Adele Brooks

Adele Brooks was active in the realm of art documentation and design studies during a concise period spanning 1935 to 1939. Brooks’s documented output is strongly associated with the Index of American Designs, a crucial project dedicated to cataloging and preserving records of American material culture. Fifteen works attributed to Brooks are preserved in collections associated with this extensive index.

Brooks specialized in the descriptive rendering of historical artifacts and folk objects, focusing on accuracy and detail rather than expressive interpretation. Specific examples of their documentation held in institutional collections include studies of the Cigar Store Indian, the essential Tooth Key (or Tooth Extractor), and domestic furnishings such as the Windsor Chair and the Hobby Horse. A notable regional study represented in the database is the rendering of the Bishop Hill: Salt Box.

These detailed documents are represented in the collection of the National Gallery of Art, establishing the historical and museum-quality significance of Brooks's contributions to the field of American decorative arts history. The precision demonstrated in Adele Brooks prints and drawings ensures their ongoing use as valuable reference material. Today, this documentation is often part of the public domain, making these high-quality resources widely available for researchers and enthusiasts.