Full Name: Wehle, Harry B.
Other Names:
- Harry Brandeis Wehle
Gender: male
Date Born: 06 November 1887
Date Died: December 1969
Place Born: Louisville, Jefferson, KY, USA
Place Died: New York, NY, USA
Home Country/ies: United States
Subject Area(s): European and painting (visual works)
Career(s): curators
Overview
Curator of European Painting, Metropolitan Museum of Art. Wehle was the son of Otto Wehle (1845-1931) and Amy Brandeis (Wehle), the sister of Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis (1856-1941). He was raised in Louisville, KY. He entered Harvard University, graduating in 1911 and continuing the graduate school where his training included the famous ‘Museum Course” lead by Paul J. Sachs. He was appointed an assistant curator of European painting at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1918 under Bryson Burroughs (1869-1934). In 1922 he married Kate Finkel (1884-1977). Wehle’s early interests were in American miniatures. He published a 1927 book on the subject. When Burroughs died in 1934, Wehle succeeded him as the curator of European Painting. During World War II Wehle spearheaded the removal of paintings from the Museum to a location near Philadelphia, fearing bombing attacks, as many east-cost American museums did. When the paintings returned in 1944, he rehung the collection in a contemporary fashion. In 1947 he published with Margaretta M. Salinger, A Catalogue of Early Flemish, Dutch, and German Paintings in the Metropolitan Museum. Under his tenure, the collections of Bache, Griggs, Havemeyer and Lewisohn came to the Met. He retired as curator of European Painting in 1948, succeeded by Theodore Rousseau, Jr., but retained the title curator of collections until 1953. In retirement he authored a book on the Prado paintings of Madrid. After his death, his catalog co-author, Salinger, donated his papers in 1977 to the Archives of American Art, which notes her relationship to him was unclear.
Wehle’s legacy today remains as the overseer during the great period of painting acquisition at the Met, both through purchase and donation. These included paintings from the Jules Bache (1861-1944) donation in 1944, which included Raphael’s portrait of Giuliano de’ Medici; the Louisine Havemeyer (1855–1929) important Impressionist and 19th-century paintings donated in 1929; and the Irene Lewisohn (1886-1944) donation of historic and regional costume, 1937, which formed the basis of The Museum of Costume Art’s holdings.
Selected Bibliography
- and Salinger, Margaretta. Tiepolo and His Contemporaries. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1938.
Sources
- [obituary:] Horsley, Carter B. “Harry Wehle, 82, Ex-curator, Dead.” New York Times December 15, 1969, p. 47.
- “Wehle Resigns.” Art Digest , 22 (July 1948): 14.
- “Art: The Bache Collection.” Time April 10, 1944
Archives
Archives of American Art, https://www.aaa.si.edu/collections/harry-b-wehle-papers-5766