Yaacov Agam - B. 1928
Untitled, 1976

Untitled, 1976
Tempera and collage on cardboard, 27X21 cm, Signed and dated.

About The Artist:

Yaacov Agam was born in Rishon Lezion, then a small town, to a religious family. His father was a rabbi with an interest in Kabbalah and Jewish spirituality. As a youngster, he studied with various religious tutors at the synagogue because there was no local religious school. In 1936, he witnessed a terrorist attack which affected him deeply. In 1940, he began to paint, influenced by Irving Stone's book Lust for Life. In 1945, he was suspected of belonging to the underground and was jailed for eight months by the British administration.



In 1946, he studied at the Bezalel School in Jerusalem. At the urging of Mordechai Ardon, he went to study in Zurich in 1949. There he encountered the constructivist art theories of the Bauhaus school. In 1951, he moved to Paris and developed ties with the city's Surrealist artists. At first, he earned a living from teaching at a seminary run by the Jewish Agency. In 1953, he created Polyphonic Pictures, kinetic works that change as the viewer shifts perspective. In 1967, he produced his first sculptures. In 1986, he began to use stainless steel. In 1996, he won the UNESCO Education Prize, acknowleding the unique program he designed for early childhood visual education.



Agam makes use of Jewish-Kabbalistic iconography that he turns into abstract images. Many of his works feature opposites that merge in keeping with the thesis-antithesis-synthesis dialectic. Among his best known works are Salon Agam (1971-1975) commissioned for Elysee Palace in Paris, his Fire and Water Fountain (1986) at Dizengoff Square in Tel Aviv and the facade of the Dan Hotel (1986) in Tel Aviv.

Education

1946 Bezalel School of Art, Jerusalem

1949 Eidgenossische Technische Hochschule, Zurich, Switzerland

1949 History of Art and Music, Zurich University, Zurich, Switzerland

1951 School of Abstract Art, Paris, France

1951 Academie de la Grande Chaumiere, Paris, France

Teaching

1967 Harvard University, Boston, United States of America

1983 Hebrew Academy, San Francisco, California, USA,

1983 Visual Education, Yavne, Israel

1985 Visual Education. Weizmann Institute, Rehovot, Israel

Environmental Sculptures

1985 "Roots", Menorah in Bernard Garden, Tel Aviv; 1986 "Fire and Water", Dizengoff Square, Tel Aviv.; Works mainly in Paris; 2002 Wheels - at the portal of Yad Sarah, Jerusalem.