Wednesday, April 10, 2013

The Art Center School circa 1960-1963

I recently posted a shout-out to one of my closest friends from the Art Center, Fred Pfeiffer, illustrator,whose career ended much too soon by his own hand.  At this age we are starting to loose our pals at an increasingly rapid rate.  Nostalgia took over while digging up as much as I could find from that period to provide some  back story to a dedicated site of his work FredPfeifferArtist.blogspot.com by two really avid fans Courtney Rodgers and Scotty Phillips. 
I thought it might be of interest to some still around as well as to those younger to what it was like at the former building on West Third Street in Los Angeles.

A later photo of the buildings on West Third


Lorser Feitelson
Lorser taught painting  history and technique starting generally with a short lecture and then an open session for your own project.  He encouraged younger painters to copy master paintings for technical understanding


Harry Carmean - drawing and anatomy


An accomplished draftsman, Carmean emphasized careful analysis of the human form.  The texts were Bridgeman and Peck.  Live models were naturally posed for varying lengths of time.  Conte crayon and newsprint pads were generally exclusive materials for these classes.



Morgan Henninger - Advanced Illustration class
 Assignments were given out a week in advance and the crits lasted most of the session...
Do not ever be late...(Deadline of Death)
Kaminski and Ted Youngkin at coffee before morning classes
 Typical studio class


 Paul Sousa with I believe one of the Hubner twins
taken from an Art Center Catalog

preparing a board
 studio session during break


 Roommate John Demming and my truck at our shared studio on North Cahuenga
Check out the price of gas...1962


During our last year at the center we found a muddy lot on Franklin and thought up the idea of a rope pull between the Advertising Design Majors and the Illustration Majors.  The prints below were scanned in from photostats and have lost a great deal of detail.  Below are the art directors and I believe it was pretty much an exhaustive draw as we were all laughing so hard..



 The end of the day when the Blue visited the Brown

 Sandy and Timmy

Future Mad Men around 1963-64
If anyone out there has anything to contribute to this section I would love to hear from you...GL

1 comment:

  1. Thanks, George. The group photo in the ACS courtyard was an emotional jolt of nostalgia. I am glad to have it, since my copy has been lost..The other one is a great photo of you with Fred and Bruce Houston.
    Here are the names of those in the group photo:
    The top row left to right: (1) Tom Denhart (2) Jerry Andelin (3) Fred Pfeiffer.
    The next row left to right: (4) I can't remember this guy's name (on the far left) (5) Below #4 is Bill Whitely (6) Charlie Crow (next to Bill Whitely) (7) Conrad Angone (8) Ned Mueller (9) George Rekenye (on the far right).
    (10) The fellow on the lowest level -- I cannot recall his name.

    I hope this is not too confusing. If it is, let me know and I will send a clearer description of the guys in the photo with the name of each. We aim to please.
    It was good to talk to you yesterday and also to get your email with this priceless photo. Charlie

    ReplyDelete