Home

News Release

Esterline and Museum of Flight to Sponsor "Leach Heritage of the Air" Art Exhibition in February

Bellevue, WA -- Esterline Corporation has assembled for the first time for public viewing, the Leach Heritage of the Air Collection - a series of 47 World War I themed aviation paintings created by artists Merv Corning and Richard Foes. Painted between 1959 and 2005, 43 original paintings and four reproductions will be exhibited at the Museum of Flight, Seattle, WA beginning February 2, 2006.

Origin of the Collection

Leach International, a California manufacturer of aircraft relays and now a subsidiary of Esterline, originally commissioned these images depicting heroic stories of the planes and pilots of early aviation history from 1914 through the 1920s. What started out in 1959, as a three- or four-image advertising campaign in conjunction with Aviation Week and Space Technology, became a series of 45 paintings many of which graced the magazine's inside covers over a period of about 10 years. Later in 1997, Leach added a 46th painting to the collection to commemorate the 70th anniversary of Charles Lindbergh's historic trans-Atlantic flight. And this year, at the exhibition, a new, 47th painting will be unveiled to the public.

According to Corning, "One of my favorite pastimes as a kid was drawing WWI airplanes in combat. So when the opportunity came along years later to create a series of paintings depicting famous airplanes of WWI and their legendary pilots, well, I was thrilled. Getting paid to paint a subject I so admired! Of course there was no way to know what was to have been a series of three or four paintings, illustrations as they were called, would become 47 paintings in all, covering most of the famous incidents of that period in aviation history."

Award Winning Campaign

When the full-page reproductions of Merv Corning's paintings appeared for the first time, requests by the thousands flooded the magazine office, the advertising agency and Leach Corporation. The response was so overwhelming that the ads won the "McGraw Hill 1959 Readership Award" for the most responses to a printed advertisement.

Merv Corning worked as an illustrator at Studio Artist Inc. of San Francisco at the time of the first commission. Colleague Richard Foes completed two of the earliest watercolors in the series for Leach, but Corning was responsible for all the rest. As he got involved with the project, Corning became increasingly excited by the stories and the research. He worked with Lt. Col Kimbrough S. Brown, USAF Hanscom Field, Bedford, Mass., historian and curator of the Air Force archives, combing through the scant, grainy photos of the period and even aircraft blueprints. Corning recalls, "Our goal, really, was not only to make these paintings authentic in every detail, but illustrate each incident (true stories) in a way that would make the reader feel some of the excitement of being there!"

Leach International donated ten of the Heritage of the Air Collection paintings to the U.S. Air Force in 1961. Shortly before that, Pierre Salinger, press secretary to President Kennedy, accepted a specially framed set of Corning's reproductions for the White House. At about the same time, Merv Corning met with Captain Eddie Rickenbacker, who put his stamp of approval on the paintings. In fact, Rickenbacker The watercolor America's Ace of Aces (Rickenbacker) was subsequently donated to the Smithsonian Institution's National Air and Space Museum. As a result of their immense popularity, in 1981 Corning, along with the Circle Fine Art Corporation, brought out a set of 40 lithographs based on the original Leach paintings, The Great Airplanes, 1914-1918.

Aerospace and defense manufacturer Esterline Corporation acquired Leach International in 2004. The Heritage of the Air Collection was an unlooked-for bonus in the acquisition. Esterline is headquartered in Bellevue, Washington, near Seattle. Bob Cremin, CEO of Esterline, and Seattle's Museum of Flight, one of the nation's premier air and space museums, agreed that sharing these compelling paintings of WWI aviation with the community that is so much a part of the history of flight was a natural. The Esterline-Leach Heritage of the Air Collection will be on display at the Museum of Flight in Seattle from February 2nd through April 2nd, 2006.

Merv Corning, creator of Esterline's Heritage of the Air Collection of WWI aviation paintings, has been making realist art on a range of subjects close to his heart, from airplanes to automobiles, landscapes to portraits, since 1945.

"My dad and uncle owned a Waco open-cockpit biplane, and flying about in that airplane at the tender age of eight left an indelible impression indeed. I've flown many hours since those less complicated times, in all kinds of aircraft, but nothing will ever match the thrill of lifting off in that Waco. I remember the sound of wind in wire, the hot fuel and oil smells, the clattering engine noise and the lurching, swooping, sometime weightless feeling of flight." Corning has the gift of translating his feeling for his subject into paint.
"My goal ...is the marriage of the airplane, authentic in every detail, with the rich, sometimes scarred landscapes over which these young warriors flew. I place the viewer in the air, beside these beautiful ancient machines, to experience the sensation of flight..."

In addition to the 43 watercolors of heroic WWI pilots and planes he originally painted for Leach International (now a subsidiary of Esterline Corporation), Corning is equally well known for his portraits of players commissioned by the National Football League. As recently as 2003, he was presented the R. G. Smith Award for Excellence in Naval Aviation at the National Museum of Naval Aviation in Pensacola, Florida. Corning is currently creating the final watercolor in Esterline's Heritage of the Air series. That collection, along with a special display on "Merv Corning and the Artist's Process," will be exhibited at the Museum of Flight in Seattle, opening February 2, 2006.

Mervin Allen Corning, born June 16, 1926, in Santa Ana, California, joined the Merchant Marines at age 17 and remained in that service until the end of World War II. Though he had been drawing since childhood, he began his career as an illustrator for Kleer, a Bay Area drug company chain. In less than two years, Corning worked as an art director for L.C. Cole, a prominent San Francisco advertising agency. In 1949, he became the men's fashion artist for the Broadway Department Stores in Los Angeles.

In 1953 Corning's versatility led him to Studio Artist Inc., a professional group of artists committed to providing a complete art service for advertising agencies and their clients, which included TWA, Lockheed, Ford-Mercury, Sunkist and North American. Starting as an illustrator, he became a partner and eventually president of the corporation.

It was during his tenure at Studio Artist that Leach International commissioned Corning to paint the Heritage of the Air series of WWI watercolors. What started as a set of four paintings to be used in a Leach ad campaign with Aviation Week and Space Technology magazine became, due to their enormous popularity, a series of 45 paintings that spanned a decade, from 1959 to 1970. (Since that time, two more of Corning's paintings have been added to the collection.) In 1965 Corning began a long association with the Automobile Club of Southern California, creating some 16 covers for their Westways magazine. The NFL first contacted Corning in 1966-67 for watercolor illustration work; their relationship would span 30 years, with Corning becoming the official National Football League Super Bowl artist in 1977.

In 1968 Corning had his first one-man show at the Nut Tree Gallery, Vacaville, Calif. Corning retired from Studio Artist in 1969, devoting his time exclusively to fine art painting and commissions. His work has been extensively shown and collected worldwide: the Smithsonian Institute's National Air and Space Museum, the U.S. Air Force Museum and Archives, the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C., the Royal Air Force Museum in England, the National Museum of Naval Aviation in Pensacola, Peterson Automotive Museum in Los Angeles and the Football Hall of Fame, as well as a great number of galleries across the country. He is the recipient of many awards including "The Dillon Lauritzen Memorial Award" (1975) from the Art Director's Club of Los Angeles for the best painting of the year, "Artist of the West Gold Medal Award" (1989) from the American Indian and Cowboy Artists and the "R.G. Smith Award for Excellence in Aviation Art" (2003) from the National Museum of Aviation Art. More than 65 publications such as Argosy, Life, Time, Reader's Digest, National Geographic, American Artist, Southwest Art, Pro Magazine, Gameday, Aviation, Westways, Aviation Heritage, and Aviation History, have reproduced Merv Corning's artwork. His exploration into other art forms led to his handmade lithographs, which were published by Circle Fine Art Corp. Represented by Young's Gallery in Los Olivos, California, Merv Corning resides and still paints in Solvang, California.