Yehoshua Kovarsky (1907-1967)

Studied under Andre Lot and Paul Colin. In 1936 returned to Israel, took ...

Yehoshua Kovarsky (1907-1967)

Studied under Andre Lot and Paul Colin. In 1936 returned to Israel, took resident in Tel Aviv and worked in the Decoration field in the Easter Fair.

Yehoshua Kovarsky (1907-1967)

Yehoshua was born into the Vilna Jewish culture, and he was clearly in love with it since his days of youth. The artistic culture ran in his blood and painting was marked in his heart as his goal. His internal world was accompanied with a strong support system that helped him growing with his art: his father and brother were construction contractors, who engaged in decoration, and the city of his birth, Vilna, was rich with culture, and in it he received his secular, Jewish and artistic education in public art school.

In 1925 he arrived to Israel and took residence in Nes-Ziona. After two years he decided to more to Paris and eventually he returned to Vilna where he continued his art studied in the Art Academy that was managed by the painter Sledzinski (1928-1931), and following that he came back to Paris and studied under Andre Lot and Paul Colin. His life in Paris was poor, and finally in 1936 he returned to Israel, took his residence in Tel Aviv and worked in the decoration field in the Easter Fair.

In his paintings, he dealt with forces that followed and influenced him in his artistic way in Vilna, as well as his wish to disconnect himself from the influence of the Vilna Academia, and enhance the painting gentleness of the Parisian School. In 1938 the magic of Paris pulled him to return to its streets but the war forced him to come back to Israel. He managed to board one of the last ships that got away from the horrible inferno.

Yehoshua headed to the city of Zafed that with its magic evoked in him different artistic reflections. Many meetings with local elders who study the Torah, made him get closer to the tragic consciousness of the Jewish people and his soul screamed these feelings through his paintings. The tightness became too much for him to carry, so he decided to change his residency and moved to Zichron Yaakov that was full of life and rooted him in a breathing, realistic and existed present. This feeling was visible in his paintings and indicated an uplifting of the soul from the tightness.

In 1950, after he participated in the independence war, he moved to the capital, Jerusalem. The city connected between him and a dancer who came from the USA, Korin Chacham, with whom he married. Yehoshua and Korin decided to continue the joint life in the US, but the warm and special place he had in his heart for Israel made him visit here often.

His first footing in the work of art in Israel happened when he presented a first individual exhibition in Katz Gallery. In his way, through and expressive style, he presented the events occurring in the country. Later that year, he presented several exhibitions in the US. The Modern Art Center in New York received him and he took residency in the city.

During this period, he experienced a unique process in which he succeeded in releasing the chords of reality; however he didn’t adopt the regular abstract. In the painting process, he painted while being aware to the emotional and internal awakening that emerged in him in front of the fabric. Yehoshua expressed his feelings in symbols that took place on his fabric. The result reflected the memories hiding in his consciousness.

One of his pieces is the Creation Days that he painted on each fabric separately. In his way, he worked with color that created boundaries, usually an elliptic circle, in it he painted the “Emotional Activity” he experiences. The symbols he created on the fabric generated a mysterious atmosphere that reflected the ancient occurrences. This method helped him creating a piece that was beyond the familiar abstract.