Zahara Schatz Visits The Institute

On March 27 and 28, the Institute will entertain as its second Visiting Artist of the season Zahara Schatz of New York City. Miss Schatz, pictured on our cover, was born in Jerusalem, Israel, and comes from a family of prominent artists. Her father, Professor Boris Schatz who founded the Bezalel Art School and Museum in Jerusalem, was regarded as Israel’s "father of art.” Olga Schatz, her mother, is a well known art critic. Her brother, Bezalel Schatz, is a painter.

Although Zahara Schatz painted in childhood, her serious work began in Paris in 1934 where she studied at the Academy de la Grande Chaumiere and at the Ecole National Superieur des Arts Decoratifs. After her graduation from the Ecole National in 1937, she worked on the Palestine Pavilion at the Paris Exposition. Late in 1937 she came to the United States where she has lived the past fourteen years.

The work of Zahara Schatz has been exhibited in museums and galleries from the west coast to the east, most recently in a one-man show at the Bertha Schaefer Gallery, New York City. For the past few years this versatile artist has worked in plastic, both in the decorative and the creative art fields. She is recognized as a gifted sculptor who explores to the fullest extent her plastic material. As a painter she is best known for her "layer-paintings” composed of sheets of plastic with bits of copper screen and other metallic substances embedded within them. Among her accomplishments as designer, are her lamps of great beauty, all of them personal, all of them interesting. In whichever capacity Zahara Schatz approaches her compositions in plastic, one feels that she has respect for and comprehension of its special properties.

Examples of Zahara Schatz’ work will be on view in the School of Art during March. Plan to see this unusual display, to hear Miss Schatz when she lectures on March 28, and to meet the artist in person.

'The Institute Bulletin' - Utica, NY