2010.007

Lukacs, Claire

Gift

Museum Collections. Gift of a friend of the Museum.

1945 - 1955

Date(s) Created: 1945-1955 ca Date(s): 1945-1955

Good

Notes: Text below provided by donor who stated it is as the item was described in online ebay auction 2010: Done by Albert Rothstein, What do I know about him? I can only tell you there was a dilapadated egg farm in Lakewood NJ located 20 minutes from my home with a small crumbling structure in front. Both were to be plowed to the ground within a week. I put on my brakes, turn around and give the doomed relic a final check. The main house had no front door left and I could see beer cans on the floor, the place had been trashed by kids and who knows what else, there was no way. I turned around to get back to my car, gave the little cottage a final look, roof caving in, vines growing throughout it, and that typical over bearing strong smell of mildew flourishing that even on a 90 degree day you could feel the coolness on the inside from just standing by it. I decided no one in their right mind would be squatting in this place and decided to take a peek in the door. It was an old artist studio. My curiosity in full peek I tucked my socks SECURLEY over my pant legs knowing I was now walking into the spiders turf, my worst fear. In a tiny section that survived the elements was a box. I looked inside and it was filled with hundreds of 8x5 sketch pads. I browsed through one and they were wonderful. It took 3 trips to get them to my car. In the comfort of my own home I started to look through each sketch book. It took me close to a month to understand just what all these sketches were telling. It was 30 years of Alberts life beginning in sketch pad in 1941. He never went any where with out it. It was like watching what someone did every day of their life for 30 years. The sketches begin in Hoboken NJ, and Alberts EVERY DAYS were spent at the bar. His sketches depict every day life as it was then, I have drawings of all his bar friends Pete the Polack, Ralph O'Conner he refers to as the drunk, liar, petty theif. There was some notaion tucked on the back of one of these these sketches in mention of study with Zero Mostel. I never knew Mostel was an artist, and do not have a month to look through 30 years of sketches again. Alberts life as he knew it would never be the same after he was drafted in to the war, I watched, though his sketches still continued every day, his first few years in service they depicted what was going on around him in every day life trying through his sketch pads to maintain a sense of normalcy....... then something I am certain pretaining to the real horrors of war made him snap. What ever it was it took his soul because he could no longer bring to life through his sketches those every day people. I have a few oil paintings he did before he went to war which are wonderful, and I have some oil paintings he did after the war that make me just shake in total disbelief. I will be listing several of these sketches every night with no reserve, and free shipping. Regards, Lisa [end] Status: OK Status By: dw Status Date: 2010-11-04