of this only reinforced the impression, already suggested by the peculiar imagery in many of his paintings, that he was either mad or a charlatan. He was not without supporters, however. Eilshemius was championed by Marcel Duchamp, who discovered Eilshemius in 1917 and invited him to exhibit with him in Paris that year. Joseph Stella was an admirer and drew a particularly fine silverpoint portrait of him. His work was generally well received by French viewers and critics; his admirers included Matisse. Duchamp subsequently helped to arrange Eilshemius's first solo exhibition in 1920, at the Société Anonyme in New York City. The hostile critical reception to this exhibition, however, finally drove him to give up painting entirely in 1921, although there is a single known painting dated 1937. The remainder of his life was dedicated to self-promotion, and in 1931 he took to referring to himself as "Mahatma." Victor Ganz started collecting art in his teenage years with the purchases of watercolors by Louis Eilshemius and Jules Pascin and an oil painting by Raphael Soyer. Injured in an automobile accident in 1932, he became increasingly reclusive. His health in decline and his family fortune spent, his mental stability deteriorated in his final year and he died in the psychopathic ward of Bellevue Hospital in 1941. Posthumous recognition Since his death, Eilshemius's work has found a wider audience. One of the artist's few consistent patrons, Roy Neuberger, donated a large body of Eilshemius' work to the Neuberger Museum of Art located at SUNY Purchase College in New York State. According to Stefan Banz, there is no evidence that Eilshemius was a grandson of Swiss painter Louis Léopold Robert as some sources report. Notes References Karlstrom, P. J. (1978). Louis M. Eilshemius: selections from the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden. Washington, D.C.: Published for the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden and Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service by the Smithsonian Institution Press. Schack, William (1939). And he sat among the ashes. New York: American Artists Group. Neuburger, Katharina (2015). "No Jersey Blues" In: The Shadow of the Avant-garde: Rousseau and the Forgotten Masters. Edited by Kasper König and Falk Wolf. Berlin: Hatje Cantz. ISBN 978-3-77574-059-3. Stefan Banz (2015). Eilshemius: Peer of Poet-Painters. Edited by KMD - Kunsthalle Marcel Duchamp | The Forestay Museum of Art, published by JRP|Ringier. Stefan Banz (2016). Louis Michel Eilshemius und sein Einfluss auf Marcel Duchamp. Edited by KMD