Judith Sobel - 'Figures in a landscape'

Jehudith Sobel (Poland 1924-2012 America)


'Figures in a landscape'
oil on canvas
50 x 60 cm
signed lower right

After the Second World War, Jehudith Sobel attended the Academy of Fine Arts in Lodz where she was introduced to the principles of modern art, as represented by the European cubists at the time. The talent of the young artist was recognized quite quickly and ensured that in 1948 - at the age of 24 - she was selected for an exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in Krakow in 1948-1949.

Sobel was one of the few in her family to survive the German occupation and the persecution of the Jews. With the memories of the war years still fresh in her mind, she emigrated to the newly founded Jewish state of Israel in the late 1940s. There, Sobel became very active in the emerging art world and her work was exhibited in and purchased by the most important museums in Israel, including the Museum of Modern Art in Haifa.

The travel-loving artist spent more than two years in France during the first half of the 1950s, where she exhibited at Saks Gallery Paris. During this exhibition, Sobel won first prize; with a grant in her pocket, she left for New York in 1956, where her first solo exhibition soon followed; in the Brooklyn Jewish Museum.

The city - the culture - pleased her so much that she decided to move. Once moved, Sobel exhibited in the prestigious ACA Gallery, after which numerous exhibitions followed; in the US but also abroad.

Sobel lived in Manhattan, New York and also had a summer home in Woodstock NY where she was closely involved with the Woodstock Artist Association and Museum. Today she is considered one of the best female artists of the 20th century and someone who has consistently worked to promote the cultural climate in Poland, Israel and the US. It is her post-impressionist style - influenced by Matisse, Bonnard and Braque - that makes her work so beloved.