Obituary: Charles H. van Horne

Charles H. van Horne

1951 - 2023

We are deeply saddened by the sudden death of Charles van Horne on April 16, 2023. A member of the board of directors for thirty-seven years, he served as the Fund’s treasurer from 1997 to 2014 and our president from 2014 to 2021.  

Charlie was born in Mt. Kisco, New York the son of Suzanne B. Iselin and Warren G. van Horne. He was the great-nephew of Toni von Horn Roothbert, one of the founders of the Fund. An alumnus of Middlesex School, Concord, Mass., he graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with a B. A. degree in 1973. 

In 1983, he and his wife, Alexandra, were married. She survives him as do their children Camille and Nicholas.  

In 1973, he began his business career at Bankers Trust Company in New York. The bank would later send him to London for six year. After leaving the bank, he worked at Creditanstalt International Advisors, AIG Capital Partners, and, for twenty-two years, Abbott Capital Management.    

Charlie was a man of parts. In addition to his successful career in international finance he was an artist, collector, medievalist, and wine connoisseur. On his web site he wrote about his painting: 

I have been painting rectangles in colors for over 30 years – grids of multilayered rectangles, however similar to others in the image, each a different color, enough to create a dynamic between them. The eye seeks for structure and patterns among continuous or distant rectangles, but does not find definition of landscape, figures or object. After a while, it keeps looking, engaged purely in visual experience. Confounding, playful, contemplative.   

He also turned his talents to three-dimensional objects such as a serpentine stone wall on his property in upstate New York.   

While in Europe he assembled a large collection of very early books on palmistry, most in Latin or early French. The collection was sold in New York and acquired by Princeton University. He also developed an interest in medieval sculpture and he and his wife started collecting in Europe. In 2006, some of their pieces were lent to the Metropolitan Museum of Art for their exhibit, “Set in Stone: The Face of Medieval Sculpture.”  

At the Fund, Charlie was an active board member, reading applications, conducting interviews, participating in the weekend retreats at Pendle Hill, and hosting receptions at his apartment in the city. He kept a sharp eye on the Fund’s finances during his time as treasurer and the financial strength of the organization today is due, in no small part, to his astute judgment. He was keenly aware of the ethos of the Fund and sought to balance respect for the founders’ values with the needs of an evolving world in our decision-making.  

In 2010, he wrote Antonie von Horn Roothbert (1899-1970) Notes for a Biography, about his great-aunt who was a fashion photographer in the 1920s and 30s. Many of her images that originally ran in Harper’s Bazaar, Vogue and Vanity Fair are reproduced in the book. Charlie generously gave several hundred copies of the book to the Fund so that every Fellow who expressed an interest could have a copy. The custom of offering a copy of his book to each newly-elected Fellow continues to the present day.  

Thanks to his efforts to document his great-aunt’s work, Toni was included in the exhibit, “The New Women Behind the Camera” organized by the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. The exhibit, on view in New York from July to October, 2021, and in Washington from October to January 2022, examined the extraordinary impact women had on the practice of photography worldwide from the 1920s to the 1950s. The National Gallery of Art now has several of Toni’s images in their permanent collection.     

 At the last meeting of the board of directors attended by Charles, Nadjwa E. L. Norton read from an elegant scroll she composed: 

That on this 21st day of October in the year 2022 that Sir Charles of the Van Horne has shown himself worthy as spiritual kin and has earned the honor of Roothbert Fellow. To those who have journeyed with him upon his quest, you know the truth of which the legends have been told. O’Truly honored we have been to share a world with his visions and space. The Charles of Van Horne, shineth brightly. His merit, integrity, fortitude, and steadfastness as a steward of Roothbert Kin will never be paralleled. His guarding of the past, his wrestling with the present, and his birthing of the future all wonderfully combined to fortify the Roothbert Spirit. Thus, may the trumpets of the most worthy sound, and the sunsets of the most worthy sights, unite in a splendor unable to be captured by the most notable poets as we welcome our newest fellow: Charlie Van Horne. 

The entire Roothbert Fund community is grateful beyond measure to our Honored Fellow Charles van Horne for his manifold contributions over four decades.