4/10/2017 UC Berkeley got its biggest art grant ever to buy this Jewish artists paintings | Jewish Telegraphic

paintings | Jewish Telegraphic Agency

UC Berkeley got its biggest art grant ever to buy this Jewish
artists paintings
By Jose n Dolsten April 3, 2017 4:44pm 420 SHARES

(JTA) The University of California,

Berkeley, received its biggestart grant ever
to acquire the worlds largest collectionby
theJewish-Polish artist Arthur Szyk and
display itin a public institutionfor the first
time.

The $10.1 million gift from theTaube

Philanthropies will be used to acquire 450
The United States of America (1945), left, and The artworks including paintings, drawings
Scribe (1927), by Arthur Szyk. (The Magnes Collection of and sketches accordingto a statement.
Jewish Art and Life, University of California, Berkeley)
The collection, which featuressome
ofSzyksmost valuable works,also includes some books, newspapers and magazines that
published hisart.

It will be displayed at theMagnes Collection

of Jewish Art and Life, the third-largest
Jewish museum collection in the country.

Szyk was born in 1894 in Lodz, Poland, to a

middle-class Jewish family. He studied art at
a private school in Paris, lived in London and
Canada, and traveled to the Middle East and
North Africa before settling in New York in
Self-portrait (ca. 1932-1933), left, and My People: Samson 1940 following the outbreakof World War II.
in the Ghetto (The Battle of the Warsaw Ghetto) (1945), by In New York, Szyk met the Taube family,
Arthur Szyk. (The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life,
University of California, Berkeley) whose foundation provided the grant. Szyck
later moved to New Canaan, Connecticut,
where he died in 1951 at 57.

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4/10/2017 UC Berkeley got its biggest art grant ever to buy this Jewish artists paintings | Jewish Telegraphic Agency

Hedrew inspiration from Judaism, including

stories from the Bible, as well as the
historical events he witnessed, including both
world wars, the Holocaustand the
establishmentof the State of Israel. In
addition to working as a painter, Szyk
produced political caricatures and materials,
including anti-Nazi and anti-Axis paintings,
that he considered weapons in the war and
urged American soldiers to use as
propaganda.

Arthur Szyk (YouTube) Arthur Szyks unique contributions to

contemporary art and political illustration
have not yet been recognized to the extent his work deserves, Tad Taube, the chairman of
Taube Philanthropies, said in a statement.

With our shared Polish Jewish heritage, and a relationship my parents developed with Szyk
upon first arriving in the United States from Poland in the early 1940s, it is significant to me
to ensure that Szyks remarkable works are available to todays and future generations.

The collection previously belonged to art collector Rabbi Irvin Ungar, according to SF Gate.
Ungar, an expert in Szyks art, has co-produced documentaries about the artist anddescribes
himself asthe tireless force behind the Szyk renaissance.

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4/10/2017 UC Berkeley got its biggest art grant ever to buy this Jewish artists paintings | Jewish Telegraphic Agency

David and Saul (1921), left, and Madness (1941), by

Arthur Szyk. (The Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life,
University of California, Berkeley)

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