Shimon Avny, Abstract Expressionist Landscape Israeli Modernist Oil Painting, Moody Blue

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Shimon Avni
Shimon Avny, painter, born 1932, Paris

Shimon Avny (Stein) was born in Paris, France. He grew up in … Read more Shimon Avni
Shimon Avny, painter, born 1932, Paris

Shimon Avny (Stein) was born in Paris, France. He grew up in the Belville neighborhood. In 1942, when the Nazis occupied France, he was separated from his family. His mother and brothers were killed in the Holocaust. After the war, he was transferred from his hiding place to the town of Andlis. He immigrated to Israel with Youth Aliyah in 1948. In 1956, he joined Kibbutz Ra'im. In 1957, he studied painting with Joseph Zaritsky, Avigdor Stematzky and Haim Kiewe. He also studied with Yehezekel Streichman at the Avni Institute. At the end of the 1950s, he went to Paris to continue his studies. In the 1980s, he joined the Radius artists cooperative.
Avny's early work was influenced by the abstractionism of the New Horizons group. In 1963, he took part in the group's exhibition at Ein Harod. His work is characterized by bold colors, expressive brushstrokes and flat planes. He is a figurative painter, but some of his work incorporates symbolic imagery.

Education
1957 Painting with Joseph Zaritsky, Avigdor Stematsky and Haim Kiewe
Avni Institute, Tel Aviv, with Yehezkel Streichman
Grande Chaumiere Academy, Paris, 1958
Ecole des Beaux Arts, Paris, 1961
Fine Arts Academy, Rome
Photography and television, Paris, 1965-67

Teaching
Lectured abroad for the Ministry of Education and Culture, 1969-71
Bezalel Academy, Jerusalem, painting, 1974-78
College of Visual Arts, Beersheba, 1975-81
Headmaster of the Art Institute, Rehovot, 1975-85
1981-85 and 1988-92 Art Teachers College, Ramat Hasharon
Since1992 Avni Institute, Tel Aviv, Teacher and coordinator of the Arts Department

Awards And Prizes
1975 The America-Israel Cultural Fund Scholarship
1985 Scholarship, The Cité Internationale des Arts, Paris, France
1993 The America-Israel Cultural Foundation, Sharett Fund Scholarship for a Young Artist.
A member of the Aclim Group, which was organized in 1974. The group was established in the wake of the Yom Kippur War to point to the necessity of raising the public's consciousness of its Israeli identity in all cultural spheres. Participants in the group's exhibitions until 1983 were: Eliyahu Gat, Rahel Shavit, Ori Reisman, Avram Rafael, Michael Gross, Hannah Levy, Tova Berlinski, Yechezkel Streichman, Avraham Mendel, Zvi Aldouby, Avraham Ofek, Ran Shehori, Hannah Megged, Shimon Avni, Hannah Evyatar, David Ben Shaul, Reuven Cohen, Zvi Tolkovsky, and Shimshon Holzman. Some participated in only one or two shows, others in most of the group's exhibitions. The works were eclectic in style, the only feature common to all was the influence of the landscape or a component of the landscape on them. The group's rejection of a literary and mythological "Israeliness" and archaism on the on hand, and a universalistic and avant-grade approach on the other, recalls the ideology of the "Group of Ten". See less