Oswald Adler
| Oswald Adler | |
|---|---|
 אוסוולד אדלר.jpg | |
| Born | July 24, 1912 Békéscsaba, Austro-Hungarian Empire |
| 💀Died | November 18, 2005 (aged 93) Tel Aviv-Yafo, IsraelNovember 18, 2005 (aged 93) |
| 💼 Occupation | |
| Known for | Painter and graphic designer. |
| Movement | Realism |
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Oswald Adler (24 July 1912, Austro-Hungarian Empire – 18 November 2005, Israel) was a graphic designer and artist known for designing postage stamps, posters, and watercolor paintings.
Early Life
Adler was born in 1912 in the town of Békéscsaba in Hungary, the second of three sons of Solomon Adler, a colonel in the Austro-Hungarian Army.
Adler spent most of his youth in the city of Kronstadt in Transylvania. At the age of 16, alongside his studies at the Higher School of Commerce, he began taking private lessons in portrait and watercolor painting with the painter Gusztáv Kollár, whose work included landscapes in a style reminiscent of classical English watercolors. Kollár's work influenced Adler’s artistic style in the years that followed.
Career in Europe
In 1934 Adler moved to Bucharest, where he turned to painting for his livelihood. He began working at an advertising agency, where he was involved in applied graphics, a field he studied independently.
In 1938 he relocated to Budapest. During the day he worked in a commercial graphics studio, and in the evenings he attended courses at the Academy of Fine Arts. At the end of 1938, following the German annexation of Austria, Adler was forced to return to Romania. Shortly after his arrival he was conscripted into the army and later sent to various labor camps until the end of the war. After the war Adler returned to Bucharest and continued his career as a graphic designer. He designed posters, book covers, book illustrations and advertisements, postage stamps, as well as graphic materials for national and international fairs.
In 1955 Adler became acquainted with Dr. Gheorghe Ghițescu, a professor of artistic anatomy who was also a painter, surgeon, and scientist. Adler undertook the graphic design for the three volumes of Ghițescu’s book on artistic anatomy. Through this collaboration Adler gained an understanding of the structure of the human body, the aesthetic qualities of the paintings of Renaissance artists, and the integration of structure and perspective. During these years, as far as his professional obligations allowed, Adler returned to pursuing his ambition of becoming a painter.
Career in Israel
In 1960, after many years of waiting to receive an exit visa, Adler immigrated to Israel. He was permitted to take with him only a small portion of his graphic works. Among these was the original graphic design for the poster "Feather Export", which won a silver medal at the triennial graphic design exhibition in Milan in 1957. This poster, together with a few other works that Adler managed to bring with him, reflects the graphic design style characteristic of that period.
In Israel Adler continued to work in applied graphics. He designed postage stamps, including 18 stamps for the Jewish National Fund, three coins for the Bank of Israel, and two medals for the Israel Coins and Medals Corporation.[1]
In 1963 Adler was sent to Guinea by the Government Printer to draw subjects for postage stamps. Following the design of stamps for Guinea, Adler went on to design stamps for many other African countries.
Artistic style
Adler always regarded drawing as the foundation of the visual arts.
Adler frequently painted watercolor landscapes of the Land of Israel and portraits. He preferred a classical style and also produced animal paintings, a subject he studied in Vienna in 1969 with the painter Fritz Martinz. Adler, who was deeply impressed by nature and its “merciless” laws, focused in his work on the elements of growth and decay:
“Growth and decay is what I see around me in the world, the relentless law of nature. That is what I am painting, when sitting in the open air and having my dialogue with nature. The stage on which this relentless law is carried out is lit by a warm sunshine which gives beauty to it. That beauty, I paint.”
[2] (Some of the recurring symbols in his work are the tree and the stone.)[3] Adler distinguished between commercial graphic design and fine art. According to him, the graphic designer works in the service of society and in interaction with it. While the work requires high artistic standards and creative imagination, its purpose is to convey information to the public and to meet the client’s needs. By contrast, fine art was, in his view, a personal expression of the artist’s inner life and an integral part of his being. Adler defined his artistic approach as stemming from the belief
that there is so much to admire in nature, that every sincere artistic record is an act of worship.
Gallery
-
Around Yotvata – watercolor -
Nahal David, 1960s, watercolor, 36 cm -
Olivi Electric poster, 1962, gouache with airbrush, 70 × 100 cm -
Abandoned boathouse on the Yarkon River, watercolor, 57 cm -
Portrait of a boy, watercolor, 31 cm -
Symbolic landscape drawing, 71 cm -
North of Eilat, 1960s, watercolor
Stamps
- Israel 1960 stamps – Henrietta Sald
- Israel 1961 stamps – Event Stamps
- Israel 1962 stamps – Janusz Korczak
- Israel 1966 stamps – IDF Fallen Soldiers Remembrance Day
- Israel 1967 stamps – Commemorative Stamps
- Israel 1968 stamps – Airmail Stamps
Solo exhibitions
- 1984 – Ben Ari Museum, Bat Yam
- 1989 – Tel Aviv Tourist Office, Tel Aviv
- 1994 – Reuben and Edith Hecht Museum, University of Haifa
Selected group exhibitions
- 1948–1949 – Official Salon Exhibitions, Bucharest, Romania
- 1971 – London Sketch Club, Annual Exhibition
- 1971 – The Mall Galleries, Wildlife Artists, Pastel Society, London
- 1971 – Art Gallery, Guildhall Museum, London
- 1973 – 25th Anniversary Exhibition of the State of Israel, Arnhem, under the auspices of the Rijksmuseum, Netherlands
- 1974 – "Yad LeBanim" Museum, Petah Tikva
- 1974, 1987, 1989 – Painters and Sculptors Association, Artists' House, Tel Aviv
- 1986 – "Self-Image", Israel Museum, Jerusalem
- 2025 – Israeli Masters in Drawing, Artists' House, Tel Aviv
Awards
- 1956 – Bronze and Silver Medals for a series of sports stamps, International Olympic Committee, Rome
- 1957 – 11th Triennale of Graphic Design, Milan, Silver Medal
External links
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- Oswald Adler – Shenkar Center for Design Research, Israel
- Oswald Adler – Israel Museum, Jerusalem
References
- ↑ "A stamp in the heart of Africa", Masa Acher
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 From an interview for a solo exhibition, Hecht Museum, 1994.
- ↑ Sanford C. Shiman, Oswald Adler – Oil Paintings, Watercolors and Graphic Works, Hecht Museum, June 1994.
Category:Israeli painters Category:Israeli graphic designers Category:Israeli people of Austro-Hungarian birth Category:1912 births Category:2005 deaths
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