Man who died in Trump Tower fire has local ties
Late art dealer, Warhol protege’s family owns Lake Worth art gallery.
The New York Trump Tower resident who died after fire engulfed his home on the 50th floor Saturday evening has family ties to a Lake Worth art gallery.
Art enthusiast and dealer Todd Brassner, who died at a New York hospital shortly after first responders pulled him out of the burning unit, is a member of the family that owns Art Link International on Lucerne Avenue. His brother, Howard Brassner, a locally recognized expert on Florida Highwaymen art, owns the business, according to state records.
“At the moment, the family would like to have some privacy,” said a woman who answered the gallery phone Sunday morning. “They will issue a statement once everyone knows. Not everyone knows right now.”
The upper floors of the 58-story tower, at 721-725 Fifth Ave., are not equipped with fire sprinklers, New York City’s fire commissioner, Daniel Nigro, told reporters.
The building, which houses the headquarters of the Trump Organization on the 26th floor and where President Donald Trump and his family keep a penthouse, was completed before sprinklers were required by city code. Fire investigators were seeking the cause of the blaze that roared through the large apartment, sending gusts of black smoke throughout the building and out the windows.
Todd Brassner was 67. Echoes of his life resound in Palm Beach, where his nonagenarian mother, Edna Weissman, still lives, according to public records. Weissman once served as health and science editor for the Palm Beach Daily News.
Brassner is described in some stories as the late Andy Warhol’s art dealer. While that connection is not confirmed, the dealer certainly appears to have been a friend of the legendary pop artist. Brassner is mentioned various times in the 1989 book “The Andy Warhol Diaries,” published two years after Warhol’s death.
Warhol drops Brassner’s name in celebrity-studded journal entries that chronicle his days in details grand and random.
On Tuesday, Dec. 21, 1976, Warhol wrote: “Went around Fifth Avenue looking for ideas for art projects (cabs $5.75). Went to 860 for lunch with Todd Brassner and (art writer) Rainer Crone, but I couldn’t spend too much time with them; I was painting in the back ...”
The following year, in Los Angeles, Warhol wrote: “Up at 7:00. Todd Brassner called and said he just saw Muhammad Ali in the Polo Lounge, and that he also saw Charles Bronson in the lobby.”
Among Warhol’s works was a commissioned portrait of Brassner’s late father, the fine art dealer Jules Brassner, who died in Palm Beach in 2015.
“His dad, Jules, got him into that art scene. He got him that apartment at Trump Tower. I knew his father for 10 years,” said Eddy Shipek, a local real estate agent who dubs himself “Mr. Sunshine.” As for Todd Brassner, Shipek says he “never spent much time in Palm Beach.”
Warhol is not the only noteworthy name that ties Todd Brassner’s life in New York to his father’s life on Palm Beach. While the son lived at Trump Tower in Manhattan, his father frequented Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Club in Palm Beach, Shipek recounts. It was Jules Brassner who first took him to the oceanfront club, the real estate agent said by phone Sunday.
He details this and other visits in a series of “Mr. Sunshine” videos on YouTube: “Where does he take me to eat? Right to Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago ... As I’m sitting over there, Donald Trump comes over to the table and he says, ‘Mr. Brassner, you are my hero.’”
On Saturday night, the heroes were the more than 200 first responders who raced to New York’s Trump Tower, where they found Todd Brassner unresponsive as the fire raged through his condo, 50C. Six firefighters were injured in the blaze.
Meantime, the man who reportedly called Jules Brassner his “hero” some years ago issued no statement regarding the death of Brassner’s son at Trump Tower. The president did make this statement via Twitter Saturday night: “Fire at Trump Tower is out. Very confined (well built building). Firemen (and women) did a great job. THANK YOU!”