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INVENTORY OF THE ULRICH ALEXANDER MIDDELDORF PAPERS,
1925-1981
840024
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Title: Ulrich Alexander Middeldorf papers
Date (inclusive): 1925-1981
Collection number: 840024
Creator:
Middeldorf, Ulrich Alexander, 1901-
Extent:
71.72 linear feet
(172 boxes)
Repository:
Getty Research Institute
Research Library
Special Collections and Visual Resources
1200 Getty Center Drive, Suite 1100
Los Angeles, CA 90049-1688
Abstract: German-American art historian who specialized in the areas of sculpture, bronzes, and the applied arts. The bulk of the collection
consists of Middeldorf's research files: clippings and bibliographic notations about the arts, particularly sculpture, drawings,
Renaissance medals, and applied arts such as costumes, textiles, furniture, and metalwork.
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Language: Collection material in English, and German
Open for use by qualified researchers.
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Library Rights and Reproductions
Ulrich Alexander Middeldorf Papers
1925-1981, Getty Research Institute, Research Library, Accession no. 840024.
Acquired in 1984.
Ulrich Alexander Middeldorf, born in 1901, was a German-American art
historian who specialized in the study of sculpture, medals, and the minor and
applied arts. He was director of the Art Institute of Chicago, the Longhi
Institute, and then served as the director and librarian of the
Kusthistorisches Institute until his death in 1983.
In addition to his research specializations, Middeldorf had an abiding
interest in Italian art, and a collector's passion for the connection between
art and fiction. He assembled a collection of fiction, much of it popular,
paperback works, which include characters or plot lines that relate to art
(artists, art history, forgery, etc.). This collection of Art in Fiction was
acquired by the Getty Research Institute Library in 1984. Middeldorf's
correspondence with Sybille Pantazzi about his art in fiction collecting and
other interests (1966-1983) may be seen in Special Collections Accession no.
950004.
Scope and Content of Collection
The Ulrich Alexander Middeldorf papers contain some correspondence,
many clippings, also photographs, postcards, bibliographic and research notes,
as well as articles, offprints and annotated books, dating from ca. 1925 -1981.
These papers document his research interests and contacts with other art
historians and some students. His interests in Italian art, sculpture, medals
and the applied arts are evident in the research files which cover costume,
architecture, textiles, graphic arts, Italian artists, decorative arts, as well
as sculpture and medals. The collection comprises ca. 55 linear ft.
Arrangement
The papers are organized in five series:
Series I.
Clippings files
(boxes 1-17);
Series
II. Letters and bibliographic notes
(boxes 18-21);
Series
III. Journals and offprints
(boxes 22-38);
Series
IV. Annotated books
(boxes 39-48, 167-172);
Series V.
Bibliographic files
(boxes 49-166).