He spent the next 20 years commuting between New Orleans and New York City while various dealers tried unsuccessfully to manage him and his often volatile career.

[1] In the early 1940s, while his parents covered World War II as art correspondents for Life magazine, Noel attended Putney School in Vermont, where he graduated in 1947.

He was encouraged by Henry Francis Taylor, director at the Metropolitan Museum and became acquaintanced with Raphael Soyer, John Koch, and Yasuo Kuniyoshi.

Xavier Gonzalez, Jack Levine, and Fletcher Martin all encouraged Noel Davis to ignore the art fads of the time, including abstract expressionism, and persevere in his own unique direction.

Upon leaving his wife and children, he moved to Coney Island, and then Xavier Gonzalez arranged for him to obtain a studio in the house of New Orleans painter Paul Ninas, where, according to Davis, he could "dwell in creative obscurity".

[9] Once in New Orleans, he met E. Lorenz Borenstein, gallery owner, Pre-Columbian artifact dealer, Preservation Hall co-founder, and real-estate entrepreneur.

Upon Rockmore's return to New Orleans, Borenstein had found a young couple, Sandra and Allan Jaffe, who had turned Preservation Hall into a going concern featuring old jazz musicians.

[8] The portraits included the following jazz musicians: Billie & DeDe Pierce, George Lewis, Odetta, Dizzy Gillespie, Jim Robinson, Cie Frazier, Louis Nelson, Punch Miller, Oscar Chicken Henry, Kid Thomas Valentine, Joe Robichaux, Narvin Kimball, Danny Barker, Alcide Pavageau, Kid Sheik Cola, Percy Humphrey, Willie Humphrey, and Emma Barrett (Sweet Emma the Bell Gal) to name a few.

[11] Rockmore worked with a framer, Bruce Brice, whom he mentored and encouraged on his career path, and who eventually became a respected American folk artist.

[13] In 1965, another relationship was formed with Jon and Gypsy Lou Webb, publishers of The Outsider, featuring Charles Bukowski.

Their company, Lou-Jon Press published Crucifix in a Death Hand" featuring Bukowski's poetry and Rockmore's art.

In 1964, he won a Ford Foundation Award that resulted in a show at the Swope Art Museum in Terre Haute, Indiana, where he was artist-in-residence.

[13] In 1967, Luba and Victor Potamkin, a Cadillac dealer from New York, and Sergio Franchi, world-famous tenor, decided that they would manage Rockmore.

They arranged for his biggest show ever, set to take place in New York City in November 1967 at Greer Gallery.

The works captured much of the tension and anguish in Israel at the time, and a show is held at the Crane Korchin Gallery in PA in May.

In early 1969 Rockmore parted ways with Potamkin and Franchi and returned to San Francisco to visit his sister and paint a new series.

Rockmore was also included by Wein on the inaugural Jazz Fest committee and commissioned to do a watercolor series of the event.

He embraced and painted many famous characters from the French quarter, including Mike Stark and his Free Head Clinic, Ruthie the Duck Girl, the jazz musicians Bill Russell and Gypsy Lou, and his new girlfriend Riva Segall.

He was commissioned by George Wein to do an "Homage to the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival", and also began a five-year intimate relationship with Rita Posselt.

He was now represented by the Sandra Zahn Oreck Gallery and had three very successful shows during the next three years that included his "Mardi Gras Backstage series" from the Blaine Kern warehouses.

William May sequestered Rockmore away in a house in Mill Valley, CA and supplied him with canvas, paint, materials, and money to live on.

May was unable to procure the New York show and had to settle for the Chattahoochee Valley Art Association of LaGrange, GA.[13] Rockmore, now 56, returned to New Orleans.

He attended Alcoholics Anonymous and worked hard to reconcile his relationship with Mary May, but by the end of 1987 she had gone and Rockmore was once again alone and without a gallery.

Rockmore began to exercise, working out at the YMCA; his new-found motivation allowed him to move forward and produce an entirely new "Ancient Egyptian" series in 1990.

On Friday February 17, 1995, the day Rockmore was to lose his life, an open house was scheduled at Dr. Hava's but did not occur.

The show "Noel Rockmore: Fantasies and Realities" was presented by curator Gail Fiegenbaum and included a brochure and panel discussion with George Wein, Shirley Marvin and Rita Posselt.