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Perhaps no one has enabled so many to acquire artistic talent as has Larry Gluck. His breakthroughs in fine art training have led to success and artistic fulfillment for countless thousands of all ages and from all walks of life.
Lawrence Jerrold Gluck was born to Maurice and Jane Gluck, a pharmacist and homemaker, on April 9, 1931. It was in a modest home among the sycamore and maple studded suburbs of Queens, New York, that Larry would have, as he puts it, his first "aesthetic experience."
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| Four-year-old Larry Gluck. New York, 1935. |
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When his Father had come home after a hard day's work, and Larry and his older brother Michael had been put to bed, enchanting music would drift through the house. Larry was inescapably drawn to the magic.
Sneaking downstairs, he would tip-toe into the living room and hide behind the sofa. As he peered over an armrest, there would be Dad pouring his heart out over the piano keys. The man was a natural who played by ear; the notes spontaneously flowed from his fingers. And so began Larry's love of creativity.
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| Flushing, Queens, New York, 1930. |
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Flushing, Main Street, 1934. |
It wasn't long before he climbed onto the stool himself, and by age six was taking piano lessons from Mrs. Stamm at fifty cents a pop. Music, however, wasn't the only feather in Larry's creative cap. He can't remember the first time he put pencil to paper, but what is certain is that Larry was drawing and sketching from a very early age. Unlike piano, this was something he didn't have to learn. The lines and shapes seemed to draw themselves.
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Giuseppe Trotta's studio, Flushing, New York |
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Family and friends who frequented the Gluck's often found young Larry sitting quietly in a corner sketching. When asked to show what he had drawn, he'd flip the sketch pad around and surprise them: instead of the expected stick figures, Larry had drawn their portrait. And if there's any question as to how adept those portraits were, it wasn't uncommon for visitors to take his works home and have them framed.
By age thirteen, he was studying under the Italian portrait master Giuseppe Trotta, an old classmate of Picasso himself. For three solid years Larry worked under the eccentric master. Trotta had an uncanny ability to bring someone to life on canvas and passed much of his wisdom on to the young apprentice. During these formative years, Larry was inspired to become a portrait painter in earnest.
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| Pratt Institute, New York, 1951. |
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Graduation photo,
Class of Illustration |
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After graduating high school, Larry pursued his dream by attending the nation's most prestigious art school. He found, however, an institution more dedicated to modern fads and abstract theories than to fine art. The classical, "representational" art that had pervaded civilization and inspired culture for thousands of years was now deemed irrelevant, defunct... passé. Worse, those who could draw or represent the "real world" were considered unimaginative bores; not true artists at all, but illustrators at best. By the time Larry graduated, he was both disheartened and disillusioned. Not only had he learned nothing new, he gave up on the idea that he could succeed as an artist.
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