Monday, October 17, 2011

More Arno Sternglass

I've talked about Arno Sternglass before.  I show a number of his paintings here and talk about his joy of life here.

Recently I bought a painting of his on eBay.  The seller had salvaged it from a barn sale.  It was mildly water damaged, but now cleaned and framed, it shines like a bright light.


Cafe by Arno Sternglass
The scene is a cafe on Third Avenue in Manhattan where Arno and his wife Lila liked to eat.  In exchange for some meals, Arno made this painting for the owner in 1971.  The owner gave Arno more credit than he had expected.  So — and this is typical Arno and Lila — they decided to celebrate their 15th wedding anniversary at the restaurant and invited 3 couples to join them.  Lila says, "We all enjoyed a fine meal and drank a lot of wine."

The cafe is gone.  Somehow, years later, the painting ended up in a damp box in a barn in New Hampshire where it had been collected — and hoarded — by a blind woman who liked to buy art work at yard sales.  For a blind woman, she had a good eye.

Here's one more painting I didn't include in my previous post.  Some of the color has faded.  It's another playground scene from Central Park in the 1950's:

Playground, Central Park by Arno Sternglass

3 comments:

  1. I'm Arno's daughter in law and that painting is great. I love the detail on it. We have several of Arno's painting in the house my favorite is one of our whole family at a deli in New York City. He has go the personality of everyone at the table down perfectly. On July 1st it will be 6 years since he died. He is missed.

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  2. Arno was an amazing painter.

    I just discovered a painting he did of my house in Buffalo in 1944 while visiting my grandparents --fellow German-Jewish refugees from the Nazis.

    Peter Allen Weinmann

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    Replies
    1. What a great thing to find! He always had a strong interest in architecture.

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