Eugene Ludins
{{Short description|Ukrainian-American painter}}
Eugene Ludins (March 23, 1904 in Mariupol Russian Empire – May 20, 1996 in New York City){{cite web|url=http://fletchergallery.com/?page_id=222 |title=Artists: Eugene Ludins (1904-1996)|work=Fletcher Gallery|author=n.a.|date=2011|accessdate=April 17, 2013}} was a leading regional American painter and academic.
His paintings are in the collection of the Whitney Museum of Art, and his works have been shown in solo exhibits in Woodstock, New York, New York City, the Dorsky Museum at SUNY in New Paltz, New York, and Albany, New York, as well as in Iowa.{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/08/nyregion/eugene-ludins-an-american-fantasist-at-the-samuel-dorsky-museum-of-art.html|work=The New York Times|title=Beneath the Cobwebs, Regional Treasure|last=Ruiz|first=Rebecca|date=July 6, 2012|accessdate=April 17, 2013}}
His representational art, often fantastic and surrealistic, fell into obscurity after 1948, concurrent with the advent of Abstract Expressionism and his move to teach at the University of Iowa.{{cite web|url=http://www.rollmagazine.com/a-forgotten-american-fantasist-showcased-at-the-dorsky/|work=Art Roll|title=A Forgotten American Fantasist Showcased at the Dorsky|last=Woods|first=Lynn|date= 2012}} Only in the early 21st Century did he regain national recognition, posthumously.
Early career
Ludins was born in Mariupol, Russian Empire,{{cite book |title=The 1955 Pittsburgh International Exhibition of Contemporary Painting |date=1955 |publisher=Department of Fine Arts, Carnegie Institute |location=Troy, MI}} and he moved with his parents, David and Olga Ludins,[https://www.askart.com/artist/Eugene_David_Ludins/100971/Eugene_David_Ludins.aspx Eugene Ludins] to America when he was a few months old.{{cite news|url=http://www.troyrecord.com/articles/2013/02/18/news/doc512185d0c4c48106006008.txt|archive-url=https://archive.today/20130630113406/http://www.troyrecord.com/articles/2013/02/18/news/doc512185d0c4c48106006008.txt|url-status=dead|archive-date=June 30, 2013|work=The Record (Troy)|title=Woodstock artist Eugene Ludins' works on display at museum|last=Benjamin|first=Ian|date=February 18, 2013|accessdate=April 17, 2013}} They settled in the Bronx, where he grew up.
Ludins attended the Art Students League, and from 1928 to 1932, he lived and worked in the Maverick Artists Colony in Woodstock.{{cite web|url=http://www.hudsonvalleyalmanacweekly.com/2012/02/08/eugene-ludins-exhibit-opens-at-dorsky/|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160303213738/http://www.hudsonvalleyalmanacweekly.com/2012/02/08/eugene-ludins-exhibit-opens-at-dorsky/|url-status=usurped|archive-date=March 3, 2016|work=Hudson Valley Almanac Weekly|title=Eugene Ludins exhibit at Dorsky |last=Smart|first=Paul|date=February 8, 2012|accessdate=April 17, 2013}} There, in 1932, he met fellow Woodstock artist Hannah Small, who was then married to (but separated from) artist Austin Mecklem; later, they eloped to New Mexico, and upon returning, moved to their own house in Woodstock.
In 1937, he married the now-divorced Small, and he served as a director of two Federal Art Projects from 1937 to 1939.{{cite news|url=http://metroland.net/2013/02/14/eugene-ludins-an-american-fantasist/|work=Metroland|title=Eugene Ludins: An American Fantasist|author=Staff|date=February 14, 2013|accessdate=April 17, 2013}}
From 1941 to 1942, Luden's Fish Hunt was exhibited at the Art Institute of Chicago, but did not win any awards in their annual show of American paintings and sculpture.{{cite web|url=http://www.artic.edu/sites/default/files/libraries/pubs/1942/AIC1942PandS52ndAn_comb.pdf|work=Art Institute of Chicago|title=52nd Annual Exhibition of American paintings and sculpture|author=|date=October 30, 1941|accessdate=April 17, 2013}}
World War II and later career
At the age of 40, he enlisted in the Army; he served in the American Red Cross during World War II in Okinawa in the Pacific theater of war. He was changed by the experience; According to the Troy Record, "the horrors he saw there would strongly influence his artistic career for the next decade and to some extent for the rest of his life." "His war experiences seep into the imagery" of his paintings and drawings, noted Art Roll.
The New York Times praised his work on July 4, 1948.{{cite news |last1=Hunter |first1=Sam |title=New Group Exhibitions |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1948/07/04/archives/new-group-exhibitions.html |work=The New York Times |date=July 4, 1948 |location=New York, NY |page=X8 |accessdate=April 21, 2022}} The Times also noted a solo exhibit of his drawings in 1958, calling them "light ... a bit of welcome relief."{{cite web|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1958/02/05/archives/art-satiric-drawings-eugene-ludins-spoofs-modern-foibles-displays.html|work=The New York Times|title=Art: Satiric Drawings; Eugene Ludins Spoofs Modern Foibles -- Displays by Two Women |last=Devree|first=Howard|date=February 5, 1958|accessdate=April 17, 2013}}
Ludins taught for many years at the University of Iowa starting in 1948,{{cite news |title=S.U.I. Funds Requested of Education Board Are Higher than Last Appropriation |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/100163023/eugene-ludins-1904-1996/ |work=Iowa City Press-Citizen |date=October 15, 1948 |location=Iowa City, IA |page=13 |accessdate=April 21, 2022 |via=Newspapers.com}} {{Open access}} until he retired in 1969. Amongst his many students at U. of Iowa was Berta Rosenbaum Golahny.{{cite web|url=http://www.golahny.org/biography|work=Berta-Golahny.org|author=|title=Biography: BERTA ROSENBAUM GOLAHNY: Painter, Printmaker, Sculptor, Teacher|date=|accessdate=April 17, 2013}} He was one of a number of W.P.A. artists who had gone to teach art at U. of Iowa, all without academic credentials, including his more famous peer, Grant Wood, although Ludins would stay there for 30 years.{{cite web|url=http://vcg.emitto.net/1vol/oakes.pdf|title=How The Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944 (GI Bill) Impacted Women Artists' Career Opportunities|last=Oakes|first=John|work=Visual Culture & Gender|volume=1|page=24|year=2006|issn=1936-1912|accessdate=April 17, 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160305034443/http://vcg.emitto.net/1vol/oakes.pdf|archive-date=March 5, 2016|url-status=dead}}
He moved back to Woodstock, and lived there in his retirement from 1969 until his death in 1996.
Even in his retirement, Ludins mentored and befriended art students, including Susana Torruella Leval, director of El Museo del Barrio, and her husband, Pierre Leval, who was a Federal judge; they would be critical to the reëvaluation of his artistic oeuvre.
Death and legacy
Small, his wife, died in 1992, and Ludins created a fireproof storage facility for their collective works of art. Ludins died in 1996 at the age of 92. According to Metroland, "Ludins' works languished, forgotten, in the concrete vault the artist built for them...."
In the early 21st century, Ludin's art, once "covered in cobwebs" according to The New York Times, received lost-due favorable recognition, in great part to the work of his old friends the Levals. Prices of his art were "at first consistent and now rising" as of 2012. SUNY New Paltz's Dorksy Art Museum hosted a major exhibition of his art in 2012, curated by Torruella Leval, which received rave reviews.{{cite web|url=http://www.newpaltz.edu/museum/exhibitions/exhibitions_10.html|work=SUNY New Paltz|title=Eugene Ludins: An American Fantasist|author=n.d.|date=2012|accessdate=April 17, 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120730051959/http://www.newpaltz.edu/museum/exhibitions/exhibitions_10.html|archive-date=July 30, 2012|url-status=dead}}{{cite news|url=http://www.arttimesjournal.com/pdfs/Art_Times_Mar_Apr_12.pdf|work=Art Times|title=Eugene Ludins: An American Fantasist at the Samuel Dorsky Museum of Art|last=Steiner|first=Raymond|volume=28|issue=5|date= March–April 2012|page=1|accessdate=April 17, 2013}}
There followed an exhibit of about 60 of the same pieces in 2013 at the New York State Museum.{{cite web|url=http://www.nysm.nysed.gov/exhibits/special/eugeneludins.cfm|work=New York State Museum|title=Current Exhibitions: Eugene Ludins: An American Fantasist|author=|date=February 11, 2013|accessdate=April 17, 2013}}{{Dead link|date=August 2019 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}
References
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External links
- [http://www.askart.com/AskART/artists/biography.aspx?searchtype=BIO&artist=100971 Biography] at Ask Art
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Category:Artists from the Bronx
Category:American male painters
Category:Artists from Woodstock, New York
Category:20th-century American painters
Category:Emigrants from the Russian Empire to the United States
Category:Painters from New York City
Category:People of the New Deal arts projects