Jewish Gallery Was Far Ahead of Times

[ellisonz]

‘No Two-Faced Cows’: By the time these 1931 paintings by Marc Chagall were shown at The Gallery of Jewish Art in 1945, much of the architecture depicted in them in rich detail had been destroyed by the Nazis.

By Jenna Weissman Joselit
Published January 06, 2012, issue of January 13, 2012.

Last month, on December 14, three carefully detailed renderings of synagogue interiors, the handiwork of Marc Chagall, fetched $2.3 million at Sotheby’s. In the days preceding the auction, much was made of the rarity of these works and of how they stood apart from the artist’s oeuvre, which tilted toward the fantastical.

A great deal of attention was also lavished on how the paintings had come to light: It seems that they were recently consigned to Sotheby’s by the heirs of the collector, who had first purchased them in 1945 from the Gallery of Jewish Art, in New York.

Virtually no account of the paintings’ provenance paid heed to this choice tidbit, but it stopped me dead in my tracks. The Gallery of Jewish Art? In the heart of Midtown Manhattan, on East 30th Street? In 1945, several years before The Jewish Museum first opened its doors on Fifth Avenue? I pride myself on knowing a lot of obscure things about the American Jewish experience, but I had never before stumbled across the Gallery of Jewish Art.

Read more: http://www.forward.com/articles/149044/?p=all#ixzz1jWNuDaT0

[meti57b]

1. Hey, ...thanks! I didn't know about a "Gallery of Jewish Art", either.

n/t

[ellisonz]

2. You're welcome.

I thought it was an interesting article and the one painting included is lovely.

[ellisonz]

4. Thanks for posting Mosby!

Yeah - I blew out the bandwidth on one my photobucket accounts.