Israel's Artist Family
Written By: Syd Applebaum
Lellik is a big man. He is tall, broad, with strong features and a bald head. Lellik is a famous artist. His media are oils, mobiles, wood, metal, cloth, — anything. One of his close friends claims he has no sense of humor. Another writes down every second word he utters, and plans to publish it as an anthology of pure humor.
Louise is a tall woman. She is slim, lissom, graceful, taciturn. She is introspective and beautiful. Louise is a well-known artist. Her media are water colors, mobiles, fabrics, iron - everything.
Zahara is a spare woman. She too is tall, with commanding features and a face made stark by the pull of her taut-back hairdo. She talks rapid-fire in two or three languages at once. She is a noted artist. Her media are water colors and metal screening, oils and plastics — anything and everything.
Lellik, Louise and Zahara have a great deal in common. First of all, they bear the same family name — Schatz. Lellik (or Bezalel, as he was named at birth) is Louise’s husband. He is also Zahara’s brother. Taken separately, each one of these individuals is a wonderful creator of living art in Israel. As a trio they are superb.
Bezalel or Lellik was born in 1912, the son of Professor Boris Schatz. His father, a former court sculptor to the King of Bulgaria, later came to Jerusalem to found the Bezalel School of Art. His mother is a renowned figure who is still noted for art criticism.
Bezalel was born in the building in Jerusalem of the same name, foreshadowing his profession from the very beginning. He has borne the nickname of Lellik (a diminutive of the last syllable of his name) since he was two years old. He never went to public school. He had private tutors, and also, from the age of seven to fourteen, he studied at the Bezalel School of Art. His “bar-mitzvah” speech was an exhibition of his own paintings. Two years in the United States, five in Paris — and by 1938, Lellik, influenced by Cezanne and Soutine, felt he was at the “beginning of an artist’s work.”
Then he returned to Palestine, collected his late father’s work, and together with some of his own and his sister’s paintings, set off with Zahara to tour the United States. They held forty-one exhibitions all over the country.
The war found Lellik in Richmond, California. Along with 65,000 other men and women, he worked at the Kaiser Shipyards, starting as a draughtsman. Subsequently he became chief draughtsman and put in sixteen hours of work each day, helpingplan liberty ships, LST’s and corvettes. According to him, a breath of fresh air came into his life when he met Louise, also a draughtsman who specialized in ventilation design. This wave of oxygen went to his head: they were finally married in 1948.
Lousie is quite different from her husband. She comes of an old California family by the name of McClure. At the University of California in Berkeley, Lousie studied art and was especially influenced by a Japanese master. "The door opens as you go," Louse says. She took prizes for her work - then of the academic school - when she was still studying.
Louise’s style is a great contrast to Lellik’s. Her water colors, for example, catch Israel’s mood and life with tender exactness, with an Oriental grace of line and delicacy. Lellik’s style is smashing, crashing color, thrown together in what seems a frenzy. It is an expressionistic mantle of life, recorded on canvas, a coat of many colors.
Lellik has vast, energy. At one time, he decided that the greatest books ever produced were “printed” in medieval days. The form of each manuscript of that period, illustrated, hand-written, colored, seemed to fit the idea of each book, like a scabbard does a sword. “The book and its design are one,” Lellik believes (a formulation which parallels Jewish theology, and an example of its pervading influence, even on “Bohemians").
At any rate, Lellik set about producing what he calls “a modern conception of a book.” He found a collaborator in Henry Miller. Miller was at one time one of the many American expatriates who regarded Paris as their spiritual home. His wild moods of books are not widely known. At least two: “Tropic of Capricorn” and “Tropic of Cancer” are banned for import into the United States or England.
Lellik speaks half-a-dozen languages, none grammatically. He once had a passionate argument with a Greek art critic, in Greek. “Can you speak Greek, Lellik?” I asked. “No,” he replied, “but he was wrong, and even if you don’t know Greek, you can surely tell him so.”
It is hard to put him down on paper. A typical conversation might be: “Shalom Lellik, what’s new?”
"New? Nothing's new. Well, lots of things. We're designing for a ship and making some new chairs and there's an exhibition."
Or, after listening to someone outline and idea for a design: "Thats's terrific, it's wonderful, it's magneficent. There's only one thing wrong. It stinks!"
Zahara, his sister, is very much like Lellik, but somewhat more restrained. There homes are an indication of their personalities. Great barns of homes, with no walls - just one tremendous room, and families of cats wandering about freely through a maze of paintings, sculptures, mobiles, and an Aladdin's lamp collection of modernistic objets d'art, with people floating in and out, smoking, sipping coffee laced with cognac, or gulping red vermouth or dry wine.
Zahara Schatz is four years younger than her brother. She, however, went to school. She began painting at the age of three. Her first subject were standard European themes and Jerusalem's Oriental motifs. In her high school days however, botany ranked above art with her. But finaly the family talent won out.
Zahara made her way first to Paris. But 1939, she was in Hollywood and renowned as a designer of jewelery. She also continued painting and did some teaching. One day, while laminating two pieces of plastic, she noticed some dirt remained imbedded between the two pieces. This, says Zahara, was for her "the birth of an idea." Using transparent surfaces like plastic, with all sorts of "thingamajigs" imbedded, a new facet of art was discovered, which wonderfully exploits the play of light and shade.
One of Zahara's pet jobs was for the office of Bank Leumi in New York, where she employed five layers of plastic to give depth to a map of Israel. In the United States she took a number of prizes for her work, including one from the Museum of Modern Art.
Four years ago, Zahara came home to Jerusalem. Now she works as advisor to the department of product developement in the ministry of commerce. She is kept busy guiding manufacturers in designs for their goods, helping infuse functional beauty in substances that might otherwise be tawdry. Another job handled by this department is the organization of exhibitions abroad. This plus her artwork almost manages to keep Zahara busy. She is active in Jerusalem in a civic improvement group known as the "face-lifting" committee (almost a direct translation from the Hebrew).
After thirteen years abroad, Lellik, along with his wife, Louise, also returned to Israel. The three Schatzes promptly became a kind of trinity in Israel art circles.
They are a unique trio. In addition to pure art, each is quite proficient in the field of applied art. Lellik, for example, earned his first fee for a hand-wrought brass menorah; Zahara has been working on her plastic jewelery; Lousie helped put herself through college by designing fabrics.
In the past few years, the Schatz group has held a number of exhibitions. One, in Tel Aviv, had entries of each of the three in pure art, applied art, and in craft. Their show ran five weeks instead of the scheduled three.
They have taken prizes recently at Milan's Triennale for crafts, and at the Venice's Bienale for pure art. Now, together with Jean David (noted for his tourist posters - Jonah in the Whale, King David and the Lion) the trio has fromed a group called Ya'ad for producing and marketing jointly all typed of art objects as well as crafts, ranging from chairs and trays to vases and tables. The Jerusalem Israel Bond office was one of the first to recognize Ya'ad's work, comissioning a series of photo albums which are presented to distinguished visitors to Israel - Elanor Roosevelt was one of the recipents.
The importance of the three Schatzes is summarized in their family name Schatz which in Yiddish means treasure. The name, though, stems from the initials of the Hebrew term Shaliah Zibbur. This is a title for the Chazan, who is the representative of the public.
The Schatzes are the representatives of an international trend in art, of a modern renaissance. Zahara calls it "taking art out of the sky and putting it into everyday life." Louise defines it as "integrating art into life." Lellik just practices it.
The results may be a brooch which Mr. Man-in-the-street would call "nuts," a chair which is "crazy," or a painting which is a "riot." Be that as it may, Israel is represented in this modern renaissance, perhaps right up in the front row. The three Schatzes see to that.
Israel's Artist Family
Written By: Syd Applebaum
Lellik is a big man. He is tall, broad, with strong features and a bald head. Lellik is a famous artist. His media are oils, mobiles, wood, metal, cloth, — anything. One of his close friends claims he has no sense of humor. Another writes down every second word he utters, and plans to publish it as an anthology of pure humor.
Louise is a tall woman. She is slim, lissom, graceful, taciturn. She is introspective and beautiful. Louise is a well-known artist. Her media are water colors, mobiles, fabrics, iron - everything.
Zahara is a spare woman. She too is tall, with commanding features and a face made stark by the pull of her taut-back hairdo. She talks rapid-fire in two or three languages at once. She is a noted artist. Her media are water colors and metal screening, oils and plastics — anything and everything.
Lellik, Louise and Zahara have a great deal in common. First of all, they bear the same family name — Schatz. Lellik (or Bezalel, as he was named at birth) is Louise’s husband. He is also Zahara’s brother. Taken separately, each one of these individuals is a wonderful creator of living art in Israel. As a trio they are superb.
Bezalel or Lellik was born in 1912, the son of Professor Boris Schatz. His father, a former court sculptor to the King of Bulgaria, later came to Jerusalem to found the Bezalel School of Art. His mother is a renowned figure who is still noted for art criticism.
Bezalel was born in the building in Jerusalem of the same name, foreshadowing his profession from the very beginning. He has borne the nickname of Lellik (a diminutive of the last syllable of his name) since he was two years old. He never went to public school. He had private tutors, and also, from the age of seven to fourteen, he studied at the Bezalel School of Art. His “bar-mitzvah” speech was an exhibition of his own paintings. Two years in the United States, five in Paris — and by 1938, Lellik, influenced by Cezanne and Soutine, felt he was at the “beginning of an artist’s work.”
Then he returned to Palestine, collected his late father’s work, and together with some of his own and his sister’s paintings, set off with Zahara to tour the United States. They held forty-one exhibitions all over the country.
The war found Lellik in Richmond, California. Along with 65,000 other men and women, he worked at the Kaiser Shipyards, starting as a draughtsman. Subsequently he became chief draughtsman and put in sixteen hours of work each day, helpingplan liberty ships, LST’s and corvettes. According to him, a breath of fresh air came into his life when he met Louise, also a draughtsman who specialized in ventilation design. This wave of oxygen went to his head: they were finally married in 1948.
Lousie is quite different from her husband. She comes of an old California family by the name of McClure. At the University of California in Berkeley, Lousie studied art and was especially influenced by a Japanese master. "The door opens as you go," Louse says. She took prizes for her work - then of the academic school - when she was still studying.
Louise’s style is a great contrast to Lellik’s. Her water colors, for example, catch Israel’s mood and life with tender exactness, with an Oriental grace of line and delicacy. Lellik’s style is smashing, crashing color, thrown together in what seems a frenzy. It is an expressionistic mantle of life, recorded on canvas, a coat of many colors.
Lellik has vast, energy. At one time, he decided that the greatest books ever produced were “printed” in medieval days. The form of each manuscript of that period, illustrated, hand-written, colored, seemed to fit the idea of each book, like a scabbard does a sword. “The book and its design are one,” Lellik believes (a formulation which parallels Jewish theology, and an example of its pervading influence, even on “Bohemians").
At any rate, Lellik set about producing what he calls “a modern conception of a book.” He found a collaborator in Henry Miller. Miller was at one time one of the many American expatriates who regarded Paris as their spiritual home. His wild moods of books are not widely known. At least two: “Tropic of Capricorn” and “Tropic of Cancer” are banned for import into the United States or England.
Lellik speaks half-a-dozen languages, none grammatically. He once had a passionate argument with a Greek art critic, in Greek. “Can you speak Greek, Lellik?” I asked. “No,” he replied, “but he was wrong, and even if you don’t know Greek, you can surely tell him so.”
It is hard to put him down on paper. A typical conversation might be: “Shalom Lellik, what’s new?”
"New? Nothing's new. Well, lots of things. We're designing for a ship and making some new chairs and there's an exhibition."
Or, after listening to someone outline and idea for a design: "Thats's terrific, it's wonderful, it's magneficent. There's only one thing wrong. It stinks!"
Zahara, his sister, is very much like Lellik, but somewhat more restrained. There homes are an indication of their personalities. Great barns of homes, with no walls - just one tremendous room, and families of cats wandering about freely through a maze of paintings, sculptures, mobiles, and an Aladdin's lamp collection of modernistic objets d'art, with people floating in and out, smoking, sipping coffee laced with cognac, or gulping red vermouth or dry wine.
Zahara Schatz is four years younger than her brother. She, however, went to school. She began painting at the age of three. Her first subject were standard European themes and Jerusalem's Oriental motifs. In her high school days however, botany ranked above art with her. But finaly the family talent won out.
Zahara made her way first to Paris. But 1939, she was in Hollywood and renowned as a designer of jewelery. She also continued painting and did some teaching. One day, while laminating two pieces of plastic, she noticed some dirt remained imbedded between the two pieces. This, says Zahara, was for her "the birth of an idea." Using transparent surfaces like plastic, with all sorts of "thingamajigs" imbedded, a new facet of art was discovered, which wonderfully exploits the play of light and shade.
One of Zahara's pet jobs was for the office of Bank Leumi in New York, where she employed five layers of plastic to give depth to a map of Israel. In the United States she took a number of prizes for her work, including one from the Museum of Modern Art.
Four years ago, Zahara came home to Jerusalem. Now she works as advisor to the department of product developement in the ministry of commerce. She is kept busy guiding manufacturers in designs for their goods, helping infuse functional beauty in substances that might otherwise be tawdry. Another job handled by this department is the organization of exhibitions abroad. This plus her artwork almost manages to keep Zahara busy. She is active in Jerusalem in a civic improvement group known as the "face-lifting" committee (almost a direct translation from the Hebrew).
After thirteen years abroad, Lellik, along with his wife, Louise, also returned to Israel. The three Schatzes promptly became a kind of trinity in Israel art circles.
They are a unique trio. In addition to pure art, each is quite proficient in the field of applied art. Lellik, for example, earned his first fee for a hand-wrought brass menorah; Zahara has been working on her plastic jewelery; Lousie helped put herself through college by designing fabrics.
In the past few years, the Schatz group has held a number of exhibitions. One, in Tel Aviv, had entries of each of the three in pure art, applied art, and in craft. Their show ran five weeks instead of the scheduled three.
They have taken prizes recently at Milan's Triennale for crafts, and at the Venice's Bienale for pure art. Now, together with Jean David (noted for his tourist posters - Jonah in the Whale, King David and the Lion) the trio has fromed a group called Ya'ad for producing and marketing jointly all typed of art objects as well as crafts, ranging from chairs and trays to vases and tables. The Jerusalem Israel Bond office was one of the first to recognize Ya'ad's work, comissioning a series of photo albums which are presented to distinguished visitors to Israel - Elanor Roosevelt was one of the recipents.
The importance of the three Schatzes is summarized in their family name Schatz which in Yiddish means treasure. The name, though, stems from the initials of the Hebrew term Shaliah Zibbur. This is a title for the Chazan, who is the representative of the public.
The Schatzes are the representatives of an international trend in art, of a modern renaissance. Zahara calls it "taking art out of the sky and putting it into everyday life." Louise defines it as "integrating art into life." Lellik just practices it.
The results may be a brooch which Mr. Man-in-the-street would call "nuts," a chair which is "crazy," or a painting which is a "riot." Be that as it may, Israel is represented in this modern renaissance, perhaps right up in the front row. The three Schatzes see to that.