Jeff Zurschmeide
Guest Columnist
Art & Books
Jeff Zurschmeide - Guest Columnist: Art and Books.
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Jeff Zurschmeide can’t remember a time before he could read, but he clearly remembers being handed a copy of “Stories of Road & Track” at an impressionable age. That book set him on a path that continues almost half a century later, or it warped his mind, depending on your perspective. Jeff has written nine books on automotive topics, and he makes his living prattling on about automobiles all the time.
He was never going to be a great racing driver, but he collects paintings of great racing drivers, and that’s almost the same thing. When he’s not spending himself into penury on car stuff, he makes his living writing about cars for outlets including the Portland Tribune newspaper, Sports Car Market magazine, and a variety of printed and online outlets. If you find a nice piece of automotive art at a bargain price in a second-hand store, have some pity and don’t tell him about it. He lives in Tillamook, Oregon at the convergence of nice weather, great roads, and public acceptance of keeping a dozen old sports cars in a barn. j.zursch@gmail.com |
Some of Jeff Zurschmeide's articles:
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Books: Issue #6 July/Aug 2019
The day Niki Lauda passed away, I went to my bookshelf and pulled down his treatise, The Art and Science of Grand Prix Driving. It’s part memoir and part explication. That book got me thinking about the value of enjoying a good read, even if the story may be a little self-aggrandizing or jejune here and there. With that in mind, here are two books I believe have a place on any racing enthusiast’s shelf.
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Art - Dion Pears The Golden Age of Everything: Issue #6 July/Aug 2019
My art collection started in the basement of a stranger’s home. I dropped into an estate sale because the man whose stuff was being sold had owned a British car parts business, and I figured (correctly) there would be some treasures in the mix. I didn’t expect to start an art collection.
Down in that basement, among innumerable racing and concours event posters, was a painting by British artist Dion Pears. The work depicts Captain George Eyston and Count Johnny Lurani driving the No. 39 MG Magnette K3 in the 1933 Mille Miglia. The asking price was well out of my budget... |
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Vintage Jaguar Keyrings:
Issue #15 Mar/Apr 2021 Key fobs are a particularly collectible corner of the automobilia world. They have the advantage of being relatively inexpensive, easy to display and transport, and you can use them if you want. Every automotive enthusiast has at least a few gems in their desk drawer. One of mine is a late-60s vintage Honda motorcycle fob, and I’m accumulating quite the little collection of those leather key wallets our dads used to have back in the day.
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Working in Bronze with the Lost Wax Process, Stanley Wanlass
Issue #19 Nov/Dec 2021 Stanley Wanlass might fairly be called a Renaissance man. He’s an automotive sculptor, which is why we’re here, but he has also been a professor at the European Art Academy in Paris and at the Université de Grenoble. He is a renowned sculptor of heroic historical monuments. On top of all that, he’s a writer and a painter, he went to medical school, and he designed the well-known Wanlass aerodynamic windshield for vintage ’32 Ford hot rods. Wanlass is, as the saying goes, a man for all seasons.
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Brumos: An American Racing Icon by Sean Cridland
Nov/Dec 2021 Edition Mention Brumos Racing to anyone in motorsports and they’ll immediately think of Hurley Haywood and Peter Gregg’s dominating success in the Porsche 911 of the late 1960s and early ’70s, but the story starts long before they arrived on the scene, and continues to this day. Sean Cridland has catalogued the entire history of Brumos in a packaged set of three books – one can only call it a compendium – with amazing attention to detail and unparalleled access to company and personal records.
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