Baruch Nachshon

The Song of Peace

Abstracted colorful painting of the first verse of the Shema Prayer. (VeAhavta... and you shall love...) William Proweller is an associate professor of art history at S.U.N.Y., Fred...

Genre: Contemporary Subject: Abstract Medium: Oil Surface: Canvas Hand signed and dated lower left Dimensions: 23 3/4" x 19 3/4" x 1/2" Dimensions w/Frame: 24" x 20 1/2" A bright and colorful abstract oil painting from Ackerman's Celestial Field series. While most pieces in this series are gouache, this electric blue painting is done in oil. Shmuel Ackerman (also spelled Shmuel Akkerman, Samuel Ackerman, Samuel Akkerman) Israeli Symbolist Painter and Co-Founder of the Leviathan Group Shmuel Ackerman (b. 1951, Soviet Union) is an Israeli painter known for his abstract symbolist works exploring the intersection of Jewish mysticism, folk art and folkloric motifs, and modern Western art. Born in Ukraine to a religious family, Ackerman trained at the Institute for Monumental Art in Ukraine from 1965 to 1970 before immigrating to Israel in 1973, settling in Jerusalem. Founding the Leviathan Group In 1976, Ackerman co-founded the Leviathan group in Jerusalem alongside Avraham Ofek and Mikhail Grobman, aiming to enrich Israeli art by drawing on Jewish sources, myth, and symbolism. The group combined conceptual and land art with Jewish mysticism and Kabbalah, seeking to forge a distinctly "national" style of Israeli art — publishing its ideas through a Russian-language periodical, also titled Leviathan, that Grobman edited. Within the group, Ofek pursued sculptural and performative work rooted in Kabbalistic symbolism, staging pieces like Ornament in the Landscape (1979) and projecting Hebrew letters onto the soil of the Judean Desert in works such as Letters of Light (1979), while Grobman's paintings and prints wove Hebrew and Russian text through images drawn from Jewish mystical tradition. Ackerman was an active member of the group until 1981, when both he and Ofek departed; Grobman continued the Leviathan project afterward with newer members including Lena Zaidel, who joined following her graduation from the Bezalel Academy of Art and Design in 1987, and staged further performances such as Khlebnikov 100 (1985) and Messiah (1987). Context: The Post-Soviet Jewish Avant-Garde Ackerman's formation belongs to a broader generation of Soviet-born Jewish artists whose emigration to Israel and the West reshaped both Israeli and international art in the 1970s and '80s. Grobman himself had been an active figure in the Second Russian Avant-Garde in 1960s Moscow, a milieu of unofficial, nonconformist artists resisting Soviet Socialist Realism that also produced émigré figures such as Ilya Kabakov, Erik Bulatov, Viktor Pivovarov, Vladimir Yankilevsky, Eduard Steinberg, Yuri Kuper, Grisha Bruskin, and the duo Komar and Melamid — many of whom, like Ackerman, carried the visual language of Soviet nonconformism into new engagements with Jewish identity and symbolism after leaving the USSR. Ofek's work from this same period was later exhibited in the landmark survey Chagall to Kitaj: The Jewish Experience in Twentieth Century Art at London's Barbican Art Gallery, situating the Leviathan group's project within this larger international conversation about modern Jewish art. Later Career in Paris In 1984, Ackerman relocated to Paris, France, where he continued to develop his abstract practice, producing large-scale mixed-media works on paper engaging with the legacy of twentieth-century modernism — his mature series paying explicit homage to Piet Mondrian, Wassily Kandinsky, Clyfford Still, and Robert Motherwell. Ackerman remains active in both Israel and France, continuing a practice that bridges Soviet-era training, Jerusalem's postwar avant-garde, and the broader trajectory of international abstraction. Keywords: Shmuel Ackerman, Shmuel Akkerman, Samuel Ackerman, Israeli painter, Soviet-Israeli artist, Leviathan group, Avraham Ofek, Mikhail Grobman, Second Russian Avant-Garde, Moscow Nonconformist art, post-Soviet Jewish avant-garde, Kabbalah art...

Nachume Miller (1949–1998) was a German born Israeli artist who immigrated to New York City in 1973, where he made a name for himself in the American Modern Art scene. Miller immigrated to New York to study at the School of Visual Arts, where he would later become a professor of painting and drawing. He was quickly identified as a star on the rise and at the age of 29, was included in the Guggenheim Museum’s “Young American Artists,” Exxon National Exhibition. A decade later he was granted a solo show at the Museum of Modern Art, where his work is now part of the permanent collection. Though his career was cut short by his untimely death in 1998, Nachume exhibited at some of the most prominent galleries in New York and around the world. Miller's parents were both Holocaust survivors. His father was a captain in the front lines of the Russian Army during World War II and his mother was a Lithuanian who had once been held captive in a concentration camp. Both escaped the Nazis, re-united and fled to Israel. Nahum was born during their voyage, in Frankfurt, Germany, on January 28, 1949. He grew up in the town of Holon, Israel, where he was inspired by his father who spent most of his post-war days carving elaborate wood sculptures of Cubist human forms. Nachum, on the contrary, excelled in painting. By the age of 16, Miller was painting elaborate surreal dream lands referencing religion, politics and the history of Modern Art. His earlier works show similarities to Hieronymus Bosch, Salvador Dali and Francisco Goya. Miller was enlisted in the Israeli Army where he worked as one of Ariel Sharon's personal assistants and also fought in the 1973 Yom Kippur War. He went to New York in 1966 to study at the School of Visual Arts, and joined the faculty in 1977 to teach painting and drawing. He was enlisted in the Israeli Army and fought in the 1973 Yom Kippur War. That same year, he received a scholarship from the Israeli-American Cultural Foundation. He married his girlfriend Ruth and moved to New York to study at the School of Visual Arts. In 1977, he joined the faculty to teach painting and drawing. Over the next two decades, Nachume was prolific in the range of media, styles, and references he incorporated into his art. His paintings and three-dimensional works pay homage to artists throughout history, from the classical Greeks to Robert Rauschenberg. He prioritized craft over concept and was a disciplined painter, never neglecting workmanship in favor of a trend. His work is marked with curiosity, sincerity and intensity. Cara McCarty, an assistant curator in the department of architecture and design, organized the current show. It reveals Mr. Miller as someone who finds common ground with both Turner and Jackson Pollock - with the former's Romantic re-creations of storms at sea and with the latter's search for content in abstract gesture. Selected One-Person Exhibitions 1976: "Drawing Show", Bertha Urdang Gallery, New York 1981: "Figures", A&M Artwork, New York 1988: Exit Art, New York; "Projects: Nachume Miller", Museum of Modern Art, New York 1989: E.M. Donahue Gallery, New York 1990: "Nachume Miller: Views", E.M. Donahue Gallery, New York 1993: "Sensual Painting", E.M. Donahue Gallery, New York 1994: The Genia Schreiber University Art Gallery, Tel Aviv University Selected Group Exhibitions 1968: "10+ For and Against", Tel Aviv Aviva Uri, Michael Druks, Nahum Miller, Izzika Gaon, Izzika Raffi Lavie. 1970: "10+ In a Circle", Tel Aviv Moshe Gershuni, Buky Schwartz, Igael Tumarkin, Reuven Kadim (Berman), 1972: "Symbols and Imagination", Artists' Pavilion, Tel Aviv; "July '72", Gallery 220, Tel-Aviv 1975: "The Work of Nine Graduates of the School of Visual Arts", New York; 112 Greene Street Gallery, New York; "Group Indiscriminate", 112 Green Street Gallery, New York 1976: "8 Israeli Artists", Bertha Urdang Gallery, New York 1978: "Young American Artists", Exxon National Exhibition, Guggenheim Museum, New York 1979: The Kadishman Connection Israel Museum, Jerusalem Menashe Kadishman, Larry Abramson, Yaacov Agam, Nachum Miller, Jacob El Hanani,Samuel Bak, Koki Doktori...

Mod, Hippie era Peace art. Chaim Gross, born in Wolowa, Austria in 1904, was educated at the Beaux Arts Institute of Design and at the Art Student's League in New York. Chaim Gross's work was greatly influenced by his experiences during a period of international conflict, World War II. He had moved to Kolomyia from Wolowa to get a better education, but the Germans came to occupy, killing, raping, and looting. Gross and his family were chased from one village to the next. He wrote, "We were sleeping on roofs and in the fields, with the sound of cannon fire always in the distance,". Eventually, he ended up in Budapest with his two brothers, where Anti­ Semitism was not as severe, and that is where he began to sculpt and draw. He even had a few odd jobs there as a gold­ and silversmith. When he was seventeen, Gross immigrated to America where his older brother was. There he was a student and then a teacher at the Educational Alliance on the Lower East Side. Teaching became a big part of his philosophy, as he believed that an artist must pass on the knowledge which he had received from others in his artwork. He was part of an artist emigre community which included Raphael Soyer, Moses Soyer, Arnold Newman, Max Weber and David Burliuk. His daughter is the artist Mimi Grooms and his son in law was Red Grooms. Chaim Gross works reflect his Jewish and Austrian roots and his Hasidic Jewish upbringing. The figures in his art reflect the Hasidic spirit of being happy and making other people happy. In his pieces, Jews sing and dance in celebration of the Jewish Sabbath and festivals. They are shown rejoicing in the great gifts of love and life. Chaim Gross was honored with a number of prestigious awards including: the Award of Merit Medal from the National Institute of Arts and Letters in 1963, and the Gold Medal award from the National Academy of Design in 1985. He often used his creative abilities to explore and experiment with media. In his artwork he retains an optimistic philosophy, even when facing somber issues such as war, depression, and the Holocaust. He is in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art; the Metropolitan Museum of Art; the Whitney Museum of American Art; the Philadelphia Museum of Art; the Art Institute of Chicago; the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Israel. And the EIN HAROD Museum's Holdings: Israeli art is represented by the works of Reuven Rubin, Zaritzky, Nahum Gutman, Mordechai Ardon, Aharon Kahana, Arie Lubin, Yehiel Shemi, Yosl Bergner and others. The graphic arts collection contains drawings and graphic works by Pissaro, Amedeo Modigliani, Jules Pascin, Marc Chagall (almost all of his graphic work), and numerous other artists. The sculpture collection includes works by Jewish sculptors from all over the world including leading Israeli sculptors; Ben Zvi, Lishansky, David Palombo, Yehiel Shemi, Aharon Bezalel and Igael Tumarkin. Many Jewish sculptors from all parts of the world, beginning with Mark Antokolsky, are represented in the collection. In the sculpture courtyard there are works by Chana Orloff, Jacob Epstein (the works he bequeathed to the Museum), Enrico Glicenstein, Loutchansky, Joseph Constant and Leon Indenbaum...

Original mid-century modern abstract oil on canvas painting by the well known Russian/American artist Nahum Tschacbasov. Signed lower right and dated 1945. Condition is very good. P...

Firoozeh Akhlaghi 1968 - Current Melody of Peace, 2024 Oil and acrylic on canvas 170 x 170 cm 66 7/8 x 66 7/8 in

Artist Comments
Figures, animals, and flowers dance together in harmony. Painted freehand, each shape flows naturally, embodying movement and connection. The rich green backgro...

“My work can be understood through the mind, but it is best felt with the heart, experienced through the emotions, recognized as a manifestation of the spiritual that is born on the ...