| Introduction | Albert Rutherston began his career as a painter of interiors, landscapes and portraits in oils. From 1912 he concentrated on decorative figural designs, book illustration and stage design, returning to oils in the late 1930s. This collection contains over two hundred letters to his parents, Moritz and Bertha Dux Rothenstein, 1896-1908. It also contains nine letters to or from other family members, including William Rothenstein, Emily Rothenstein, Blanche and Max Schwabe and Alice Rothenstein, 1898-1905. |
| Description | Family correspondence of Albert Rutherston. , The letters from AR to his parents have been arranged by date as follows: Aug 1896-May 1898 (fiche 1), May-Jun 1898 (2), Jun-Dec 1898 (3), Dec 1898-Spring 1899 (4), May-Aug 1899 (5), Aug 1899-Mar 1900 (6), Mar-Oct 1900 (7), Oct 1900-early 1901 (8), early 1901-Nov 1901 (9), Nov 1901-Sep 1902 (10), Sep-1902-Aug 1905 (11), Sep 1908 and other family correspondence, 1898-1905 (12). |
| Administrative History | Albert Rutherston was born in 1881, the son of Moritz Rothenstein, a German businessman who emigrated to England, and the brother of the artist Sir William Rothenstein. He was educated at Bradford Grammar School and at the Slade School of Art (1898-1902), where he held a Slade Scholarship. He exhibited with the New English Art Club from 1900 and held his first one-man exhibition at the Carfax Gallery in London in 1910. Rutherston served in Egypt and Palestine during the First World War and anglicized his surname in 1916. From 1929 to 1949 he was Ruskin Master of Drawing at Oxford. He was known for his decorative work and as an illustrator. He edited the series `Contemporary British Artists' (1923-27). His publications include `Decoration in the Art of the Theatre' (1919) and `Sixteen Designs for the Theatre' (1928). Albert Rutherston died in 1953. |
| Custodial History | Loaned to the Archive for filming by Max Rutherston, February 1977. |