I Remember

As is my new custom, I looked at Gurney Journey this morning and saw Jim's post about plaster casts. It was enlightening to learn that plaster anatomical casts were called " ecorche". But it was'nt until I scrolled down and saw a plaster cast that my Art Teacher had given me that my past flashed before me this morning. Just like the opening scene from the Italian Movie " Cinema Paradiso" I went back in time and I could smell linseed oil fumes in the air, it was an intoxicant to a young boy of ten.

There have been three principle Men who have shaped me. My father, who loved art, Sam Hyde Harris and Theodore Lukits.




I spent every Saturday for 10 years , beginning when I was ten, learning from Theodore N. Lukits. He built his studio attached to his main house in Los Angeles off of Wilshire Blvd and started the "Lukits Academy". I was schooled in a " Neo Atelier " style atmosphere and mindset. " Neo" in the sense that we did learn from plaster casts but we were taught to go out in Nature and learn from her Moods and to study conditions of Light. The students were taught initially in black and white graphite tonal drawings and then when Ted felt the student ready, he would move on to Still Life Color. His approach was special attention to value and structure. The student was to capture and study the " air between objects". He kept me in black and white for 7 years!




Ted would wax eloquent about Bougereau and Sargent as the greatest examples of Western Art. At a very early age my heroes were Brangwyn, Lord Leighton, WaterHouse, Abbey, Chase, Cecilia Beaux, Anders Zorn , Klimpt, Mucha , Sorolla, Arthur Rackham , Heinreich Kley. Lukits was a virtual talking Art History book. Names that have emerged from obscurity now were household names to me in the 70's.


I became an instant nerd in various ways. While my peers were submerged in Zap Comics, Andy Warhol , Jasper Johns, Wayne Thiebaud et al, I was a young man walking in the 19 th century. I was taught to hate Modern Art. It was subversive and anti-God. It was not legitimate.

Lukits was accomplished as an anatomist ( he had dissected cadavers ) . He assisted Dean CornWell on his L.A. Public Library Murals. Many of the sketches from Cornwell were lying around in his Studio for the students to see. Lukits gained a reputation as an accomplished portrait painter of Hollywood Movie Stars during the late 20's , 30's and 40's. His most famous portrait was of Delores Del Rio.

In many ways he was a second father to me. And would keep me and my Dad after class teaching us about the " Truth" until 11 oclock at night . Many of you have probably never heard of Theodore Lukits. I believe he would be better known today if he did not have a reputation for being a raving anti-semite and white supremecist. He was very much out in the open about his theories. His classes were run with a mixture of culture , politics and Art. It was not unusual to see students come and go who could not handle his diatribes on Race and Art. To him, they were eternally linked.

It has taken me years to recover from all the indoctrination that Ted fed into my young mind. I was convinced that I had talent because I had a percentage of "White" Blood in me. But there is one common phenomena about teen years ...Rebellion. And I rebelled against his teachings and went to Art Center College of Design. It was akin to changing Religions...being born again.




******* The comment below is from Jeremy Elder of "Master of None" Blog http://jeremy-lee-elder.blogspot.com/

The portrait you posted of his wife hangs in my wife's uncle's house. It is so amazing. Every time I am at his house I stare at that painting (and the rest of the family chuckles because I do it every time).

What are the odds of someone in the blogosphere connecting with you and having a personnel link to your past? God is amazing. This is blowing my mind today!!!!!!!!



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I was bitter towards Ted Lukits for many years. I would never mention his name. In fact, when I got a call from a former student that Ted had died and that he wanted me to come to the Funeral...I refused to go. Such was my bitterness.

But I have learned to forgive him. Its taken many years of self therapy and perspective and Jesus. He was a product of his Austrian Pride. I threw out the baby with the bath water, but his bath water really soiled the baby. But today, we have reassessed great thinkers and artists who held similar beliefs. One that comes to mind is the existentialist Heideggar who wrote the opus " Being and Time ". Many people forgive his Nazi past and focus on his concepts . Even Francis Scaeffer, a Christian Philosopher, quotes Heideggar. In fact today at Berkeley, Prof. Dreyfuss , who is Jewish, in the Philosophy dept says Heidegger is the greatest thinker that bridges Religion and Philosophy. And yet, if Dreyfus lived in Heideggers day, he would have been sent to an oven!





I have learned to understand him yet not EXCUSE him. He taught me many good things. One was " Faith in God and Confidence in Your abilities" . That has served me well. The other is " Know the Truth and the Truth Shall set you free"......yes I am free!





To see his work go here....http://www.theodorelukits.org/