Robert Indiana kept a series of illustrated journals during the late 1950s and 1960s, in which he discusses the development of his work as well as his daily life on Coenties Slip.
In his journal entry for December 11, 1959, Indiana describes a day of visiting galleries with artist Loren Libau. He writes that they went far uptown, to East 86th, beginning the gallery tour at Staemfpfli Gallery, "the new gallery that I have not yet come to, but which I first heard about this spring." They then went to Paul Rosenberg and Co, where they saw two Robert Keysers, "everything there a little too stylish," followed by a visit to Perls Gallery, where they saw "a frail Calder." The next stop was the Martha Jackson Gallery, where Rolf Nelson (who went by Ralph at the time), showed him a clipping from Time which mentioned Delphine Youngerman (Seyrig) "in relation to Kerouac's film [Pull My Daisy]."
This was followed by a trip to the Allan (Stone) Gallery, where they saw two Joseph Glascos, and then to the Leo Castelli Gallery, where Paul Branch was on view, "again rather stylishly," and where Castelli came out and spoke to Libau but not Indiana. After they rushed to the Pierre Matisse Gallery to see the Jean Duffet show, and to the Josef Albers show at the Sidney Janis Gallery, but arriving too late for the latter. They also had "a brief visit [to] [the] Stable, where M. Ward was positively decent when we asked about the Noguchi table sculpture." Almost three years later, in October 1962, Indiana would have his first solo show at the Stable Gallery.
Indiana records inviting Libau for a chili dinner with J. (his partner, fashion designer John Kloss), who had made two new table settings and some scarves for himself, as well as one for Indiana out of "the fabric of Ellsworth's [Kelly] that was painted commercially in Switzerland." He also writes "new constructions being prepared," and that they walked to the Battery in a light rain for Kloss to see the new monument and so that he could "pick up [the] rusted spikes from [the] monument commission . . . poor constructions."
