Jack Rutberg Fine Arts is a gallery that showcases contemporary and modern paintings, drawings, prints, and sculptures. The gallery opened in 1979 and has now settled in Pasadena after about four decades on La Brea Avenue in Los Angeles.
Owner Jack Rutberg, a long-time collector, said he is savoring the warm support his gallery is receiving from the local arts community.
Rutberg said Pasadena art connoisseurs have been expressing “tremendous appreciation for the fact that there is a gallery in Pasadena that is commensurate with the interest of those that would enjoy going to a museum.”
Jack Rutberg Fine Arts, which buys, sells and brokers the works of established artists, is not focused on collecting decorative but rather “substantial art.”
“I think every work of art is decorative at some point, but we’re not decorators. We are trying to appeal to people who take great pride in ownership that enrich their living environment by works of art that are meaningful to them,” said Rutberg.
As a collector, Rutberg finds joy in sharing. He said he is proud knowing that no one walks out of the gallery without learning something.
“The joy is really in the sharing. To inspire someone to become intrigued with an idea.”
He expressed hopes that his gallery’s decision to relocate to Pasadena will inspire other art establishments to follow suit.
“The fact that Pasadena has never had a real gallery scene, I think our planting the flag here may well inspire others to move to the area because there is a remarkable resource of a community that could well afford and appreciate art.”
Rutberg has this to say to young artists dreaming of making it big someday.
“Nothing will be more satisfying to them than to find their mentor, the artists that they admire.”
He also said nothing will substitute going to museums and galleries “The relationship between an artist and a gallery is a marriage,” he added.
Last September, Jack Rutberg Fine Arts hung and staged a “Collector’s Choice” exhibit which featured a collection of paintings, drawings, prints and sculptures from some of the world’s most recognizable artists.
An exhibition on the works of Ruth Weissberg, who has been such an important figure in not only Los Angeles, but internationally, got underway October 22. The exhibit will run through December 23.
“Interestingly, she (Weissberg) has a profound history in Pasadena and that she was the first artist to not only be the first contemporary, the living painter, to be shown in a solo exhibition at the Norton Simon Museum, and also has that distinction of the first living painter to be afforded an exhibition at the Huntington Museum,” said Rutberg.
Jack Rutberg Fine Arts has plans to mount an exhibition of works by known sculptors in the future, according to Rutberg.
Jack Rutberg Fine Arts is located at 600 South Lake Avenue, #102
Pasadena. For more information about the gallery, visit: https://jackrutbergfinearts.com/index.html
