Portrait of Itzik Manger

1950

Portrait painting of a man who faces viewer and wears a suit and tie. — Chaim Gliksberg was well-known for his portraits of literary figures. Here, he has pictured Itzik Manger, the celebrated Yiddish poet and playwright. Manger was particularly renowned for his modernist ballads and stylized folk adaptations of the Hebrew Bible, notably, the book of Esther. During World War II, Manger took refuge in England and finally settled in Israel in the late 1950s, where he found fame and an audience to a degree not enjoyed by other Yiddish writers. Gliksberg painted him in his signature style, one that reflected the influence of the work of French figurative artists such as Cézanne, Gaugin, and Matisse.

Credits

Private collection. © Estate of Chaim Gliksberg.

Published in: The Posen Library of Jewish Culture and Civilization, vol. 9.

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