Artist John Sloan is best known for his realist urban genre paintings and thanks to a bequest from his widow, the Delaware Art Museum is home to the largest collection of his art. This summer, the Wilmington museum shines a light on a lesser known aspect of the artist’s career.
Between 1900 and 1910, John Sloan produced a weekly series of word and picture puzzles for the Sunday supplement of the Philadelphia Press, one of the country’s leading illustrated newspapers.
Heather Campbell Coyle, Curator of American Art at the Delaware Museum of Art says Sloan started as a spot news illustrator but his transition to creating decorative puzzles allowed him to work in the newspaper business longer than his peers.
“Because as photography comes into the newspaper business, much of that on the spot illustration of news events gets turned over into photography,” she notes. “But Sloan’s illustrations; these decorative challenging puzzles were so popular, that it was his main source of income up through 1910.”
At the turn of the 20th century, puzzles commanded the attention of readers nationwide. Competing publications engaged in fierce circulation wars, luring customers with eye-catching visuals, colored comics, and assorted games and activities.
Coyle says Sloan was a gifted puzzle maker.
“What amazes me about these puzzles is the fertile mind that it took to come up with this week after week for years on end,” she says. “He’s not just drawing them based on someone else's ideas, he’s actually coming up with the idea for the puzzle as well.”
“The Puzzling World of John Sloan” is on view at the Delaware Art Museum through September 6th.
This piece is made possible, in part, by a grant from the Delaware Division of the Arts, a state agency dedicated to nurturing and supporting the arts in Delaware, in partnership with the National Endowment for the Arts.
