New WWI Exhibition Debuts at the Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts

August 4, 2017

On July 15, the Alabama Department of Archives and History (ADAH) and the Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts (MMFA) debuted a new exhibition at the MMFA in its Weil Graphic Arts Study Center entitled Sketching the Skies: Penrose Vass Stout, Alabama’s WWI Artist-Aviator. The exhibition is curated by ADAH Manuscripts Archivist Haley Aaron and will be on display through September 10, 2017. 

Born in Montgomery in 1887, Penrose Vass Stout completed engineering and architecture degrees at Alabama Polytechnic Institute (now Auburn University) in 1907 and 1909. He practiced architecture in Florida and New York until enlisting in March 1917. A member of the 1st Pursuit Group, 27th Aero Squadron, Stout was shot down near Charny during the Meuse-Argonne Offensive in September 1918. He received the Distinguished Service Cross for attacking a German artillery installation and battling five enemy pilots.

After the war, Stout returned to practicing architecture in New York and became well known for his designs of country homes, part of the wave of suburbanization north of New York City in the early twentieth century. He died in 1934 at age 47.

Exhibited for the first time during the centennial of World War I, this collection features detailed sketches of military training, humorous aspects of camp life, the architecture of the French countryside, and Stout's view from the cockpit as he served as a pioneer aviator in the early years of air warfare.

In 2014, Nathaniel Stout donated his grandfather’s sketchbook and letters to the ADAH. This unparalleled collection provides an honest, deeply personal glimpse of the wartime experience through Stout’s unique artistic perspective. Most recently, in the summer of 2017, Stout donated his grandfather's wartime diary to the ADAH, enhancing an already rich collection with even more fascinating information and insight into the life and personality of Penrose Vass Stout. 

For more information about the exhibition, visit www.mmfa.org. The Penrose Vass Stout collection is available to view online at www.digital.archives.alabama.gov.