Bidspirit auction | Yechiel Kriza (1909-1968)

Yechiel Kriza (1909-1968) - Echoes in a Pink City. Oil on Bristol board, signed, unframed 100×70 cm Yehiel Kriza is one of the most prominent Israeli artists of the founding generation, and painted a broad body of work that ranges from landscape, still life and figures to more abstract and expressive works created in his later years. Throughout his career, he developed a personal pictorial language, characterized by free brushstrokes, the construction of layers of color and a continuous preoccupation with the relationships of light, material and structure. In the work before us, Kriza seems to free himself from the direct description of reality and leads the viewer into an emotional and intuitive space. Layers of grays, whites and blacks are built on top of each other, with flashes of soft pink penetrating the surface and giving the work depth and life. The composition consists of vertical signs and energetic lines that create a sense of an implied urban landscape, architectural memory or buildings that appear and disappear From the Layers of Time. One of the fascinating characteristics of Kriza's work is his ability to transform the material itself into a subject. The brush marks, erasures, exposures and accumulations of color are not just a pictorial means but an inseparable part of the story the work tells. In this work, one can feel the hand that searches, builds and dismantles simultaneously, while creating a tension between order and chaos and between presence and disappearance. The painting carries the spirit of freedom and experimentation that characterized some of the artist's later works, and demonstrates Kriza's strength as a creator with a unique and recognizable visual language. This is a work with a strong presence, combining rich materiality with emotional depth, and giving the viewer an observational experience that changes and develops with each new look. Source: Estate of Yechiel Kriza. Condition: Unframed. Signed by the artist.