Archives Directory for the History of Collecting in America

Hammer, Armand, 1898-1990 print view role Collector Dealer/Gallery Patron dates 1898-1990 city Los Angeles state CA other cities New York, NY; Moscow, Russia; sex M historical notes Collector, industrialist and philanthropist. Hammer made his first million dollars in pharmaceuticals before earning his medical degree from Columbia University. He went to the Soviet Russia in 1921 to provide medical aid to famine victims and was persuaded by Vladimir Ilich Lenin to remain. His ventures, including a pencil manufacturing firm, were bought out by the Soviets in the late 1920s, and he returned to the U.S. laden with artworks formerly owned by the Romanov family. He increased his fortune in the U.S. through the whiskey and cattle industries and retired in 1956, but an investment in wildcat oil wells led to another career as head of the Occidental Petroleum Corp. (1957–90). He was a longtime advocate of broadening U.S.-Soviet trade ties. The Armand Hammer Museum in Los Angeles houses his art collection (Britannica Concise Encyclopedia). Dr. Armand Hammer was director of sales of the art galleries on the 5th floor of Gimbel Brothers in 1942. He was married to Frances Hammer, 1902-1989 (Getty Collector Files, www.getty.edu).] The Armand Hammer Collection consists primarily of paintings and works on paper by French nineteenth-century masters, including Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot, Paul Gauguin, Edouard Manet, Claude Monet, and Camille Pissarro. A small but wide-ranging group of European old master paintings includes works by Jean-Honoré Fragonard, Francisco de Goya y Lucientes, Rembrandt van Rijn, Peter Paul Rubens, Tintoretto, and Titian. Works by American artists form a significant part of the Hammer collection, which includes representative examples by eighteenth- to twentieth-century artists, among them George Bellows, Mary Cassatt, John Singer Sargent, Gilbert Stuart, and Andrew Wyeth. Hammer donated to the University of Southern California, Fisher Gallery, personally and through the Armand Hammer Foundation (founded 1968) a collection of 48 works by Dutch, Flemish, German, and Italian masters of the fifteenth through seventeenth centuries. Of note, the collection includes works by Gerard Dou, Peter Paul Rubens, Willem Buytewech, Anthony van Dyck, the Brueghels, the Ruisdaels, Henri met de Bles, and Pieter de Hooch. Dr. Armand Hammer was director of sales of the art galleries on the 5th floor of Gimbel Brothers in 1942. He was married to Frances Hammer, 1902-1989 (Getty Collector Files, www.getty.edu).] Hammer donated to the University of Southern California, Fisher Gallery, personally and through the Armand Hammer Foundation (founded 1968) a collection of 48 works by Dutch, Flemish, German, and Italian masters of the fifteenth through seventeenth centuries. Of note, the collection includes works by Gerard Dou, Peter Paul Rubens, Willem Buytewech, Anthony van Dyck, the Brueghels, the Ruisdaels, Henri met de Bles, and Pieter de Hooch. decades of activity 1920-1930 1930-1940 1940-1950 1950-1960 1960-1970 1970-1980 1980-1990 website http://www.hammer.ucla.edu updated 10/31/2024 13:33:17 bibliographic search Search Frick Art Reference Library Catalog Search Photoarchive Search Worldcat Search Library of Congress Name Authority File (LCNAF) Search Virtual International Authority File (VIAF) Search Wikidata Entry Archives/Repository Collection Title Collection Details Archives of American Art Victor Building, Suite 2200 Oral history interview with Armand Hammer, 1980 Aug. 26 see details... The Museum of Modern Art Library and Archives Artist file: Hammer, Armand; miscellaneous uncataloged material. see details... Library of Congress Manuscript Division Papers of Armand Hammer, circa 1508-1989. see details... University of California, Los Angeles. Collections and programs at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art : oral history transcript / 1987. see details... see also: Hammer, Frances, 1902-1989 M. Knoedler & Co. Hammer Galleries «  back