Also this issue: Bad for the Business A trio of showbiz books walks on the mean side. -A.D. Amorosi artquicks More stuff going on this week... Wozzeck -David Shengold ComedySportz Cares -Juliet Fletcher "Martians and Motorcycles" -Andrew Parks Fourth Of U LIE Rebel Party -Ainé Ardron-Doley PII Gallery | Stedman Gallery | And Then Thereâs · -Lori Hill Neal Barnard -Vance Lehmkuhl

July 3- 9, 2003

artpicks

"Privacy Writes: Public Lives, Personal Letters"

by Juliet Fletcher

These days, politicians find themselves tripped up mostly by what they say, rather than by anything they might premeditatively write down. Still, an off-the-cuff written remark -- the sort that surfaces only in rare, personal letters -- often boasts volumes about its author. "[Letters] reveal very human behaviors of the people whose importance to our nation's founding has made distant and iconic," explains Judy Guston, who's spent recent months painstakingly examining private missives from George Washington, Abraham Lincoln and a host of other presidents and statesmen. Guston, curator of the exhibit just opening at the Rosenbach Museum & Library titled "Privacy Writes: Public Lives/Personal Letters," enjoys balancing the historical context and personal nature of these precious letters, sketches and speeches: "There's an amusing section of one of John Adams' letters [dated 1790] in which he asserts that everyone available is too incompetent to replace Washington as president and, if any of them were, he'd retire to his farm; [and if asked] to serve, he'd leave the country and live out his years in an attic in Amsterdam! Of course, we know that he did serve as president, a fact that makes his letter all the more revealing." An earlier Adams' note mentions his 4-year-old son's anger at not receiving a mention in his father's communications.

Poring over these documents may not be as easy as getting to the museum: Some of the handwriting on show is pretty impenetrable. While Guston says Jefferson's is "fairly consistent and legible," John Adams' tends to trail off: "[He] seems to get tired towards the end of a long rant."

“Privacy Writes: Public Lives, Personal Letters,” exhibition through Sept. 28, $5-$8; reception, July 9, 5:30-7:30 p.m., free; Rosenbach Museum & Library, 2008 DeLancey Place, 215-732-1600.