Descriptive Summary
Scope and Content of Collection
Publication Rights
Biography
Preferred Citation
Descriptive Summary
Title: Martha Longenecker Papers
Identifier/Call Number: MSS 0784
Contributing Institution:
Special Collections & Archives, UC San Diego
9500 Gilman Drive
La Jolla, California, 92093-0175
Languages:
English
Physical Description:
1.2 Linear feet
(3 archives boxes)
Date (inclusive): 1916-2013
Abstract: Papers of Martha Longenecker, ceramic artist, professor of art, and founding president of Mingei International Inc., a non-profit
foundation dedicated to furthering understanding of arts of the people. The collection contains Longenecker's notebooks documenting
her glazing techniques, some files on Mingei International Inc. and the Mingei International Museum, and a small amount of
biographical materials, correspondence, and subject files on ceramics and Native American art.
Creator:
Longenecker, Martha
Scope and Content of Collection
Papers of Martha Longenecker, ceramic artist, professor of art at San Diego State University, and founding president of Mingei
International Inc., a non-profit foundation dedicated to furthering understanding of arts of the people. The collection contains
Longenecker's notebooks documenting her glazing techniques, some files on Mingei International Inc. and the Mingei International
Museum, and a small amount of biographical materials, correspondence, and subject files on ceramics and Native American art.
The subject files include material on sculptor Niki de Saint Phalle, whose work has been extensively exhibited at the Mingei.
Arranged in five series: 1) BIOGRAPHICAL MATERIALS, 2) CORRESPONDENCE, 3) MINGEI FILES, 4) NOTEBOOKS and 5) SUBJECT FILES.
Publication Rights
Publication rights are held by the creator of the collection.
Biography
Martha Williams Longenecker was born on May 18, 1920 in Oklahoma City. She earned her B.A. from the University of California,
Los Angeles and her M.F.A. from Claremont Graduate School in Claremont, California, where she studied painting with the artist
Millard Sheets. In 1952, while attending a week-long graduate seminar, Martha met and was profoundly influenced by Dr. Yanagi
Soetsu, founder of the
mingei ("art of the people") folk arts movement in Japan. She decided to devote her life to art which had a practical use. Longenecker
went on to do post-graduate study of ceramics in Japan under Shoji Hamada and Tatsuzo Shimaoka and became an accomplished
ceramics artist.
Longenecker was an art professor at San Diego State University from 1955-1990. With support from her late husband, Sydney
Martin Roth, she founded Mingei International, a non-profit public foundation for furthering understanding of arts of the
people. She also served as director of the Mingei International Museum of World Folk Art in San Diego from 1978-2005. While
at the Mingei, she supervised its 1996 move from University Towne Centre to its current location in Balboa Park, and directed
or designed nearly 130 art exhibitions, 33 exhibition documentary publications, and 19 videos.
Longenecker was awarded the Order of the Rising Sun from the Emperor of Japan in 2003 for her lifelong contribution to world
folk art. She died October 29, 2013 at the age of 93.
Preferred Citation
Martha Longenecker Papers, MSS 784. Special Collections & Archives, UC San Diego.
Subjects and Indexing Terms
Longenecker, Martha -- Archives
Mingei International Museum.
Saint-Phalle, Niki de, 1930-2002
Art museums -- California -- San Diego
Pottery -- 20th century
Women potters -- California -- San Diego