Onorio Ruotolo

Born in Cervinara, Italy, sculptor Onorio Ruotolo (1888-1966) studied at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Naples and emigrated to the United States in 1908.  In 1923 Ruotolo founded the Leonardo da Vinci Art School on Manhattan's Lower East Side.  The school was created to provide arts education for New York's immigrant community, and it remained in operation for almost twenty years.  In 1924 Isamu Noguchi  took his first sculpture class at the Leonardo da Vinci Art School, and Noguchi began his artistic career with the academic sculpture that he created as Ruotolo's protege.  Ruotolo was most well-known for his portrait sculpture, including busts of Caruso, Arturo Toscannini, Thomas Edison, Theodore Dreiser and Helen Keller.  In addition to his career as sculptor and teacher, Ruotolo also was a critic, editor, poet, illustrator and cartoonist (nom de plume: Bayard).