Lions Gallery Portrait Paintings

The imagery of Maurice Kish (1895-1987), whether factories or carousels, reliably subverts expectations. His vision hovers just around the unraveling edge of things, where what is solid and clear becomes ambiguous. He is fascinated, often delighted, by the falling apart. This unexpected, fresh perspective results in oddly affecting pictures of a now long-gone New York. Born Moishe in a town called Dvinsk, Russia (what is now Daugavpils, Latvia), Kish came with his family to New York when he was in his teens. The family settled in Brownsville, and for the rest of Kish’s life Brooklyn remained his home, though he moved from one neighborhood to another. He was close to his parents, who recognized his talent and supported his desire to become an artist. Kish attended the National Academy of Design as well as Cooper Union. His fellow students included many other immigrants and children of immigrants who were particularly receptive to the Modernism coming from Europe. As his career progressed, Kish himself applied different strains of Modernism to different purposes. For him, the story was held above all else. For years, Kish used the skills he acquired in art school to earn his living at a Manhattan glass...

Beautiful gouache on paper, by French artist, Etienne Ret, signed on top right. Etienne Ret was born in Bourbonnais, France on Jan. 6, 1900. Ret graduated from the College of Mesnie...

Moshe Katz (Romanian Israeli), 1937- an Israeli citizen, studied art at the Bezalel Academy of Art in Jerusalem, as well as at the Chicago Academy of Fine Arts. He received second pr...

Rabbi Portrait, Oil Painting Framed: 37.5 x 26. Canvas: 31.5 X 20 Bears original label verso from Safrai Gallery Lovely Israeli Chassidic Rabbi portrait oil painting, vibrant colorful painting. Hand signed in Hebrew and English. Done in a style similar and influenced by Marc Chagall. Svi Raphaely (also known as Tzvi Raphaeli...

Highly textured portrait of an elderly rabbinic sage. Moshe Katz was born March 2, 1937 in Bucharest, Romania. With his parents, he fled the Nazis and with much difficulty successfully made it safely to Israel. His paintings have been displayed by Arts International in galleries across the globe since the fall of 1965. He received second prize in the Israeli Group Artist Show in Halfa in 1959. Exhibits featuring his paintings of the young artist in the United States have taken place in Philadelphia, Los Angles...

Sandor Molnar began his studies at the Hungarian Academy of Fine Arts in 1955. His Studio at the Academy was the scene of friendly get-togethers and intellectual workshops from 1958 ...

In this painting, Nussbaum depicts a Rabbi as his subject; a recurrent figure in his body of work. The artist uses gestural marks and vibrant blue colors in this composition. Nussba...

Konstanty Swewczenko (1910-1991), signed oil Judaica Oil Painting, Polish, c.1960 Konstantin Shevchenko studied at the Institute of Fine Arts in Warsaw in the years 1927 - 1928. Then, in 1932 he studied painting under the guidance of Kowarski and Pruszkowski at the Warsaw Academy of Fine Arts. Practiced easel painting, mostly portraits, genre scenes. Among others, a portrait Moscicki, Rydz - Rydz, and after the war Rokossowski. He worked as a set designer. In the years 1934 - 1935 was production designer Variety Theatre. He collaborated with publishing houses with illustrations. He exhibited in Warsaw, Vienna, New York. In 1947 he took part in Exhibition Independent Artists Group) and abroad (solo exhibition at the Gallery G. Tomalsky in New York, 1964) . His works are in the collection of the Museum of the Polish Army.

Judaic oil painting by Krakow, Poland born artist Mark Siegband. Signature on top left. Framed w title plaque on frame. He is one of many great Jewish Polish artists that included Leopold Gottlieb...

In this painting, Nussbaum portrays a Rabbi, or Rebbe outside the synagogue The vibrant colors used in this painting seem to overlay each other without being previous mixed. Ervin B...

Itamar Siani, Israeli artist, painter, engraver, born 1941, Yemen His art commemorates the unique cultural heritage and traditions of the Yemenite Jewish community, who returned to the Promised Land on "Eagles' Wings," the code name of the Israeli rescue of Yemenite Jewry in 1949. Among his notable works is a ten-meter long oil painting depicting the immigration of the Yemenite Jews, which he worked on for 30 years.He did a celebrated series titled "The Magic Carpet" etchings depicting stages in the artist’s life including: Liberation, The Magic Carpet, Refugees, New life in Israel, Family, Mount Sinai. published in Jerusalem 1973. The artist was born in Sana’a in Yemen and flown to Israel aged 5 years old as part of operation ‘Magic Carpet’ the mass migration that transported almost the entire Jewish population of this part of the Arabian peninsula to the new State. The etchings continue and develop a long tradition of Yemenite artistry. Yemenite born Israeli painters Avshalom Okashi...

Carlo Pittore Oil on canvas, 1984, Self Portrait, initialed and dated lower left, slat framed, 21"sqr (frame) 20 X 20 canvas. Provenance: The Private Collection of Wolf Kahn & Emily Mason Carlo Pittore (1943 – 2005) born Charles J. Stanley was an American painter, educator, art activist, and publisher, whose primary study, teaching and body of work was figurative art and portrait painting. He was a pioneer in the Mail Art movement, he corresponded with such mail art luminaries as Buster Cleveland and Ray Johnson. Pittore is noted for opening the first independent art gallery in the East Village, Manhattan. In 1987, Pittore founded "The Academy of Carlo Pittore" in Bowdoinham, Maine. Pittore (née Charles Stanley) was born to Stanford and Estelle Stanley in Queens, New York. He grew up on Long Island, in Port Washington, New York with his sister Marion and brother Elliott. Pittore graduated from Port Washington High School (1961), where he was active in the political and debating scenes. He then went on to graduate from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts (1966), and post graduate from the Brooklyn Museum Art School (1978). Pittore changed his name in the 1970s while studying abroad in Rome, Italy. The children nicknamed him "Carlo Pittore", (”Charles the Painter"). From there he went on to study at the Chelsea College of Arts in London. In 1978, Pittore received the Max Beckmann Scholarship in Advanced Painting. It allowed him to begin studying with American feminist painter Joan Semmel at the Brooklyn Museum Art School. He also studied with visual portrait artist Alice Neel. After which, he taught art at the New York Cultural Foundation. In the 1970s, Pittore and his close friend Bern Porter...

Louis Wolchonok was a social realist painter and member of the Woodstock Art Association. His work was exhibited at the Whitney Museum of American Art, the National Academy of Design...

William (Sunny) Weintraub, Israeli (Born 1926) Oil on masonite William Weintraub (He was also known as Shlomo Weintraub and nicknamed Sonny Weintraub) Genre: Impressionist Subject: Portrait Medium: Oil Surface: Canvas Dimensions: framed 24 X 32.5 canvas 19 X 27 In an ever-changing art world that embraces one movement after the next, the timeless art of portraiture can become lost. Portraiture is often associated with the royal paintings of centuries-old French kings, European nobility, and other wealthy individuals from art history's past. However, styles like Social Realism and Dutch genre painting spotlighted...

Simka Simkhovitch (Russian/American 1893 - 1949) This came with a small grouping from the artist's family, some were hand signed some were not. These were studies for larger paintings. Simka Simkhovitch (Симха Файбусович Симхович) (aka Simka Faibusovich Simkhovich) (Novozybkov, Russia May 21, 1885 O.S./June 2, 1885 N.S.—Greenwich, Connecticut February 25, 1949) was a Ukrainian-Russian Jewish artist and immigrant to the United States. He painted theater scenery in his early career and then had several showings in galleries in New York City. Winning Works Progress Administration (WPA) commissions in the 1930s, he completed murals for the post offices in Jackson, Mississippi and Beaufort, North Carolina. His works are in the permanent collections of the Dallas Museum of Art, the National Museum of American Art and the Whitney Museum of American Art. Born outside Kyiv (Petrograd Ukraine) into a Jewish family who owned a small department store. During a severe case of measles when he was seven, Simcha Simchovitch sketched the views outside his window and decided to become an artist, over his father's objections. Beginning in 1905, he studied at the Grekov Odessa Art School and upon completion of his studies in 1911 received a recommendation to be admitted to the Imperial Academy of Arts. Though he enrolled to begin classes in architecture, painting, and sculpture at the Imperial Academy, he was dropped from the school roster in December because of the quota on the number of Jewish students and drafted into the army. Simchovitch served as a private in the 175th Infantry Regiment Baturyn [ru] until his demobilization in 1912. Re-enrolling in the Imperial Academy, he audited classes. Simka Simkhovitch exhibited paintings and sculptures in 1918 as part of an exhibition of Jewish artists and in 1919 placed 1st in the competition "The Great Russian Revolution" with a painting called "Russian Revolution" which was hung in the State Museum of Revolution. In 1922, Simkha Simkhovitch exhibited at the International Book Fair in Florence (Italian: Fiera Internazionale del Libro di Firenze). In 1924, Simkhovitch came to the United States to make illustrations for Soviet textbooks and decided to immigrate instead. Initially he supported himself by doing commercial art and a few portrait commissions. In 1927, he was hired to paint a screen for a scene in the play "The Command to Love" by Fritz Gottwald and Rudolph Lothar which was playing at the Longacre Theatre on Broadway. Art dealers began clamoring for the screen and Simkhovitch began a career as a screen painter for the theater. Catching the attention of the screenwriter, Ernest Pascal, he worked as an illustrator for Pascal, who then introduced him to gallery owner, Marie Sterner. Simkhovitch's works appeared at the Marie Sterner Gallery beginning with a 1927 exhibit and were repeated the following year. Simkhovitch had an exhibit in 1929 at Sterner's on circus paintings. In 1931, he held a showing of works at the Helen Hackett Gallery, in New York City and later that same year he was one of the featured artists of a special exhibit in San Francisco at the California Palace of the Legion of Honor in Lincoln Park. The exhibit was coordinated by Marie Sterner and included four watercolors, including one titled "Nudes". He is of the generation of Russian Soviet artists such as Isaac Pailes, Serge Charchoune, Marc Chagall, Chana Orloff, Isaac Ilyich Levitan, and Ossip Zadkine. In 1936, Simkhovitch was selected to complete the mural for the WPA Post office project in Jackson, Mississippi. The mural was hung in the post office and courthouse in 1938 depicted a plantation theme. Painted on the wall behind the judge’s bench, “Pursuits of Life in Mississippi”, a depiction of black workers engaged in manual labor amid scenes of white professionals and socialites, was eventually covered over in later years during renovations due to its stereotypical African American imagery. The following year, his painting "Holiday" won praise at an exhibition in Lincoln, Nebraska. In 1940, Simkhovitch's second WPA post office project was completed when four murals, "The Cape Lookout Lighthouse and the Orville W. Mail Boat", "The Wreck of the Crissie Wright", "Sand Ponies" and "Canada Geese" were installed in Beaufort, North Carolina. The works were commissioned in 1938 and did not generate the controversy that the Jackson mural had. The main mural is "The Wreck of the Crissie Wright" and depicts a shipwreck which had occurred in Beaufort in 1866. "The Cape Lookout Lighthouse and the Orville W. Mail Boat" depicted the lighthouse built in 1859 and the mail boat that was running mail during the time which Simkhovitch was there. The boat ran mail for the area until 1957. "Sand Ponies" shows the wild horses common to the North Carolina barrier islands and "Canada Geese" showed the importance of hunting and fishing in the area. All four murals were restored in the 1990s by Elisabeth Speight, daughter of two other WPA muralists, Francis Speight...