Lea Nikel (born Nikelsberg) was a Ukrainian-born artist who emigrated with her parents to Palestine in 1920, and grew up in Tel Aviv. Nikel began to study painting in her mid-teens with several influential avant-garde Israeli artists. She continued her education in Paris, where she lived and worked from 1950 to 1961. Nikel drew inspiration from the artistic atmosphere of Paris, consistently exploring a vibrant aesthetic. She also lived in New York and Rome. In 1977, she returned to Israel. Nikel’s lyrical abstract paintings were exhibited at the Venice Biennale in 1964 and at a career retrospective at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art in 1995. That same year, Nikel received the Israel Prize for painting, and in 1997, she was named a Chevalier of Arts and Letters by the French minister of culture.
This repoussé gold wedding ring inlaid with a diamond represents the iconic Bezalel style: a fusion of biblical motifs, early twentieth-century European art trends such as Jugendstil, and Eastern…
This gravestone in the oldest Jewish cemetery in the Netherlands (est. 1614), that of the Spanish and Portuguese Jewish Community of Amsterdam, is inscribed in memory of Mordechai Franco Mendes (d…
This painting has both figurative and abstract elements. The shapes representing the angel are a dynamic swirl of mystical symbols. Ben-Zion often turned to the Bible for inspiration for his work. At…