Published May 26, 2020 by Bowdoin College Museum of Art

Remembering Esta Kramer (1929-2020)

Photo of Esta Kramer
Esta Kramer

We were saddened to learn of the passing of Esta Kramer last month. Esta was a great supporter of Bowdoin and loved the College very much. In particular, she took a special interest in the Bowdoin College Museum of Art and the George J. Mitchell Department of Special Collections & Archives at the Bowdoin College Library. The papers of her late husband, the renowned art critic Hilton Kramer (1928-2012), are housed at Special Collections, and in 2015 Esta presented Bowdoin with a large, historically significant collection of American cookbooks.

Esta Teich was born in 1929 in Brooklyn, New York, and became interested in the visual arts at a young age. Beginning in the 1950s, she served as an editor at Arts Magazine during which time she met Hilton Kramer. In 1964 they married. The following year, Hilton became the chief art critic at The New York Times. Hilton was a great champion of modernist art, though increasingly railed against postmodernism as an “age of irony and institutionalized subversion.” This distaste for much contemporary art led him to resign from the Times in 1982 and to establish shortly thereafter the art journal The New Criterion, where he served as co-editor and publisher.

Esta and Hilton Kramer were great collectors of twentieth century American art, and we deeply appreciate the many loans Esta graciously made to the Museum of Art during her lifetime, enabling the BCMA to exhibit pieces by such artists as  Joseph Cornell, Louise Nevelson, Richard Pousette-Dart, Anne Ryan, and David Smith. In addition to sharing important works of art, Esta also generously established an endowment at the Museum of Art to support paid student internships. Having retired to Maine, Esta was a regular visitor to exhibitions and programs hosted by Special Collections and the Museum of Art. Being with Esta was always a great pleasure, and we will all miss her a great deal.

We have asked three friends of Esta, each of whom had the opportunity to work with her at Bowdoin, to provide brief tributes to her. The first is by Joachim Homann, the former curator of the Museum of Art; the second by Laura Latman, the Museum’s registrar; and the third by Kat Stefko, director of George J. Mitchell Department of Special Collections & Archives, Hawthorne-Longfellow Library.

 

Esta Kramer loved art as if her life depended on it. After the passing of her husband, the distinguished art critic Hilton Kramer, Esta lived independently in her beautiful historic cape in Damariscotta. Surrounded by works of art that the Kramers collected and which were often given by artist-friends, she experienced her life as interwoven with those of so many others. She spoke of her friends with the greatest affection and remained loyal to them over many decades. In conversations, she liked to recall encounters in the bohemian art circles of the late 1950s and 1960s and helped to preserve the legacy of those artists she loved by introducing their work in conversation to younger listeners.

Esta never stopped making new connections, however, especially in her beloved Maine, where she relished serendipitous encounters and entertained her friends by recounting those special “only in Maine” moments. Many members of the Bowdoin community became part of her “family,” as she affectionately said on many occasions. The Museum of Art and the Special Collections Library were especially dear to her.

Many recent exhibitions benefited from Esta’s support. She greeted plans for exhibitions of the work of Maurice Prendergast  and Per Kirkeby with enthusiasm, lent several important works to “Why Draw?”, and instigated my first studio visit with John Walker, resulting in a memorable exhibition. Notably, she connected me with Evelyn Pousette-Dart in New York, one of her closest friends, whose husband Richard Pousette-Dart then became the focus of another show. It was Evelyn who said to me once that Esta seemed to her happier in Maine than during many other periods in her life. For her friends, it is a comfort to know that her legacy will live on at Bowdoin. Works from her collection will spark joy and invite new generations into a conversation with Esta Kramer that for many of us already offered an abundance of memorable “only in Maine” moments.

Joachim Homann, Maida and George Abrams Curator of Drawings, Harvard Art Museums; former Curator, Bowdoin College Museum of Art

 

Little did I know back in 2011 when I was asked on behalf of the Museum of Art to reach out to Esta Kramer that it would be the beginning of a nine-year friendship. As the Museum’s registrar, I count it a privilege to extend my services on behalf of my colleagues. Working with Esta was always a joy. As much as I loved to see and hear about each art work in her collection, the personal footnotes she shared about an artist or about how she and Hilton acquired an object was just as much a treat. The fact that most were gifts by artists or friends speaks volumes. Not all collections come with such personal details and recollections. Over the last decade, as Esta shared these stories, it became abundantly clear how unique the collection was and how lucky the Bowdoin community was to be the recipient of the Kramer’s generosity. Esta’s wish to share their collection with students and visitors will forever be cherished.

As one whose training and professional life began at one of the biggest museums in New York City, where handling artworks were not part of the registrar’s usual responsibilities, I laughed when I had to move the Giacometti frog which so proudly sat on Esta’s kitchen table before we had afternoon tea. (Esta loved a good cup of tea!) She may be known for her passion for art and cooking, but she also loved music and animals, and she adored her beautiful cat, Abby.

I will forever be grateful that I could play a small role on behalf of the Museum to help Esta fulfill her wish to share the collection she and her husband built. It is wonderful to know that in addition to Hilton’s legacy as one of the best-known twentieth-century art critics,  Esta too has left her own legacy and will forever be remembered for what she has shared with the Museum of Art and Special Collections and Archives at Bowdoin. During recent visits Esta repeatedly said, with a smile, that she knew she had been blessed to live such a long life. I feel the same for having been lucky enough to have known her.

Laura J. Latman, Registrar and Collections Manager, Bowdoin College Museum of Art

 

Esta Kramer has played a defining role in my Bowdoin experience since before I was even part of the Bowdoin community. The George J. Mitchell Department of Special Collections & Archives was in the process of acquiring the Esta Kramer Collection of American Cookery as I was applying to be the Department’s director in 2015. The infectious excitement over the acquisition of this collection of more than 700 American cookery books from the 1770s to the 1960s signaled to me that at Bowdoin I would find a place of community, creativity, and enthusiasm. The story of the collection’s arrival at Bowdoin alone was a bit like a fairy tale. Always understated and yet strong in her presence, Esta had a fortuitous conversation with a mutual epicure, a bookseller, who was looking to place Clifford Apgar’s collection of American cookbooks, compiled by him over nearly 20 years. Esta, on the spot and with no hesitation, volunteered to donate the funds necessary to bring the collection to Bowdoin, a place that had become, over the previous fifteen years, her intellectual home.

 Esta later told me why she had said yes that day. Her husband, the noted art critic Hilton Kramer who had passed away in 2012, had given his papers to the College in 2003 as they were relocating from Connecticut to Maine. “I love the idea of both my husband and I being together in some way in the library,” she said. Still, she was sheepish to “claim” the collection as her own. As a collector of art, Esta knew the labor and skill involved in creating a major collection, and she was always deferential to Clifford Apgar, who had compiled the works. It was only after meeting Esta several times, sharing a couple memorable meals together and the ultimate bonding experience with Esta—exchanging our favorite Christmas cookie recipes—that I cajoled her to spend some time with the books. I will always remember that late afternoon we spent together, with the sun streaming into the Reading Room of Special Collections through our picture window. I did not feel quite worthy of Esta’s undivided attention. In her funky knitwear, always more stylish than a twenty-year-old, she and I paged through a copy of The American Woman’s Home, or Principles of Domestic Science, by Catharine Beecher and Harriet Beecher Stowe. Past experience had told me I should be prepared for a serious and far-ranging conversation with Esta. That day, I found her reading out loud to me about “earth-closets,” or, as we know them today, compostable toilets! Esta did have a wicked sense of humor, that of a true New Yorker. How could one ever feel intimidated by this warm presence?

Esta’s remarkable contribution to Special Collections continues to delight researchers from around the world. Since its gift to the College, faculty have designed courses around it, Marieke Van Der Steenhoven, our Special Collections Educations & Outreach Librarian, curated a major exhibition from it and regularly includes cookbooks in her teaching across disciplines. Food writers from across the state and nation have come to visit it, and Bowdoin Dining services have made some remarkable meals from recipes included within it. The collection continues to inspire students, and it engages even the most reluctant visitors. I am forever grateful for the kindness and generosity Esta showed in giving it to the College, so willingly, and for all she did to make my experience at Bowdoin so special. Bowdoin has lost a great friend with her passing, but I am delighted to say that the shared legacy of Hilton and Esta Kramer will live on in Special Collections as she wished.

Kat Stefko, Director of the George J. Mitchell Department of Special Collections & Archives, Bowdoin College Library