Collections : [Yale University -Yale Center for British Art]

This collection consists primarily of correspondence between Basil Taylor, Paul Mellon, and Mellon's advisors, including Mellon's first curator, the art dealer John Baskett, regarding the development of Mellon's British art collection. These papers cover the years 1959 through 1975, the year of Taylor's death, with the bulk spanning 1960-1969, the years of Mellon, Baskett, and Taylor's most active collaboration and collection building. The correspondence includes telegrams, letters, lists of artworks from auction houses, and internal memoranda recorded by Mellon's primary secretaries, such as Ethel Orendorff and Beverley Carter. Other significant correspondents represented in the collection are Willis Van Devanter, Mellon's librarian; Leslie Cheek, curator at the Virginia Museum of Fine Art; various associates at the National Gallery of Art, Agnew's, and Colnaghi; and Dudley Snelgrove, another advisor and curator of British prints and drawings. The correspondence provides insight into Mellon's collecting habits, and it documents the friendship and working relationship between Taylor and Mellon.

This collection consists of correspondence between Paul Mellon (1907-1999) and E. Bartlett Barnes (1908-1994). Mellon often included in his correspondence information about accomplishments and news notes for the Yale '29 alumni column, which was written by Barnes. There is correspondence about "The Mountain Club," of which Mellon was a member at Yale, and newspaper clippings about Mellon's donation of art to the National Gallery (September 30, 1995). There are also significant materials related to Mellon's racing career including pamphlets from Rokeby Stables, a photograph of Sea Hero at the Kentucky Derby, and newspaper articles about Rokeby Stables.

This collection consists of three notebooks created by Paul Mellon for a "Pictorial Art" class at Yale University during his undergraduate studies (1925-1929). The notebooks include Mellon's professor's course material on pictorial art, pictures of artwork, and Mellon's handwritten notes. The notes include Mellon's critiques and analyses of the artworks, which span from ancient to contemporary.