The Washingtonian notes that in addition to Supreme Court justices, Harlan Crow also collects Hitler paraphernalia. And yet Hitler manages to be only the second most shocking painter in this billionaire’s group show:
“I still can’t get over the collection of Nazi memorabilia,” says one person who attended an event at [Clarence Thomas’s billionaire Harlan] Crow’s home a few years ago and asked to remain anonymous. “It would have been helpful to have someone explain the significance of all the items. Without that context, you sort of just gasp when you walk into the room.” One memorable aspect was the paintings: “something done by George W. Bush next to a Norman Rockwell next to one by Hitler.”
Still more data for my 2017 assertion that George W. Bush is the most relevant painter of our cursed era.
Related: a 2017 Washingtonian article about the US Army’s collection of seized Nazi art; a breezy 2002 Washington Post article about the market for Hitler merch, including the Texas millionaire with a passion for The Austrian Painter’s paintings, no reason, he just thought they were neat
Previously: “Our Guernica, After Our Picasso”
“As he explained to Jay Leno, the idea of taking up painting comes from Bush’s fantasy of being, or being compared to, Winston Churchill. Churchill painted. Of course, Hitler also painted. If painting makes Bush like Churchill, does it make him like Hitler, too? Is either association, when based on painting, more or less outrageous than the other?”