Last Sunday, Mort Kunstler, America's leading historical artist, made a triumphant return to the Nassau County Museum of Art.

His new exhibit, The American Spirit: Paintings by Mort Kunstler, opened and the artist himself was on hand to sign books, prints, and other artifacts from his productive career.

The day also featured living encampment on museum grounds by Civil War re-enactors.

Eight years ago, Kunstler's exhibit, The Civil War: The Paintings of Mort Kunstler, broke all of the museum's previous attendance records and still stands as one of the museum's top-drawing shows ever.

The American Spirit, as the title suggests, is more wide-ranging, with paintings that span the panorama of American history, from the landing at Jamestown to the Revolutionary War to the Civil War, the Oklahoma Land Rush, and such modern events as World War II, the Vietnam War, and the age of space exploration.

"It's great to be back, I'm delighted to be here," Kunstler told The Roslyn News as he signed books and prints for local residents. Kunstler also noted that yet another new book of his paintings, this one entitled The Civil War Art of Mort Kunstler, had just arrived from the printers for the Sunday opening.

The current show will run through November 5. On Wednesday, Sept. 6, Kunstler will deliver a lecture on his career as "a painter of American history." A month later, on Sunday, Oct. 15, he will unveil a new Revolutionary War print, The World Turned Upside Down, which portrays the British surrender at Yorktown.

In addition, the museum will host two military re-enactments: The Revolutionary War on Saturday, Sept. 16 and the Civil War on Sunday, Nov. 5.

Künstler's work is esteemed for its drama and artistry and for the extraordinary level of authenticity that results from the artist's intense research. He is regarded as the world's foremost Civil War artist: Dr. James I. Robertson, Jr., the dean of Civil War historians and author of Stonewall Jackson, said, "To study his paintings is to simply see history alive....none captures the human element, the aura of leadership, the sense of being there and sharing in the drama quite like Mort Künstler."

The artist is widely acknowledged for his links to the Golden Age of Illustration, to artists such as Rockwell and Leyendecker, but as this exhibition will demonstrate, Künstler's work is also positioned within the larger context of American art. His techniques and style stand upon the foundation of a long-honored American tradition of realism and the premise of descriptive literalism. __

Künstler studied art at Brooklyn College, UCLA and the Pratt Institute. He became a highly successful illustrator, receiving coveted assignments for book and magazine covers such as Newsweek, Saturday Evening Post, Mad magazine and Boy's Life. It was his work for National Geographic, where he was creating highly accurate representations of historical subjects that pointed the way to his convincing depictions of scenes in American history.

An assignment from CBS-TV to do the paintings for the miniseries, The Blue and The Gray, began Künstler's close association with the Civil War. The High Water Mark, his painting for that series, is considered the most accurate and exciting rendering ever of the battle at Gettysburg. It was unveiled at Gettysburg National Military Park Museum in 1988 in celebration of the 125th anniversary of the battle.

In the introduction to his 1996 book, Mort Künstler's Civil War: The South, he recalled that painting as the turning point of his own career.

"All artists thrive on applause," he recalled. "Until 1988, my 'applause' was limited to 20 or 30 people who bought my paintings every two years or so from one of my exhibitions at Hammer Galleries in New York City.

"In 1988, my painting The High Water Mark was made into a limited-edition print by American Print Gallery in Gettysburg," he continued. "This multiplied my audience one-hundred-fold. Sixty-eight prints and three books on the Civil War have followed since then. The books alone have sold more than 300,000 copies. Truly, I never dreamed of that much applause."

The Nassau County Museum of Art is located at One Museum Drive in Roslyn Harbor, just off Route 25A, west of Glen Cove Road. Call 484-9337 for current exhibitions, events, days/times and directions.