Rudi Lesser (1902–1988):
The Forgotten and Rediscovered Artist
Featuring Lillie Johnson Edwards, PhD and Ori Z. Soltes, PhD
Rudi Lesser, a graphic artist already gaining significant recognition in his twenties in Germany, survived the Holocaust in Scandinavia. Interestingly, he immigrated to the US just after the war, in 1946, and although achieving success in New York--and as the founder of the graphic arts department at Howard University in Washington, DC--never felt at home here. He returned to a different Germany, in 1957, where he lived in relative poverty and obscurity--but apparent contentment--for the remaining thirty years of his long life. Lesser was one of over 10 Jewish refugee professors at Howard University and among the more than 60 at Black colleges, primarily in the South. Like other Jewish and white progressives and liberals of his era, [...]
