Unknown photographer, In New Mexico, Maria, left, is firing pottery in the open, courtesy of the Klauber family.

Unknown photographer, Miss Klauber with Maria Martinez’s extended family, 1917, courtesy of the Klauber family.

. . . On August 23, Miss Klauber prepared to leave via Espanola, Santa Clara, and Ildefanso where she spent the night sleeping on a hillside near the home of Julian and Maria Martinez’s home. From here she was off to Taos Junction, then to Taos arriving at sundown. By horse and wagon Alice went to the Pueblo where she pencil sketched under a great cottonwood tree. She found residents quite different from the Tewas. On the 26th she returned to Agua Caliente and Taos Junction and waited for the train to Pajanto Platform where other friends boarded. At the hotel in Taos she attended her mail. On Sunday morning, Miss Klauber went to the museum where she found things seemed more “comprehensible” to her than ten days previously. Santa Fe painter Sheldon Parsons, 1899-1943, and Henri were at Henri’s studio when she arrived. Later she called Natalie who wasn’t in and she ate alone. After dinner she returned to Henri’s studio for about an hour before retiring. The next day she relaxed and experimented with watercolors.

Alice Klauber, Santa Fe, watercolor, SDMA collection.

. . . In the evening she dined again with Robert and Marjorie and visited his studio. Sheldon Parsons was a guest, also, that evening, and conservation went on late into the evening.

. . . The following day Miss Klauber continued with watercolors made of views of Taos and its milieu. Late in the day she discovered that Natalie was quite ill. Alice and several unknown women found a room for her at St. Vincent’s sanatorium and assisted her in moving. She returned to Henri’s studio later where he was “tinkering” with the gypsy woman’s head. Alice admired the “very remarkable forceful canvas.” On September 1, after caring for Natalie and visiting Henri’s studio, she and the artist attended a film featuring popular idol Fattie Arbuckle.

Alice Klauber, Taos, watercolor, SDMA collection.

. . . The next day Alice finalized arrangements to move Natalie to St. Vincent’s. At the museum she viewed sketches by Beauregard, then she returned to attend Natalie. She met Paul Burlin, Natalie’s husband who was to establish a reputation as a contemporary modern American artist. She spent some time with him at dinner. She met Burlin at Henri’s studio again the next day and shared dinner once more. Natalie was apparently en route to recovery for Alice went the next day to help her dress for breakfast. She later went to the museum where Vierra and Burlin were hanging an exhibition of the Taos painters. That evening Burlin and she dined once more, and packed Natalie’s things.

. . . On September 6, Miss Klauber attended the San Ildefanso dances. At that time Juan gave her a beautiful Native ring. The next day she explored ruins and then helped Paul move Natalie to her cottage. After bidding them goodbye, Henri helped take her things to the museum where she reported seeing a “fine big portrait of one of the San Ildefanso dancers.” That evening she dined with the Henris, Hewetts and other close friends.

. . . On September 9th, Miss Klauber was at the Grand Canyon and was walking when the train arrived. En route the train would stop at various views and Hopi houses she would walk to observe. Her written description of one of nature’s grandest spectacles reflects the awesome and profound inspiration for many sensitive visitors. Her first glance was, “something between fear and shyness, comparable to the psychology of succumbing to the great… like coming to the end of the world. Opposite is a stage curtain, painted by God in the modern style - full of color (with) broken rock for pigment and the Colorado River for the solvent.”

. . . “Between the curtains, many miles away, framed in at the sides with orange colored cliffs, between that and yourself, there are islands, islands of great height and many forms. They rise from great hidden depths of the canyon and give samples of the prism - red orange, yellow, blue and violet…The slopes support struggling greens where the Indian gardens cling and where the starved pinion trees climb in one or two places. In the main, they are pyramidal in form some ending in a mesa. The size of the canyon seems such that one can not believe when one first hears that it measures thirteen miles across in cubic miles of air before you.”

. . . She was homeward bound on September tenth.

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