Archives Directory for the History of Collecting in America

Marx, Samuel A., 1885-1964

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role Collector Dealer/Gallery
dates 1885-1964
city Chicago
stateIL
other citiesNatchez, MS;
sex M
historical notes Art collector, architect and interior designer. With his wife, Florene May Marx (Schoenborn), he acquired a collection of 20th-Century French art.

The Marx collection included works by Pierre Bonnard, Georges Braque, Giorgio de Chirico, Jean Dubuffet, Raoul Dafy, Juan Gris, Roger de La Fresnaye, Fernand Leger, Henri Matisse, Joan Miro, Amadeo Modigliani, Pablo Picasso, Georges Rouault and Chaim Soutine.

Samuel Abraham Marx was born in Natchez, Mississippi and graduated from MIT's Department of Architecture in 1907. Marx sailed for Europe two weeks after graduating and spent eighteen months traveling and studying at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts. Upon his return to America, he worked briefly for Killham & Hopkins in Boston and for Shepley, Rutan & Coolidge in Chicago before opening his own practice. While his earliest recognized works were for the interior designs of hotels and department stores, Marx became a respected residential architect, designing homes that were heavily influenced by Mies van der Rohe.

Marx's senior thesis, Design for a Synagogue, exhibits outstanding rendering abilities and his propensity for stripped-down, monumental massing that would continue throughout his career. In his work on the Alexander Hamilton Memorial in Chicago's Lincoln Park, Marx provides an architectural framework for the figurative sculpture by British sculptor John Angel. Rather than enclosing the sculpture in a traditionally defined space, Marx's proposal juxtaposes rectilinear slabs of granite, slate, and limestone to form a unique environment that has a great deal in common with the houses he was designing at the time.

Florene left 32 works of art from the collection to both the Metropolitan and Museum of Modern Art.
decades
of activity
1940-1950
1950-1960
updated 03/22/2024 12:09:29
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Archives/Repository Collection Title Collection Details
Chicago History Museum
Research Center
Hedrich-Blessing photograph collection. Samuel Marx series [graphic], 1937-1958. see details...
The Museum of Modern Art
Library and Archives
Public Information Records, 1929-1997 see details...
The Museum of Modern Art
Library and Archives
William S. Lieberman Papers, 1948-1984 see details...
The Museum of Modern Art
Library and Archives
James Thrall Soby Papers, ca. 1930-1970, bulk ca. 1930-1960. see details...
The Museum of Modern Art
Library and Archives
Monroe Wheeler Papers, 1923-1985 [Bulk Dates: 1940s-1960s] see details...
The Museum of Modern Art
Library and Archives
Artist file: Wheeler, Monroe, 1899-1988; miscellaneous uncataloged material. see details...
The Huntington Library
1151 Oxford Road
Maynard L. Parker negatives, photographs, and other material see details...

see also:
Schoenborn, Florene May