Meir Lazar (1923-1995)
Between the suns

Meir Lazarovitch was born on October 4th, 1923, in Galacz, Rumania. After his birth His family moved to the capital, Bucharest. Already in his childhood he painted profusly mainly in charcoal. Later he studied art at the academy, and was active member of a Zionist youth movement. In early 1944 he sailed to Palestine, and after his release from the Atlit detention camp, he joined his sister in "Kfar Glickson" Kibbutz. He joined the Israeli defense forces in 1945 shortly after his mother and young sister had arrived to Israel. Lazar started his studies in Ahron Avni's studio/school that was a stronghold for Jewish Parisian expressionism. Avni's old-fashioned approach and color orientation a la Corotcuased a lot of his Modern approach students, and Lazar among them, to search for new ways to express themselves. In 1945,Yehezkel striechman and Avigdor stematsky started a new dynamic in the local art scene-the "Studia" in Tel-Aviv, Lazar joined the "Studia" together with: Michael Argov, David Lan-Bar, Dani Karavan, Dan kedar, Ephraim Lifshitz, Itche Mamboush, Aviva Margalit, Sioma Baram, Lea Nikel, Claire Yaniv, Zvi Tadmor, Bella Brisel, Shamai Haber, Esther Heller, Ben-Zion Einav, Yoram Kaniuk, Shimon Tsabar, Nissan Rylov, Shulamit Lewison, Rena Yaskolska, Zippora Brenner, Eliyahu Gat, Avraham Gofer Eli Mintz and Moshe Propes. The teachers and the students of the "Studia" established ties with "The center for Progressive Culture", whose members included authors and musicians. Eugen Kolb lectured to them on art criticism and art history; Haim Gamzu sometimes visited; artists such as Zritsky, Kahana, Aroch, Naton, Danziger and others came in to do unofficial critiques. Marcel Janco Joining the staff of teachers at the "Studia" for a short time, was closing a circle in Meir Lazar's life, because of the fact Janco used to teach Lazar the child back in Bucharest, Rumania.

Interior, oil on canvas, 59 by 48 cm.

Jug and Grapes, 1953, oil on canvas, 54 by 68 cm.

Still-Life, oil on canvas, 48 by 38 cm.

In October 1949 Lazar received a young artists prize from the "Painters and Sculptures Association in Israel" in memory of its members who had fallen in the War of Independence. A short time after receiving the prize, Lazar lest Israel for Paris, where he quickly became involved in the Parisian life Lazar was a familiar figure at the galleries and especiaily at the "Hotel Drouot" auction house, where he gave away free commercial advices to dealers and buyers regarding the quality of art works and whether it was worthwhile to invest in them. In January 1963 a reporter of Ma'ariv daily newspaper arrived from Israel to Paris. On Meir Lazar he wrote this:"... a Parisian critic told about Lazar that he is a poet of the Israeli landscape who has revealed the rhythm of this landscape with all its naturalness, without deviations. Lazar although he has been in Paris for more than ten years, still paints Israeli landscape, the large Israeli sub, alight with fire, the erect palm trees, the dry field, the solitary bush." Lazar held a one artist exhibtion on March 1960 at the Bernheim Jeuene Gallery, and participated in a group exhibition that was sent all the way to Japan. In 1967, a year before his beloved mother death, he visited Israel and held a group exhibition in the city of Eilat. In this visit he traveled all over the country and fell in love with the city of Sefad. Once again he engraved the Israeli landscape in his heart, and never returned to see them again.

In 1972 Lazar held a joint exhibition with sculpture Achiam at the Jewish Cultural Center in Paris. The famous art critic Waldemer Georges is quoted on the invitation to the opening of the exhibition: "Meir Lazar is the poet of color. By means of it he succeeds in making the two-dimensional three-dimensional. He paints fantastic landscape of an earthly paradise. Lazar is the painter of happiness, who eliminates the hostile, oppressive forces of our fate... His sunrise, the twilights, the landscape of night or perhaps sensations of night, are enchanted views, symphonies of rusty gold, of inks and oranges, greens, purples, blues and bright yellows, in which pairs of lovers make love on the background of the hills, their bodies more divine than human". During the seventies Lazar broke his painting arm on a car accident. Because of his new condition Lazar focused on drawing, and, developed a marvelous lightness which he expressed in hundreds of pencil drawings, mainly of figures.

Yafo nights, oil on canvas, 72 by 79 cm.

A Concert at Mrs. Levi's, 1951, oil on canvas, 65 by 80 cm.

After time Lazar's orientalism gave away to local influences by Jewish artists of the school of Paris. The landscapes of Israel mixed with biblical themes, but above all Lazar carried the female form as a "leitmotif" throughout his entire "oeuvre". In the last decade of his life Lazar's paintings became more complex and more full of details. He spoke about painting in "atmospheric", lyrical" and "poetic" terms and said his canvases are a kind of planned confusion. He aspired to freeze time and space in his palette of colors-warm, cold, and neutral, according to his division. Toward the end of his life he used to sit down near the post office close to his home and paint with Japanese brushes. Meir Lazar died in 1995 in his apartment in Paris. His sister Chaya and her husband Kadish Shermeister had his body brought to Israel. He was buried at the cemetery in Herzeliya. Meir Lazar reached his rest and repose in the soil of Israel, under the great sun which had burned in him all his life.

Garden of eden, oil on canvas, 114 by 79.5 cm.

Editor:Hana Kofler                                                                                           Produced by: chen yeremitzkey, "Matsa for Public Auctions".