Here is an article which will give you a good understanding as to how the seeds were sewn as early as 1915 to ensure the rise of New York City as one of the great art centers of the world. For the first time since the 1913 Armory Show, New York was again to host an important exhibition of the European modernists. Much of the article concerns Henri Matisse (1869 - 1954) and is illustrated with a portrait of the artist by the photographer Edward Steichen.
Things were indeed changing - not long after New York was proclaimed as the commercial capital of the art world, America was recognized as the preeminent world power, click here to read about it...
