Bingham paintings

The wrongheaded skeptical nature of the recent Associated Presss article in the Southeast Missourian regarding 10 recently discovered paintings by George Caleb Bingham, which emanated from the Kansas City Star and now disseminates like a contagion, casts a funereal pall over Bingham's Bicentennial.

The George Caleb Bingham Catalogue Raisonne Supplement is a scholarly project overseen by three well-proven Bingham specialists. The GCBCRS continues E. Maurice Bloch's Bingham Catalogue Raisonne of paintings, begun in the 1940s, which includes Bingham's known paintings up to 1986.

Nearly all of Bingham's over 500 recorded paintings (460 are portraits) are not signed, including famous ones like "Fur Traders Descending the Missouri," "The Emigration of Daniel Boone" and "The County Election."

Unfortunately, Bingham neglected record keeping and signing, allowing scores of paintings to remain unidentified, more than any other American master. Eight of the 10 paintings authenticated by the GCBCRS Committee were unknown to Bloch, the other two were unsolved mysteries; all 10 were unsigned.

Compiling Bingham's complete body of work is a challenging voyage requiring experienced connoisseurship, rarely practiced by institutional and novice explainers. My art discoveries over 30 years include a large array of rare unsigned works acquired by major museums and private collections, many documented in my memoir, "Art Explorer: A Search for Lost Art in America."

FRED R. KLINE, director-editor, Bingham Catalogue Raisonne Supplement, Santa Fe, N.M.