Timeline
Below is a detailed timeline of Anthony Eterovich’s life as an artist and educator. Eterovich created a vast body of work and positively impacted numerous aspiring artists over the course of his 70-year career. These are some highlights from his extraordinary life.
April 2, 1916
Anthony William Eterovich is born in Cleveland, Ohio, to George and Anna Eterovich. Here is a young Anthony pictured with his father George. George and Anna emigrated from Brač, Croatia, in 1900 when the wine, shipping, and fishing industries failed. George Eterovich worked in the steel industry in Cleveland.
1928
Eterovich, at age twelve, paints his first oil painting, a portrait of a friend.
Circa 1931
Eterovich studies life drawing at the Merrick House Settlement in Cleveland with a young John Teyral. They become lifelong friends.
October 23, 1931
Eterovich, a tenth Grader at Lincoln High School, states in the school paper The Lincoln Log that he, “Hopes to win a scholarship to the Cleveland School of Art.”
1934
Eterovich graduates from Lincoln High School and is featured in the Cleveland Museum of Art May show, an honor he would receive a total of 55 times in his life. He was in good company; here is part of the listing from that first program.
1934
Eterovich receives a full scholarship to attend the Cleveland School of Art, later known as the Cleveland Institute of Art.
1935
Eterovich receives the Portraiture Award from the Merrick House Settlement.
1936
George Eterovich dies due to complications from a stroke.
1938
Eterovich graduates from the Cleveland School of Art with classmates Hughie Lee Smith, Charles Sallee, Jr., Ted Gorka, and Henry Keto.
January 1939
1939 marks Eterovich’s first appearance at the Butler Art Institute in Youngstown, Ohio. Two of his small oil paintings are included: Polish Youth and Portrait of Jane.
1941
Eterovich receives his BS in Education from Western Reserve University and has two watercolors in the 1941 May Show, titled Landscape and Still Life.
1941
Eterovich begins teaching art at Cleveland Public Schools in Cleveland, Ohio. He would continue to teach in the Cleveland Public School system for the next 37 Years.
1943
Eterovich is drafted into the United States Army, eventually earning the rank of Sergeant Tech Four. During his service he creates topographical maps, posters, and portraits of his fellow service members.
1947
Anthony Eterovich wins First Prize at the May Show for his Etching Suzanne. This etching remains in the permanent Collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art.
1947
Eterovich receives an MA in Art Education from Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio.
1948-1949
Eterovich extends his study of art at the Ohio University in Athens, Ohio under Aaron Bohrod. The two become life-long friends.
1949
Eterovich’s Portrait of Ronnie wins first prize in the Jay Show and is also displayed in the CMA May Show, and the Butler New Year Show judged by Yasuo Kuniyoshi.
1950
Eterovich attends New York Art Students League in the summer of 1950, a practice he continues each summer through 1954.
1950
Anthony Eterovich marries Alice Troyan on June 22.
1950
Eterovich has five paintings included in the May Show, two at the Canton Art Institute, one in the Jay Show, and two in the 8th Annual Valley Show, one of which was Bingo Belle .
January 1951
Eterovich is awarded the First Prize Purchase Award National in the 16th Annual New Year’s Show at the Butler Institute for American Art in Youngstown, Ohio. One of the judges, Edith Halpert, requests a painting for her Downtown Gallery in New York City.
May 6, 1951
Howard Devree of the New York Times reviews Eterovich’s oil painting The Table Charade.
1951
Eterovich has three artworks in the 2nd Annual Drawing Exhibition at the Canton Art Institute and receives an Honorable Mention in Oil Painting Industrial for Effacement (now in the collection at ARTneo) and Third Prize in Freehand Drawing for Study #1. Yasuo Kuniyoshi was a judge in this May Show.
Eterovich begins teaching evening, weekend, and summer classes at the Cleveland Institute of Art in Cleveland, Ohio as an adjunct instructor.
1951
This is the first year that Eterovich entered, exhibited, and sold artwork at the Cleveland Institute of Art Faculty Show, a tradition that he would carry on for the next 54 years, ending in 2005.
1952
Journey with Orpheus first appears in the May Show and Serenade appears in the 3rd Annual Cleveland Public Schools Art Teachers Show.
1953
Eterovich has Ohio Landscape in the 18th Annual Midyear Show at the Butler Art Institute. This show is judged by Edward Hopper and Dong Kingman; both men have a profound, lasting effect on Eterovich’s future style as can be witnessed in Cold Day Downtown and Short Stool.
CIRCA 1954
Eterovich interviews Ivan Mestrovic, the great Croatian Sculptor, at Syracuse University. Alice photographs them, and Eterovich submits an article to Paul Metzler at the Plain Dealer but the article is not published. Ivan Mestrovic studied with Rodin and has sculptures across the globe including his version of the Pieta at the Vatican.
May 1954
Eterovich wins First Prize at the CMA May Show in the Oil Painting, Figure Composition category for Press Boy. The review is glowing “…the first prize going to Anthony W. Eterovich’s Press Boy, a striking medley of arbitrary colors so synchronized as to achieve a pattern of arresting conviction.”
Summer 1955
Children’s Pas de Deux appears in the 20th Annual Midyear Show at the Butler Institute of American Art and Oriental Phantasy wins Second Prize at the Ohio State Fair.
March/April 1956
Anthony Eterovich’s first solo show is held at the Women’s City Club in Cleveland, Ohio.
May 6, 1956
Regal Decline is favorably highlighted in the Cleveland Plain Dealer.
January 1958
Eterovich’s Portrait of Alice is favorably mentioned by Paul Mooney in the Cleveland Plain Dealer.
1959-1960
Eterovich is featured in the Lakewood Civic Auditorium Exhibit.
January 17, 1960
The Choreographer is reviewed favorably by Paul Metzler in Art Today, a column in the Cleveland Plain Dealer.
May 1960
July Heat is included in the Cleveland Museum of Art’s 42nd May Show.
December 1960
Anthony Eterovich and his painting The Merry Table are reviewed in La Revue Moderne, an art magazine, published in Paris, France.
May 1962
Eterovich’s drawing, The Figure, is included in the 44th May Show, judged by Richard Diebenkorn.
October 10, 1963
Anthony Eterovich has his second solo show of drawings at the Cleveland InTown Club and is favorably reviewed by Marie Kirkwood of the Sun Press.
November 28, 1964
Eterovich’s artwork is featured with six other local artists including Viktor Schreckengost, John Teyral, and Peter Paul Dubaniewicz in a Festival of Arts and Champagne Dinner held at the Pick Carter Hotel. The special guest at this dinner was Dame Judith Anderson and Windsor French wrote it up in the Cleveland Press, on November 12, 1964.
December 22, 1964
The Jewish Community Center of Cleveland Awards a Certificate of Recognition for Artistic Excellence of the Work for an oil called Press Visit in its Eleventh Annual Art Show.
1970
Eterovich’s mother, Anna, dies at aged 90.
June 28, 1970
King Rhetoric makes its first appearance at the Butler Midyear Show. Eterovich would work on this painting for the next 40 years until 2010, finally calling it The Always-Running Art Critic.
March 7, 1971
Eterovich’s work King Rhetoric is featured in the Massillon Museum’s 5th Regional Fine Arts Exhibition, in Massillon, Ohio.
February 18, 1974
Eterovich receives an Art Faculty Grant from the Union of Independent Colleges of Art for his proposed project, The Big Leap.
March 1, 1974
Eterovich’s students hold top Scholastic Honors as in so many years before. What is unusual about this photo is that his students recreated this pose at the opening of A Thrilling Act in 2016.
June 1978
Eterovich retires from teaching at the Cleveland Public Schools after more than 30 years.
1980
Eterovich chairs the Regional Scholastic Art Competition hosted by the Cleveland Institute of Art beginning in 1980 and ending in 1989.
1983
City Reverie, now in the collection at the Artists Archives of the Western Reserve, is in the Cleveland Institute of Art Centennial Faculty Exhibition at the State Office Building in Columbus and is featured in the Plain Dealer on Sunday, February 27, 1983.
1984
Maxine Masterfield pays tribute to her teacher and mentor, Anthony Eterovich, in the book Painting the Spirit of Nature.
1999
Venus Fantasy, on view at the Cleveland Institute of Art Faculty Show, was sold to Mr. & Mrs. Moran of New York City.
2003
Anthony Eterovich is interviewed by Rich Garr for the Tremont Oral History Project conducted under the auspices of Cleveland State University.
2005
Eterovich retires from teaching at the Cleveland Institute of Art after 50 years.
2010
Anthony and Alice Eterovich celebrate their 60th wedding anniversary.
April 26, 2011
Anthony Eterovich dies in Cleveland, Ohio, at the age of 95. He is survived by his wife Alice, his daughter Karen, and granddaughter Alice.
2014
Through former student, Laura Ospanik, the Cleveland Institute of Art names a classroom for Anthony Eterovich in honor of his contribution to art and education. Pictured here, at the dedication, are Laura’s husband, Steve Robbins, Laura Ospanik, Anthony Eterovich’s wife Alice Eterovich, daughter Karen Eterovich-Maguire, her husband John Maguire, and their daughter Alice Maguire.
2015
Eterovich has a painting, Bridal Shop, in Fractured Planes at ARTneo and Mallscape is on display at the Artists Archives of the Western Reserve in a group show called Sustenance.
2016
A Thrilling Act: The Art of Anthony Eterovich opens at Tregoning & Company, a gallery specializing in art from the Baroque to contemporary, in Cleveland, Ohio. Eterovich receives reviews in Cleveland Scene, the CAN Journal, radio Interviews conducted by Dee Perry on Ideastream and WKSU and two videos, one on Ideastream produced by Emmy winner Dennis Knowles on Ideastream and Ted Sikora for the Artists Archives Oral Histories.
2018
Eterovich had artwork in Three Angles: A History of Cleveland Art presented by the AAWR and ARTneo for the CAN Triennial. A Thrilling Act tour begins at the Southern Ohio Museum in Portsmouth, Ohio, curated by Charlotte Gordon and Mark Chepp, and the show then moves to the Stocker Art Gallery at Loraine County Community College.
2019
Fulfilling the Eye, Eterovich’s Welcome to the Archives Solo Show curated by Mindy Tousley, opened November 21, 2019, and closed January 20, 2020.
Photo by Stuart Pearl
2021
A Thrilling Act: The Art of Anthony Eterovich opens at Massillon Museum, 50 years after he first exhibits a painting in its 5th Regional Fine Arts Exhibit.
