ALVIN ROSS
RENAISSANCE MAN
Alvin Ross was born on January 12, 1920 in Vineland, New Jersey. His mother, Sonya Eagle Milner was an accomplished sculptor and Alvin was encouraged at an early age by his parents to pursue his artistic inclinations. As soon as he graduated from the Tyler School of Fine Arts at Temple University in 1944, Alvin moved from Philadelphia to New York City where he studied with Peggy Bacon, Louis Bouché, Furman Finck, Earl Horter and Franklin Watkins.
Ross first showed his work with the Charles-Fourth Gallery in New York City. His early figural works often started with preliminary drawings or even a fully scaled smaller version. Both Sketch for Cat’s Cradle and the final version of Cat’s Cradle,1945 and Sketch for Follow the Leader and the final Follow the Leader,1949 demonstrate this method. Alvin included and sold some of his smaller oil sketches for paintings in later exhibitions and also kept numerous small pencil drawings, watercolors and photographs filed away for future development. Departure,1949 and the related drawings show Ross’ careful attention to detail and the placement of both the figures and objects for dramatic effect.
In August of 1950, Ross sailed for France on the Mauretania. By September, he wrote to his parents that he had no money and no letters. He left Paris for Milan, then Munich and finally arrived in Florence on October 1st to begin his study at Academia di Belle Arti. American Sunday in Florence,1951 captures another recurring Ross composition element using three figures or objects, two more closely together and one somehow separated.
Alvin spent the summer of 1956 traveling abroad. Khosrov Ajootian, Acting Dean of the Art School at Pratt Institute writes in a letter of introduction that Ross’ “excellent personality makes it possible for him to make friends easily, but more important, to retain friendships.” He was met in London on June 7th by his close friend from New York, Allan Ross “Dougie” MacDougall and spent the next two weeks visiting museums, going to the theater and dining with him. He met up with his friend, composer, Ned Rorem and sparked up a lifetime of friendship and correspondence with Basil William Sholto Mackenzie, Lord Amulree, with whom he stayed at his Lordship’s Egerton Terrace home in Kensington for a few days. Ross was then off to Amsterdam, Bruges and then to Paris where he met up with Dougie and Morris Golde on Bastille Day before heading on to Spain and finally to Florence on August 13th where he first learned the shocking news of Dougie’s death in Paris on July 19th. Alvin arrived back in New York on the Ile de France in September for a full fall schedule of teaching, lecturing and painting. He also attended a number of dinner parties, gallery openings, museum exhibitions and concerts. Ross continued his close friendship with composer Aaron Copland, with whom he met a veritable who’s who of other noted musicians and composers of the time including Samuel Barber and Leonard Bernstein.
Alvin Ross, Fire Island, 1958
It was during his summer of painting and vacationing on Fire Island in 1957 that Alvin painted Hi. Ross returned to teaching at Pratt in September. In October, he bought an etching press. Ross returned to Fire Island in 1958 where he sketched and painted Serenade. Ross’ first one-person exhibition opened at the Robert Isaacson Gallery on February 24, 1959. The sales and success of this show enabled Alvin to have another summer abroad. He was met at the London airport by his friend, Lord Amulree on May 31st and returned back to New York in September.
Ross traveled to Provincetown in June of 1960 and wrote on June 29th that he “worked constantly at restaurant”, Plain and Fancy that his sister, Lenore owned and operated. He returned to Fire Island only to get caught in the Long Island Railroad strike. After fellow realist painter John Koch purchased Alvin’s Fishing on the Arno, another important artist friendship between the two artists began to unfold. Later that summer, Alvin visited Aaron Copland in Pittsfield and attended Copland concerts at Julliard with him for his birthday later that fall. Aaron purchased Potting Garden and actor Tony Perkins bought Bartender at Ross’s 1961 show of 25 paintings included Kitchen Sink, Rehearsal, Outdoor Restaurant in Florence, and Wastepaper Basket at the Robert Isaacson Gallery. In April, the Peridot Gallery showed Ross lithographs. Alvin headed to Provincetown to stay with Lenore and visited poet and dance critic, Edwin Denby at his dune shack off Snail Road in June. Later that year Ross met composer, Virgil Thomson and his partner, artist Maurice Grosser and developed a lasting friendship with them. Ross went back to Europe in June via London where he renewed his friendship with Lord Amulrée and returned to America in September. Alvin took a trip in December to Provincetown to celebrate the holidays with Lenore to end 1962.
After a highly successful one-person show at the Banfer Gallery in 1963, Alvin was able to rent a cottage and studio at 349A Commercial Street in Provincetown for $400 for the summer season. Alvin returned to the “old shack” in Provincetown for the summer of 1964 and showed his work at the J. Thomas Gallery at 359 Commercial Street. Alvin’s 1966 exhibition of 53 paintings at the Banfer Gallery included Self-Portrait in Bathrobe, Antony Lazarek, Accoutrements, Washed Idahoes and Old Toaster. Kenneth Pitchford’s article on Ross published in the April 1968 issue of art and artists highlighted the trio of three paintings — Interior: Provincetown, Interior: Provincetown II and Interior: Provincetown III first shown together in this 1966 one person exhibition and discusses the careful placement of the knife first seen in Departure,1949. “One painting shown by itself, shows us, again, the detail of the kitchen. Celebration? But one cannot miss a knife lying casually on a table edge, its point transfixing the same unyielding space that is Ross’s primary motif, early and late. Casually? The other outside panel to the triptych, as it were, shows a seemingly unrelated scene, an elongated, semi-dressed, youth, head bent over, hands covering his face. Ross refuses to tell us more about the figure, surrounded by familiar domestic paraphernalia.” The 1968 exhibition of his work at the Banfer Gallery featuring 37 paintings included American Coffee and Danish, Bags and Oranges, Boy Reading Map, and Broken Wine Glass and Cup with 29 of the 37 paintings sold.
Alvin Ross, New York, c. 1966
Alvin sold a significant number of still life paintings through Peridot Gallery in 1971. Alvin also started showing some of his work here in Provincetown with the Jules Brenner Gallery at 382 Commercial Street in 1971. Joan Washburn wrote from Peridot Gallery in July that she “read with some jealousy that Jules Brenner has some of your new goodies even if the company is interesting, I can hardly wait to get my hands on them.” She did and by the Washburn Gallery was featuring 41 works, mostly still life at Alvin’s show.
Alvin Ross was elected President of the Provincetown Art Association in 1973 and took his newly appointed position very seriously. He flew back and forth from New York to Provincetown every weekend in September. Soon after discovering he had cancer and needed surgery, Ross submitted his resignation in 1974. Although Alvin also had to stop teaching and lecturing, he continued to paint some of his finest work here in Provincetown until he died in 1975. “These last paintings are eloquent testimonials to the fragility of life. Compotier and Box, 1975, is such a work: the delicate glass vessel, a battered, patched carton; a piece of string slipping away—all are metaphors of mortality. Wastepaper Basket could be seen as a rehearsal for this work,” concludes Tony Vevers in in his essay for the Provincetown Art Association and Museum’s 1978 Ross Retrospective Exhibition.
James R. Bakker
March 2020
SIX DEGREES OF ALVIN ROSS
Much of my success can be attributed to Alvin Ross — Call it “Six degrees of Alvin.”
This pedigree begins with countless and wonderful childhood recollections I have in Provincetown. Growing up, there were places you wanted to go; one often heard about specific places and certain people. One name you always knew was Pat Shultz Real Estate. Her signs were everywhere, and everyone knew real estate was her domain. She fascinated me and I wanted to know her.
Pat, and her partner Lenore Ross, became friends with a young new business owner who was raising four kids and running the Clambake Restaurant at the Crown & Anchor. Joy McNulty was in search of property that would enable her to expand her business that would one day be her own. She approached Pat Shultz about buying Plain & Fancy, a restaurant that Pat and Lenore had run for two decades. Pat suggested that perhaps “The Lobster Pot” down the street, on the water was a better property. Joy took a look. The “Pot” was run down, needed tons of work and at the very least, daunting. Pat said, “This is what you are going to buy.” Joy took heed and, in 1980, Clambake at the Lobster Pot was born.
In July 1985, I was approached by Sharlene Marchette to work part-time at the “Pot” as a cashier. Within just a few weeks, I was working full-time. For the next 13 years, the Lobster Pot became my home. During that time, I learned more about business, human resources, customer service and food service than my four years at UNH could ever teach me.
Pat Shultz and Lenore Ross were regular customers at the Pot. They would entertain clients, friends and family and we all knew that they were to be treated like royalty, which to me, they were. Over time, I was invited to events with Pat and Lenore, I visited their beautiful home on Creek Hill Road and I was introduced to the works of Alvin Ross.
In 2001, I started Roderick’s Payroll and one of my first clients was the Provincetown Art Association and Museum. Pat was on the board. We immediately reconnected and, by 2004, she was calling me for bookkeeping and payroll services. As she got older, Pat stayed at home more. She would routinely summon me to the house to review and pay bills and write checks, all the while talking about business in town. She knew a lot but she always wanted to know more. She liked being on top of the enterprises in town and continued to crave business updates.
Lenore was always in the other room reading or watching TV. I loved being in their house — brilliant views and incredible art. In 2008, Pat passed away and my meetings that began with her resumed with Lenore. We would have dinner, discuss business and just spend time together. In the years that followed, I learned so much about Lenore, her family and of her many business experiences in Provincetown. There was the fishing boat, lunch counter, Chinese restaurant, Plain & Fancy and of course, a gallery. I learned that Lenore, herself, was an artist and she invited me into her studio in the house. Filled with her art and supplies, it was incredible. Just as importantly, it was filled with works, journals, books and supplies that belonged to Alvin.
Lenore talked constantly of Alvin. After a while, I thought I knew him — his likes, his passions and some of his pain from cancer. Lenore and Pat both cheered me on during my first stint of cancer. Lenore was there for me during my second and she was so knowledgeable about it all.
When Lenore passed away in 2013, her cousin Mark Goldberg and I were the administrators of the estate. Mark, an artist following in his family’s rich history of artists, is a genuinely nice guy. A major part of the estate was handling the art owned by Pat and Lenore. By now, one can guess that most of the art was the work of Alvin Ross.
Before her passing, Mark and I had spent hours with Lenore determining exactly which pieces should go to PAAM. Each time we discussed the selections, we would pull them out, study them, understand their story and comprehend why certain pieces would be so important to the collection. Other works were distributed to family and friends; people who had made a difference in Pat and Lenore’s lives. One painting was gifted to Seamen’s Bank. Pat had told me that she made her money in Provincetown and she kept her money in Provincetown. In her words, “Papa Bill Silva believed in me and helped me.” Today ‘Before the Storm’ hangs in the main lobby of Cape Cod’s First Community Bank on Commercial Street.
I am fortunate to have Brioche hanging in my office along with My Sister. My Sister, a portrait of a young Lenore, looks over me — she gives me guidance and I can see in that painting the special bond that was never broken between Lenore and Alvin.
Since 2013, I have read Alvin’s journals and letters, sat with his works, glanced through his date books and read article after article. I feel that I knew him — that I know him. We would have been friends. In fact, we are friends — friends of the heart.
This show is one from the heart. Christine McCarthy, Jim Bakker and I share a deep friendship and we are all fans of Alvin. We share the passion of his work and sometimes I think we all imagine ourselves in his works, living in this community, while he painted here.
Six degrees of Alvin: Alvin — Lenore — Pat — Sharlene —
Joy and Me. I have been successful because of these people; I have a greater appreciation and love of art because of these people; and sufficed to say that I am, indeed better for having known them.
Steven Roderick
April 2020