Marie Norton Harriman
| Marie Norton Harriman | |
|---|---|
| First Lady of New York | |
|
In role January 1, 1955 – December 31, 1958 |
|
| Governor | W. Averell Harriman |
| Preceded by | Frances Dewey |
| Succeeded by | Mary Rockefeller |
| Personal details | |
| Born |
Marie Norton April 12, 1903 New York City |
| Died |
September 26, 1970 (aged 67) Washington D.C. |
| Spouse(s) |
Cornelius Vanderbilt Whitney (m. 1923; div. 1929) W. Averell Harriman (m. 1930; her death 1970) |
| Children | Harry Payne Whitney II Nancy Marie Whitney |
| Parents | Sheridan Norton Beulah Einstein |
| Education | Miss Spence's School |
Marie Norton Harriman (April 12, 1903 – September 26, 1970) was an American art collector and First Lady of New York from 1955 to 1958. She was the wife of former New York Governor and diplomat Averell Harriman. Harriman operated a prominent New York City art gallery for more than a decade.
She was born Marie Norton on April 12, 1903, in New York to Sheridan Nook Norton, an attorney, and Beulah Sanfield Einstein, who wed in 1901. Her maternal grandparents were Rosanna Cullen and Benjamin Franklin Einstein, attorney to the New York Times and a shareholder in several advertising companies. She attended Miss Spence's School, graduating in 1922.
From 1930 to 1942, she owned and operated an art gallery on 57th Street in Manhattan, the Marie Harriman Gallery. She later said: "It was all Ave's idea. He said I should be doing something."Henri Matisse attended the glittering opening of the gallery on October 3, 1930, which featured important works of Derain, Gauguin, Van Gogh, and Matisse. In 1936, she bought and exhibited one of Gauguin's last works, D'où Venons Nous / Que Sommes Nous / Où Allons Nous. The gallery's exhibitions took many forms and included a show dedicated to a single canvas, Henri Rousseau's La Noce; solo shows devoted to such comparatively unknown figures as Josselin Bodley (1893-1974), Sir Francis Rose, and Emile Branchard; group shows of French modernists, the Paris Fauves of 1905, and American primitives ("They Taught Themselves"); and others with a particular focus like "Chardin and the Modern Still Life" and 19th-century French primitives.
In the 1930s, she also undertook major projects for her husband's business ventures, designing the interiors of the first streamlined passenger cars for the Union Pacific Railroad and decorating the public rooms and accommodations of a resort he developed in Sun Valley, Idaho.
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