Episode 68: Esther McCoy
Esther McCoy was born on November 18th, 1904 in a town called Horatio, Arkansas. Esther would go to boarding school in Missouri and briefly attend the University of Michigan. In her early twenties, Esther would spend the majority of her time in New York City, working with novelist Theodore Dreiser. While traveling back and forth between New York, Europe, and Florida, Esther would become friends with interesting people like E.E. Cummings, Bonnie Grainger, and Ernest Hemingway. Eventually, Esther made it to California, where she worked as a drafter for airplanes during World War II. After the war, Esther worked as a drafter for R.M. Schindler. While working for him, Esther would write for several publications about the work being done in California which would lead to Esther traveling to Mexico to write about the Mexican Modernist period happening at the time. Esther's work would take her all over the world, traveling to Italy, Brazil, and many more places. Esther is credited for bringing Western American Architecture to the rest of the country and more notably shedding the light on architecture in Central and South America. We can credit her for us knowing about the work of Luis Barragan, Richard Neutra, and several others. On December 30, 1989, Esther would pass away at her Santa Monica home.
Caryatid: Alexandra Lange
Alexandra Lange is an architecture and design critic. Her work has been published in publications like Metropolis, The Atlantic, New York Magazine, The New Yorker, and the New York Times - just to name a few. Alexandra is also the Editorial Lead for the podcast New Angle Voices. Besides her countless publications, Alexandra is an author of several books, including her latest publication “Meet me by the fountain: an inside history of the mall”.
References
An Exhibition and Two New Publications on Esther McCoy - Announcements - E-flux. www.e-flux.com/announcements/35050/an-exhibition-and-two-new-publications-on-esther-mccoy.
Florian, Maria-Cristina. “Pioneers of Architecture Criticism: 5 Women Who Are Shaping the Built Environment Through Words.” ArchDaily, 1 Jan. 2023, www.archdaily.com/990487/pioneers-of-architecture-criticism-5-women-who-are-shaping-the-built-environment-through-words.
Kats, Anna. “Esther McCoy (1904–1989).” Architectural Review, 12 July 2021, www.architectural-review.com/essays/reputations/esther-mccoy-1904-1989.
Morgan, Susan. “Being There: Esther McCoy, the Accidental Architectural Historian.” Archives of American Art Journal, vol. 48, no. 1–2, Aug. 2016, pp. 18–27. East of Borneo, eastofborneo.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Being_There_Esther_McCoy_.pdf.
---. “Mother Modern.” T Magazine, 30 Sept. 2011, archive.nytimes.com/tmagazine.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/09/28/mother-modern.
“The Mother of Us All: Esther McCoy.” KCET, 21 Dec. 2021, www.kcet.org/shows/artbound/the-mother-of-us-all-esther-mccoy.
Whipple, Marc. “Architecture Historian and Write Esther McCoy - Blog Article.” Whipple Russell Architects, 30 Sept. 2021, whipplerussell.com/blog/architecture-historian-esther-mccoy.
Although all of the resources above were extremely helpful, a special shout out to the resource mentioned the most in this week’s episode: the Smithsonian’s Archives of American Art (listed below), and the transcript of the oral history interview can be found here.
Esther McCoy papers, circa 1876-1990, bulk 1938-1989. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.
