A Special Exhibition of Paintings and Drawings 
by Israel Hershberg
From the collection 
of Arnold Druck, Esq., Jerusalem

Forum Gallery is pleased to present A Special Exhibition of Paintings and Drawings by Israel Hershberg, one of the world’s foremost realist artists.  On view will be masterpieces spanning the past 20 years of Hershberg’s career.  The works are from the collection of Arnold Druck, Hershberg’s long-time attorney and friend. The exhibition begins on February 13^th and continues through March 29, 2003.

Israel Hershberg re-defines representational art by using his talent and masterful technique to evoke the timeless essence of his subjects. He understands the essential self of an object or person, not through the capture of a positive expression of that self, but through an exploration of what is left behind, through an examination of the absence of their fundamental nature.  

His work is sharply observed and fiercely detailed. Exploring the characteristics of everything from a thorn to a pair of pears, he isolates them. The space is cleared of extraneous elements in order to concentrate the viewer’s energy on the central object.  We become aware of the isolation and silence of the subjects and they seem to exist in an almost abstract space.  

In the painting, Nova, Hershberg focuses on a brittle and cracked sunflower. Exposure to the sun, the very thing that gives the object its name, has reduced it to a near cinder, drying out all color and vitality. The head of the flower, normally turned up towards the sun, is curved away from us, hiding in shadow. It is through an examination of this shell of the sunflower that we come closer to understanding what it might once truly have been. Our definition of a sunflower is expanded beyond its decaying physical presence to include something metaphysical, to include its experience in the world.  

Israel Hershberg was born in 1948 in a displaced persons camp in Linz, Austria.  The following year, he emigrated to Israel with is family and in 1958, moved with them to the United States.  He received his Bachelor of Fine Arts from the Pratt Institute, Brooklyn, and his Master Fine Arts from the State Institute of New York at Albany. He has been awarded both the Sandberg prize for Israeli Art, 1991, and the Tel-Aviv Museum prize for Israeli Art, 1997.

Israel Hershberg’s work has been exhibited in museums and galleries internationally, including one-person exhibitions at the Marlborough Gallery in London and in New York.  Mr. Hershberg lives and works in Jerusalem and is the founder and artistic director of the Jerusalem Studio School.

A Special Exhibiton of Paintings and Drawings by Israel Hershberg opens with a reception on February 13^th from 5:30 – 7:30 pm, and will be on view through March 29, 2003.
 

©2005 Forum Gallery