architect. He is known for the design a ...

Skidmore, Owings, and Merrill Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM) is an American architectural, urban planning and engineering firm. It was founded in 1936 by Louis Skidmore and Nathaniel Owings in Chicago, Illinois. In 1939, they were joined by engineer John Merrill. The fir ...

, Robert A. Stern,

Eleanor Roosevelt Anna Eleanor Roosevelt () (October 11, 1884November 7, 1962) was an American political figure, diplomat, and activist. She was the first lady of the United States from 1933 to 1945, during her husband President Franklin D. Roosevelt's four ...

Salvador Dalí Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dalí i Domènech, Marquess of Dalí of Púbol (; ; ; 11 May 190423 January 1989) was a Spanish Surrealism, surrealist artist renowned for his technical skill, precise draftsmanship, and the striking and bizarr ...

Louise Nevelson Louise Nevelson (September 23, 1899 – April 17, 1988) was an American sculptor known for her monumental, monochromatic, wooden wall pieces and outdoor sculptures. Born in the Poltava Governorate of the Russian Empire (present-day Kyiv Oblast, ...

, Stewart Klonis and The Art Students League,

Louise Bourgeois Louise Joséphine Bourgeois (; 25 December 191131 May 2010) was a French-American artist. Although she is best known for her large-scale sculpture and installation art, Bourgeois was also a prolific painter and printmaker. She explored a varie ...

Robert Rauschenberg Milton Ernest "Robert" Rauschenberg (October 22, 1925 – May 12, 2008) was an American painter and graphic artist whose early works anticipated the Pop art movement. Rauschenberg is well known for his Combines (1954–1964), a group of artwor ...

Christo Christo Vladimirov Javacheff (1935–2020) and Jeanne-Claude Denat de Guillebon (1935–2009), known as Christo and Jeanne-Claude, were artists noted for their large-scale, site-specific art, site-specific environmental art, environmental art i ...

Roy Lichtenstein Roy Fox Lichtenstein (; October 27, 1923 – September 29, 1997) was an American pop artist. During the 1960s, along with Andy Warhol, Jasper Johns, and James Rosenquist among others, he became a leading figure in the new art movement. Hi ...

Dale Chihuly Dale Chihuly () (born September 20, 1941) is an American glass artist and entrepreneur. He is best known in the field of blown glass, "moving it into the realm of large-scale sculpture". Early life Dale Patrick Chihuly was born on September 20 ...

Chuck Close Charles Thomas Close (July 5, 1940 – August 19, 2021) was an American painter, visual artist, and photographer who made massive-scale photorealist and abstract portraits of himself and others. Close also created photo portraits using a very l ...

James Turrell James Turrell (born May 6, 1943) is an American artist known for his work within the Light and Space movement. Much of Turrell's career has been devoted to a still-unfinished work, ''Roden Crater'', a natural cinder cone crater located outside ...

, James Moody,

Ed Ruscha Edward Joseph Ruscha IV (, ''roo-SHAY''; born December 16, 1937) is an American artist associated with the pop art movement. He has worked in the media of painting, printmaking, drawing, photography and film. He is also noted for creating severa ...

Spike Lee Shelton Jackson "Spike" Lee (born March 20, 1957) is an American film director, producer, screenwriter, and actor. His production company, 40 Acres and a Mule Filmworks, has produced more than 35 films since 1983. He made his directorial debut ...

Whoopi Goldberg Caryn Elaine Johnson (born November 13, 1955), known professionally as Whoopi Goldberg (), is an American actor, comedian, author, and television personality.Kuchwara, Michael (AP Drama Writer)"Whoopi Goldberg: A One-Woman Character Parade". ' ...

Richard Dreyfuss Richard Stephen Dreyfuss (; born Dreyfus; October 29, 1947) is an American actor. He is known for starring in popular films during the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s, including ''American Graffiti'' (1973), ''Jaws'' (1975), ''Close Encounters of the T ...

John Turturro John Michael Turturro (; born February 28, 1957) is an American actor and filmmaker. He is known for his contributions to the independent film movement. He has appeared in over sixty feature films and has worked frequently with the Coen brothers, ...

Lynn Redgrave Lynn Rachel Redgrave (8 March 1943 – 2 May 2010) was an English actress. She won two Golden Globe Awards throughout her career. A member of the Redgrave family of actors, Lynn trained in London before making her theatrical debut in 1962. By ...

Olympia Dukakis Olympia Dukakis (June 20, 1931 – May 1, 2021) was an American actress. She performed in more than 130 stage productions, more than 60 films and in 50 television series. Best known as a screen actress, she started her career in theater. Not lon ...

Ang Lee Ang Lee (; born October 23, 1954) is a Taiwanese filmmaker. Born in Pingtung County of southern Taiwan, Lee was educated in Taiwan and later in the United States. During his filmmaking career, he has received international critical and popula ...

Lin-Manuel Miranda Lin-Manuel Miranda (; born January 16, 1980) is an American songwriter, actor, playwright and filmmaker. He is known for creating the Broadway musicals ''Hamilton'' (2015) and ''In the Heights'' (2005), and the soundtracks for the Disney animate ...

Claire Bloom Patricia Claire Bloom (born 15 February 1931) is an English actress. She is known for leading roles in plays such as ''A Streetcar Named Desire,'' ''A Doll's House'', and '' Long Day's Journey into Night'', and has starred in nearly sixty film ...

Ellen Burstyn Ellen Burstyn (born Edna Rae Gillooly; December 7, 1932) is an American actress. Known for her portrayals of complicated women in dramas, she is the recipient of numerous accolades, including an Academy Award, a Tony Award, and two Primetime Em ...

, Patricia Field, Jack O'Brien,

Paul Auster Paul Benjamin Auster (born February 3, 1947) is an American writer and film director. His notable works include ''The New York Trilogy'' (1987), ''Moon Palace'' (1989), ''The Music of Chance'' (1990), ''The Book of Illusions'' (2002), ''The Broo ...

William Ivey Long William Ivey Long (born August 30, 1947) is an American costume designer for stage and film. His most notable work includes the Broadway shows '' The Producers'', '' Hairspray'', ''Nine'', '' Crazy for You'', ''Grey Gardens'', ''Young Frankenstein ...

, Dr. Neil DeGrasse Tyson, and

Anna Sui Anna Sui (; born August 4, 1964) is an American fashion designer. She was named one of the "Top 5 Fashion Icons of the Decade", and in 2009 earned the Geoffrey Beene Lifetime Achievement Award from the Council of Fashion Designers of America ( ...

Exhibitions

The club hosts a rotating series of public art exhibitions in its galleries. Works by

Pablo Picasso Pablo Ruiz Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist and Scenic design, theatre designer who spent most of his adult life in France. One of the most influential artists of the 20th ce ...

, Joan Míro, Ilya and Emilia Kabakov, Lissa Rivera,

Andy Warhol Andy Warhol (; born Andrew Warhola Jr.; August 6, 1928 – February 22, 1987) was an American visual artist, film director, and producer who was a leading figure in the visual art movement known as pop art. His works explore the relationsh ...

Keith Haring Keith Allen Haring (May 4, 1958 – February 16, 1990) was an American artist whose pop art emerged from the New York City graffiti subculture of the 1980s. His animated imagery has "become a widely recognized visual language". Much of his wor ...

, and many other renowned artists have been featured in the space. NAC SOHOVoicesOpening DEC2020 jkratochvil DSC 3045

In December 2020, the Club presented ''Voices of the Soho Renaissance,'' the first exhibition of artwork born out of the calls for social justice which transformed New York City's Soho neighborhood, following the murders of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor. The show was followed by ''What Happened This Summer: ART2HEART'', a second exhibition exploring the topic.

Societies within the club

Several smaller groups have existed within the National Arts Club: * The Discus, a short-lived eating and debating club. * The Vagabonds, a lunch group of writers, editors, printers, and illustrators. They met on Mondays in the grillroom of the Club. Members included

, Walter Alden Dyer,

Henry James Forman Henry James Forman (February 17, 1879 – January 3, 1966) was an author famous for his 1933 book '' Our Movie Made Children'', which was a summary of the Payne Fund Studies. The book has been described as an " alarmist tome", and was responsible ...

, Alexander Harvey, Forbes Lindsay, Mathias Sandor, Harry Peyton Steger, Ryan Walker, Edward Jewitt Wheeler,

Theodore Dreiser Theodore Herman Albert Dreiser (; August 27, 1871 – December 28, 1945) was an American novelist and journalist of the naturalist school. His novels often featured main characters who succeeded at their objectives despite a lack of a firm mora ...

Benjamin De Casseres Benjamin De Casseres (April 3, 1873 – December 7, 1945) (often DeCasseres) was an American journalist, critic, essayist and poet. He was born in Philadelphia and began working at the Philadelphia Press at an early age, but spent most of his p ...

Marius de Zayas Marius de Zayas Enriquez y Calmet (March 13, 1880 – January 10, 1961), was an early 20th-century Mexican artist, writer and art gallery owner who was influential in the New York arts circles of the 1910s and 1920s. Life De Zayas was born to we ...

,Wendy Wick Reaves, "Marius de Zayas: ''Spotlight on Personality''", chapter 4 of ''Celebrity Caricatures in America'', 1998, , p. 74 and

Andrew Carnegie Andrew Carnegie (, ; November 25, 1835August 11, 1919) was a Scottish-American industrialist and philanthropist. Carnegie led the expansion of the American steel industry in the late 19th century and became one of the richest Americans i ...

, who "humorously deplored the fact that he was not a vagabond". In 1907, Harvey founded their magazine or pamphlet ''The Bang'', which was published weekly until December 1917.Harvard University Libraries
catalog record
/ref> * The Men's Open Table, 1910-1950s, weekly dinners with a speaker. * The Women's Open Table

References

External links

*

at the

Smithsonian Archives of American Art The Archives of American Art is the largest collection of primary resources documenting the history of the visual arts in the United States. More than 20 million items of original material are housed in the Archives' research centers in Washingt ...

National Arts Club
within Google Arts & Culture * {{Authority control 1898 establishments in New York City American artist groups and collectives Arts organizations established in 1898 Clubs and societies in New York City Culture of New York City Gentlemen's clubs in the United States Gramercy Park Organizations based in Manhattan Gothic Revival architecture in New York City