Nineteen-year-old Theodore Lukits with Christian Von Schniedu (1893-1976) at the Art Institute of Chicago, June 1917
 
   
     Before Theodore Lukits passed away in 1992, Jeffrey Morseburg, the author of this site, began the laborious process of organizing the artist’s personal papers. Fortunately, the artist managed to live long enough to witness the reappraisal of the Early-California era taking place, so his papers have been valued and maintained. In an unfortunate contrast, many California painters died when their work and era were underappreciated and so their records were scattered or even destroyed. Several years before Theodore Lukits died, Lucile Lukits, the artist’s second wife, began sorting boxes of papers and putting them into file cabinets. In 1998, when Mrs. Lukits was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease and she was moved to Utah to be close to her sister and family, Jeffrey Morseburg, who was also one of his many students, began organizing the artist’s papers and transferring them into file boxes. They have gradually been sorted into files and organized chronologically as well as by subject. As ninety years of photographs, brochures, catalogs, documents, and correspondence have been reviewed and organized it has brought the artist’s work and career into sharper relief. The personal papers of Theodore Lukits are in the process of being scanned and transferred to disc, enabling them to be more easily maintained, utilized and shared. As time allows, the documents and photographs will be added to this web site, allowing them to be read by anyone with an interest in the artist and accessed by other art researchers. This represents a true democratization of art history. For those who are willing to read deeply, Lukits’ long life, artistic career and work as an advocate for traditional artistic principles should add rich detail to the fascinating story of California Art.