Mrs. Lewis Larned (Annie Swan) Coburn

Mrs. Lewis Larned (Annie Swan) Coburn

Born in 1856 in Fremont, Illinois, Annie Swan Coburn moved to Chicago with her family by 1871 and lived in the city until her death in May 1932 (fig. 1).1 In 1880 she married Lewis Larned Coburn, a prominent patent attorney and one of the founders (and first president) of the Union League Club of Chicago. Upon his death in 1910, Mrs. Coburn began to collect art, initially purchasing American works and gradually expanding her collection to include French Impressionist paintings. Around the same time, she moved into an apartment in the Blackstone Hotel. Although wall space was limited in her new home, she continued to collect works of art, which she displayed in her own unique and intimate way (fig. 2, fig. 3, fig. 4, fig. 5, fig. 5 and fig. 6).2

From April 6 to October 9, 1932, the Art Institute of Chicago (under the auspices of its Antiquarian Society) held a special exhibition of more than sixty paintings, watercolors, drawings, and pastels from Mrs. Coburn’s collection.3 Just two months after the opening of the exhibition—which included Édouard Manet’s Woman Reading (fig. 7), one of her last major acquisitions—Mrs. Coburn died, leaving the Art Institute more than one hundred works of art. The Fogg Museum at Harvard University and Smith College also received a portion of her collection.

Monet Paintings in the Art Institute of Chicago from the Collection of Mrs. Lewis Larned (Annie Swan) Coburn

The Beach at Sainte-Adresse (cat. 13)

Cliff Walk at Pourville (cat. 19)

Stacks of Wheat (End of Day, Autumn) (cat. 28)

Water Lily Pond (cat. 37)

Venice, Palazzo Dario (cat. 45)

Vétheuil (cat. 42)

Champ de coquelicots (Poppy Field)4

Citrons sur une branche (Lemons on a Branch)5

Église de Varengeville, temps gris (The Church at Varengeville, Gray Weather)6

Portrait de Léon Peltier7

Renoir Paintings in the Art Institute of Chicago from the Collection of Mrs. Lewis Larned (Annie Swan) Coburn

Alfred Sisley (cat. 4)

Young Woman Sewing (cat. 7)

Two Sisters (On the Terrace) (cat. 11)

L’Algérienne8

La cueillette des fleurs9

Pivoines2

For more on Annie Swan Coburn, see Eleanor Jewett, “Noted Private Art Collection on Exhibition,” Chicago Daily Tribune, Apr. 6, 1932; “Masterpieces of the French Impressionists from the Collection of Mrs. L. L. Coburn Being Exhibited for the First Time at the Art Institute of Chicago,” Fine Arts 19, 1 (June 1932); Daniel Catton Rich, “The Bequest of Mrs. L. L. Coburn,” Bulletin of the Art Institute of Chicago 26, 6 (Nov. 1932), pp. 66–71; “Annie S. Coburn Estate Is Given $888,982 Value,” Chicago Daily Tribune, Nov. 19, 1932, p. 16; Daniel Catton Rich, ‘Midwest Art Capital,’ Town and Country 105 (Mar. 1951), pp. 72–77, 135–37; Stefan Germer, “Traditions and Trends: Taste Patterns in Chicago Collecting,” in The Old Guard and the Avant-Garde: Modernism in Chicago, 1910–1940, ed. Sue Ann Prince (University of Chicago Press, 1990), pp. 171–91, 259–61; and Regina M. Buccola, “Annie Swan Coburn,” in Women Building Chicago, 1790–1990: A Biographical Dictionary, ed. Rima Lunin Schultz and Adele Hast (Indiana University Press, 2001), pp. 174–75.

Art Institute of Chicago, Exhibition of the Mrs. L. L. Coburn Collection: Modern Paintings and Watercolors, exh. cat. (Art Institute of Chicago, 1932).

Art Institute of Chicago, Exhibition of the Mrs. L. L. Coburn Collection: Modern Paintings and Watercolors, exh. cat. (Art Institute of Chicago, 1932).

Daniel Wildenstein, Monet: Catalogue raisonné/Werkverzeichnis, vol. 2, Nos. 1–968 (Taschen/Wildenstein Institute, 1996), cat. 888 (ill.). Formerly 1933.440 in the Art Institute’s collection; deaccessioned in 1944.

Daniel Wildenstein, Monet: Catalogue raisonné/Werkverzeichnis, vol. 2, Nos. 1–968  (Taschen/Wildenstein Institute, 1996), cat. 725 (ill.). Formerly 1933.442 in the Art Institute’s collection; deaccessioned in 1944.

Daniel Wildenstein, Monet: Catalogue raisonné/Werkverzeichnis, vol. 2, Nos. 1–968  (Taschen/Wildenstein Institute, 1996), cat. 542 (ill.). Formerly 1933.438 in the Art Institute’s collection; deaccessioned in 1944.

Guy-Patrice Dauberville and Michel Dauberville, Renoir: Catalogue raisonné des tableaux, pastels, dessins et aquarelles, vol. 2, 1882–1894 (Bernheim-Jeune, 2009), cat. 1206 (ill.). Formerly 1933.451 in the Art Institute’s collection; deaccessioned in 1945.

Guy-Patrice Dauberville and Michel Dauberville, with the collaboration of Camille Frémontier-Murphy, Renoir: Catalogue raisonné des tableaux, pastels, dessins et aquarelles, vol. 1, 1858–1881 (Bernheim-Jeune, 2007), cat. 92 (ill.). Formerly 1933.454 in the Art Institute’s collection; deaccessioned in 1947.

Guy-Patrice Dauberville and Michel Dauberville, with the collaboration of Camille Frémontier-Murphy, Renoir: Catalogue raisonné des tableaux, pastels, dessins et aquarelles, vol. 1, 1858–1881 (Bernheim-Jeune, 2007), cat. 36. Formerly 1933.456 in the Art Institute’s collection; deaccessioned in 1942.

Mrs. Coburn did not bequeath all of her Monet and Renoir paintings to the Art Institute of Chicago. Only those that were given to the museum are numbered and captioned in these archival photographs. We will identify works by other artists as we produce each monographic volume in the series.

Daniel Wildenstein, Monet: Catalogue raisonné, vol. 3 (Taschen/Wildenstein Institute, 1996), cat. 998 (ill.). Formerly 1933.445 in the Art Institute’s collection; deaccessioned in 1944.