Mid 20th Century Portrait Chalk Drawing of Franklin Delano Roosevelt by Julius Zirinsky, Framed

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Born in Latvia in 1898 and based in New York City (14, West 84th Street), where he died in 1970, … Read more Born in Latvia in 1898 and based in New York City (14, West 84th Street), where he died in 1970, artist and collector Julius Zirinsky was widely known for his brown-chalk-on-paper portraits of international worthies. "Many famous personalities have posed for Zirinsky", a 1941 article noted. Those subjects included US Supreme Court Associate Justice Benjamin Cardozo (American Jewish Historical Society), US Supreme Court Associate Justice Louis Brandeis (Rose Art Museum, Brandeis University), artist Louis M Eilshemius (Whitney Museum of American Art), lawyer and artist James N. Rosenberg (American University Museum), French president Georges Clemenceau, artist George Biddle (National Gallery of Art), stage star Katharine Cornell, and chess grandmaster Samuel Reshevsky. Irwin & Lane’s signed Zirinsky sketch depicts US president Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1882-1945). Presumably sketched between 1941 and Roosevelt's death in 1945 — he would have been cited in the 1941 article if the portrait had already existed — the portrait was framed in its cerused-wood frame in 1954, per dated newspaper pages tucked behind the portrait. See less