Igael Tumarkin (
Hebrew: יגאל תומרקין; 23 October 1933 – 12 August 2021) was an Israeli painter and sculptor.[1]
Biography
Peter Martin Gregor Heinrich Hellberg (later Igael Tumarkin) was born in 1933 in
Dresden,
Saxony,
Germany. His father,
Martin Hellberg, was a German theater actor and director, and a son of a
pastor. His
Jewish mother, Berta Gurevitch, and his stepfather, Herzl Tumarkin,
immigrated to then
British Mandate of Palestine (now Israel) when he was two.[2]
Tumarkin served in the
Israeli Navy. After completing his military service, he studied sculpture in
Ein Hod, a village of artists near
Mount Carmel, under
Rudi Lehmann. His youngest son is the actor
Yon Tumarkin.[3][4] Tumarkin died at the age of 87 on 12 August 2021.[5][6]
Tumarkin was also an art theoretician and stage designer. In the 1950s, Tumarkin worked in East Berlin, Amsterdam, and Paris. Upon his return to Israel in 1961, he became a driving force behind the break from the charismatic monopoly of lyric abstraction there. Tumarkin created assemblages of found objects, generally with violent expressionist undertones and decidedly unlyrical color. His determination to "be different" influenced his younger Israeli colleagues. The furor generated around Tumarkin's works, such as the old pair of trousers stuck to one of his pictures, intensified the mystique surrounding him.[8][9][10] One of his controversial works is a pig wearing phylacteries (or tfilin, small boxes containing scriptures).[11]
1992 August Rodin Prize, The International Sculpture Competition of the Open Museum, Hakone, Japan, for his sculpture of the sign at the entrance to Auschwitz concentration camp Arbeit Macht Frei.
1997 Award of Excellence, the President of the Federal Republic of Germany
1969-71 "War and Peace", steel and stone, Ramat Gan
1970 "Keystone Gate", painted steel, Jerusalem
1970 "Homage to Dürer, painted steel, Haifa
1971 "Homage to Jerusalem", Givat Shapira
1971 Sculpture Garden, 61 Weizmann Street, Holon
1971-75 "Monument to the Holocaust and Revival", corten and glass, Tel Aviv[13]
1972 "Happenings and Homage to Kepler", concrete and painted steel, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv; "Sundial Garden", concrete, Ashkelon; and "Monument to the Fallen", concrete painted white and steel, Jordan Valley[13]
1972-73 "Airport Monument", painted steel, Lod
1973 "Challenge to the Sun", Ramot Alon, Jerusalem