William Sanger — Downeast

William Sanger, who was a leading social radical of his era, was at heart a romantic artist. Yet a more touching, personal double irony brackets Sanger’s artistic career. If not for his relationship with Margaret Sanger, William might have remained an adjunct figure in the world of early 20th century modern art. On the other hand, Sanger’s relationship with Margaret’s contemporary and then abiding fame as a social reformer and Planned Parenthood founder may well have served as a brake on his artistic success during his lifetime. Today he is still the lesser-known Sanger in the family. His work is widely dispersed and rarely seen.

William Sanger, who was a leading social radical of his era, was at heart a romantic artist. Yet a more touching, personal double irony brackets Sanger’s artistic career. If not for his relationship with Margaret Sanger, William might have remained an adjunct figure in the world of early 20th century modern art. On the other hand, Sanger’s relationship with Margaret’s contemporary and then abiding fame as a social reformer and Planned Parenthood founder may well have served as a brake on his artistic success during his lifetime. Today he is still the lesser-known Sanger in the family. His work is widely dispersed and rarely seen. Some of his art does remain in family hands. Yet most of the paintings, prints and watercolors he so resolutely created are lost. A few paintings remain sequestered at the Brooklyn Museum, the Whitney Museum, the Newark Museum, and the Hispanic Society of America. His one large public commission, a mural for the Brooklyn Industrial School for Girls, done when he was a WPA artist during the Depression, was later painted over with another mural. But with the current exhibition at the Tides Institute & Museum of Art, the day has come to re-examine William Sanger’s artistic achievements and struggles in their own right. It’s high time to rescue him from his disproportionately one-dimensional role as a supporting figure in the life and legend of his famous, even notorious, first wife.

Alexander Sanger was born in New York City. His father was Margaret and William Sanger’s second son. A graduate of Princeton, he earned law and business degrees from Columbia and an advance law degree from NYU. For 14 years he practiced law, first as an associate and subsequently as a partner of White & Case. From 1991 until 2000 he was President and CEO of Planned Parenthood of New York City. In 2000 he became Chair of the International Planned Parenthood Council as well as Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations Population Fund. An artist in his own right, he is currently completing a book about his grandmother.