A few years back, a Sotheby’s auctioneer banged his gavel on a $1.9 million winning bid for an oil painting of a little girl named Lily Williams, a red-cheeked ragamuffin from the East Side slums whose blue eyes sparkle like sapphires. “A child of the slums will make a better painting than a drawing-room lady gone over by a beauty shop,” Luks said. “Down there, people are what they are.” (http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime/n-y-painter-loved-downtrodden-dies-bum-article-1.2064955)