Bacia Gordon, Mid Century Modernist Israeli 'Sabra in Haifa' Landscape Harbor Oil Painting, 1960

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Genre: Classic
Subject: Portrait, Sabra in Haifa
Medium: Oil
Surface: Canvas
Country: United States


Bacia Gordon (1904-1977) came to the … Read more Genre: Classic
Subject: Portrait, Sabra in Haifa
Medium: Oil
Surface: Canvas
Country: United States


Bacia Gordon (1904-1977) came to the United States from Poland and studied at the Art Institute of Chicago. She traveled widely the United States, Mexico, Europe, and Israel. She was a member of, and has exhibited with Artists Equity, Jewish Arts Club, the Renaissance Society of the University of Chicago, The Chicago Art Institute, and in Migdal Ashkalon, Israel. She was also a member of the Chicago Society of Artists. Her work is represented in many private collections in New York, Los Angeles, Detroit, Cleveland, St. Paul, Rockford, Milwaukee, and Chicago. Mrs. Gordon spent much time in Israel in the 1950s and 1960s, and most of the works in this web site reflect her stay there.

The New York art critic, Alfred Werner, has said: “I find Mrs. Gordon’s freedom of paint aesthetically rewarding. She blends the reporter’s task of objectively recording appearance with the poet’s privilege of imprinting subjective reaction upon exterior reality... Here is the talent that often omits details, to let the spectator fill in, that prefers an allegorical hint to a straight tale, and that translates the strangeness of Maabaroth and Kibbutzim into terms of universally acceptable humanity”

An Israeli critic has written of Mrs. Gordon : “The Jewish Daughter, born in Lithuania and reared in the United States, was stirred by the miracle of the Ingathering of the Exiles. The men, women and children she pictures thrill and pulsate with life because of her warm and loving brush.”

"My first encounter with Israel in 1955 was inspiring and productive. It was a birds-eye view of the land and the people – the kibbutz, the village, the settlement, the Maabora, the Huleh project, Lachish at its inception, dedicated Israelis, new immigrants and the military of all ranks. I lived among people of many lands sketching and painting. I felt a great urgency to record and interpret. Working at an accelerated pace – line and color merged as I endeavored to express the universal qualities in these people. It was a tremendously stimulating experience and resulted in rechanneling my creative energy.

I sketched and I wandered. I sketched in the Uval Gad where pipes are made to carry water to the Negev. I wandered among the bewildered white-robed bearded men of Morocco in Lachish… and among the older Yemenite settlements in Migdal Ashkalon. In Tiberias I saw people dressed in all garbs, the orthodox mantles of the polish ghetto and the oriental robes of the Middle East. In Hedera I sketched children in their classrooms and laboratories, some working out of doors, and others playing chase on the lawn. And from a mountaintop Huleh Region I painted swamps changing into fertile fields.

I became aware of the contrasts presented by many types --- children from Iraq, Iran, Yemen, Turkey, Egypt, Persia, Morocco, Poland, Germany, Romania --- from all over Europe and Asia, some second generation Sabras… now all of them Israelis. Back home, the sketches and memories they evoked intermingled and I found myself concentrating more and more on the Israeli Theme “The Return to the Promised Land.”

Again in Israel last summer – the usual excitement plus new experiences, meeting with family, old friends, and making new friends. On a field trip thru the Negev to Eilat with Hartzfeld, stopping at small settlements, kibbutzim new and old, Massada, Ein Gedi – meeting the dedicated visionary of the Dead Sea, Yehuda Almog. As I listened, observed and sketched these early pioneers I began to see Israel through through their eyes. Some of them still play a vital role in the Israeli scene and are becoming a legend in their own lifetimes. They came to this land when it was a desert and a swamp and lived to see the fulfillment of their dreams – a state of Israel – A home for the Jewish People. They are revered today and will remain heroes in the contemporary history of Israel.
The reaction of the Israel Press to my exhibition in Tel Aviv was that it “could serve as a historical document for generations to come.” Here are Jews rescued from the ghettos of Hungary, Poland, Lithuania: you can still see the lines of suffering on their faces. Here is a Yemenite family in their native dress, the young wife beside the children of the elderly husband she has married in accordance with Yemen Traditions that will soon be a relic of the past. Here are Jews from Morocco, Iran, Persia, India, and Egypt that have not yet lost the marks of their origin in this newest of national melting pots. See less