DETROIT — Paintings, writings and the iconic blue sweater of assisted-suicide advocate Jack Kevorkian are going up for auction, his attorney and close friend said Friday.
Mayer Morganroth said the late pathologist’s artwork and items will be sold in late October at the New York Institute of Technology.
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Slated for auction are more than 20 paintings, Kevorkian’s art kit and the sweaters he became known for donning during his high-profile assistance in dozens of suicides in the 1990s.
Many of the paintings depict death or dying, and are often intended to provoke. One of those up for auction, titled “Genocide,” features a bloody head being dangled by the hair and held by the hands of two soldiers. One wears a German military uniform from World War II and the other a Turkish uniform from World War I.
Morganroth said Kevorkian wanted to depict the mass killings of Armenians and Jews during World I and World War II, respectively. The doctor was of Armenian descent.
Morganroth said most of the proceeds will go to Kevorkian’s sole heir – a niece – and the charity Kicking Cancer for Kids. Morganroth said the timing was right to sell the items, since there was interest from several auction houses and the broader art world, as well as a desire to settle the estate.
Convicted of second-degree murder in 1999, Kevorkian was freed from prison in 2007. He died in June at 83.
Anne Kuffler, owner of the Ariana Gallery in Royal Oak, who has twice displayed Kevorkian’s work and sells signed and numbered lithographs of six of his works for $500 apiece, said she was offered $100,000 for one of his original paintings during the first exhibit of his work in 1994. She suspects that the value has only increased since then.
Twain says she has compassion for confessed stalker
TORONTO – Country music star Shania Twain testified Friday that she has compassion for a man accused of stalking her but remains concerned that he will continue to pursue her.
Giovanni Palumbo has been charged with three counts of failure to comply with a court order and criminal harassment. He pleaded guilty Friday to the charges after pleading not guilty earlier this week.
The former Ottawa doctor allegedly sent Twain a series of letters, made unwanted visits to her family cottage in Ontario and even attended her grandmother’s funeral before being arrested at a Canadian awards ceremony this year.
Daltrey: See me, hear me, lead me
NEW YORK – Roger Daltrey says there aren’t many contemporary singers who could lead a band, and he partially blames shows like “American Idol” for it.
“A lot of the new people they choose on shows like ‘American Idol’ and things like that — I don’t ever hear lead singers,” The Who front man said.
“They always seem to choose people that are great singers, fabulous singers, but they’ve never got the voice that makes a great lead singer.”
Daltrey, 67, went on to name-drop some of music’s best singers: “You hear 10 seconds of Rod Stewart, you know it’s Rod Stewart. Ten seconds of Mick Jagger, that’s Mick Jagger. Ten seconds of Eddie Vedder, you know that’s Eddie.”
The English-born Daltrey says there is one exception in today’s music scene: Adele.
“I love Adele. That’s a lead singer, that’s the real deal,” he said of the British soul singer, whose sophomore CD “21” is the year’s top-selling album in both the United States and the United Kingdom.
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