SHEMI (SCHMIDT), MENAHEM
Courtyard in Safed.

Courtyard in Safed.
Oil on canvas. Signed by the artist lower right and on reverse. Framed. 28 x 20.75 inches; 71.5 x 53 cm.

Haifa, 1949.

Russian born Menahem Shemi (1897-1951) studied art at the Odessa Academy of Arts before emigrating to Palestine in 1913 when he joined the Bezalel School. After a rebellion against the school's management and cutting ties, he sought to discover for himself an artistic course in the spirit of the East, seeking to portray the art of the Jewish-Israeli painter in his new homeland: Eretz Israel. A founder of the artist colony of Safed, Shemi was principally a landscapist. His palette, originally somber, became bright in his later years; his mystic, dreamlike canvases of Safed are considered his best works.
     


Provenance: Givon Gallery, Tel Aviv, 1985.
     


Exhibited: Venice Biennale 1950.
     


Literature: Daliah Belkine, Menachem Shemi: Man and Artist, Zohar Tsvaim Association (2009).