Henry Glintenkamp
1887-1946

Born in Augusta, New Jersey in 1887, Henry Glintenkamp began his artistic career in 1903 at the National Academy of Design in New York. He remained at the Academy for three years before studying with the seminal American modernist Robert Henri and his protégé, John Sloan, at the New York School of Art. There, Glintenkamp’s world view would be forever changed. Henri promoted a realistic style of painting inspired by scenes of contemporary life.  He encouraged work that was a reflection of the times even if it meant the depiction of social injustices and the grittier side of society.  Henri awoke his students to the importance of capturing the emotional lives of their subjects.  In 1908, Glintenkamp began sharing studio space in the Lincoln Arcade Building with fellow artists Stuart Davis and Glenn O. Coleman. The three became frequent supporters of the saloons in Newark and Harlem. For struggling artists, the price was right: 5 cent beers and live music. It was during this period that Henri orchestrated the ground-breaking exhibition The Eight at Macbeth Galleries.  Featured in the show: Arthur B. Davies, William Glackens, Robert Henri, Ernest Lawson, George Luks, Maurice Prendergast, Everett Shinn and John Sloan. The exhibition rattled the art world. Confronted with paintings of subjects heretofore unacceptable — the critics lashed out labeling the works as “offensive” and “vulgar.” A new school of American painting was born and Glintenkamp’s beginnings as a painter were informed by the philosophy and aesthetics of the Ashcan artists.

In The Conductor, Glintenkamp depicts a favored pastime and subject of many of his peers: local entertainment. Much like Ashcan artist Everett Shinn, he found interest in the urban spectacle of life, drawing parallels between the theater, crowded seats and life – specifically, interactions between the audience and performers.  As distinctive as Glintenkamp’s paintings are, the artist also developed a successful reputation as an illustrator. The Conductor appears to combine both the gestural vigor of his painting as well as the interpretive liberties present in his illustrative works. Again, like Shinn, who had studied Edgar Degas, Glintenkamp uses modern light to draw our attention to the main character, in this case the conductor, while leaving the audience in the shadows.  For Glintenkamp the performance was not on stage, instead the focus appears to be between the choreographed movements in the orchestra pit and the audience interaction.  Glintenkamp places the first row of the audience with their backs to us, the viewer, creating surrogates for us to be included as spectators. The word “Bathtub,” framed in the upper left, remains a mysterious indicator to identify the play or film; however, it is possible that it alludes to The Animated Bathtub, one of the first silent animated films shown in New York at the time.  If so, this directs even more importance to Glintenkamp’s subject, the orchestra, as it would have truly captured the only live performers at the film showing. However  one assumes, by choosing to concentrate on painting the audience from behind, the word “bathtub” as well as highlighting specific musicians: the conductor, the trombonist, and the violinist — Glintenkamp has cleverly turned those typically out of the spotlight into the star attraction.   In 1913, Glintenkamp’s work was included in the Armory Show. During this time, his teacher John Sloan, one of the driving forces behind the illustrative socialist magazine The Masses, recruited Glintenkamp to become a regular contributor. Drawn to its commitment to humanitarian causes, Glintenkamp produced illustrations for the magazine from 1913 to 1917. In 1917, the US government declared that much of the material in The Masses, including Glintemkamp’s cartoons, threatened the war effort by advocating for pacifism. With the magazine under siege, Glintenkamp moved to Mexico and lived there until 1924. After travelling extensively in Europe he returned to New York in 1934.

Glintemkamp’s paintings can be found in the permanent collections of several prominent institutions, including The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York and the Museum of Modern Art, New York.