Menashe Kadishman

Menashe Kadishman, an Israeli sculptor and painter, was born in Tel Aviv in 1932. When he was 15 when his father died, Kadishman left school to help support his family, while taking evening art classes at the Avni Insitute of Art. In 1950 he joined the Nahal Brigade of the Army, and was assigned to Ma’ayan Baruch, on the borders of Lebanon, Syria and Israel. He worked as a shepherd, which affected many of his works and core ideals. Kadishman is famous for his colorful sheep portraits, which he began painting in 1995.

Kadishman studied with the Israeli sculptor Moshe Sternschuss at the Avni Institute of Art and Design in Tel Aviv, and with the Israeli sculptor Rudi Lehmann in Jerusalem.
In 1959, he moved to London, where he attended the Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design and the Slade School of Art. During 1959 and 1960 he also studied with Anthony Caro and Reg Butler. He remained in London until 1972, and witnessed the development of pop-art.

His sculptures of the 1960’s were Minimalist in style, and designed as to appear to defy gravity. This was achieved either through careful balance and construction, as in Suspense (1966), or by using glass and metal so that the metal appeared unsupported, as in Segments (1968). The glass allowed the environment to be part of the work.
In the 1970’s he began to relate to new media such as earth art. He examined the relationship between society, nature and art. In 1978, for example, he presented the “Sheep Project: Nature as Art and Art as Nature” at the Venice Biennale of Art, where he built a live sheep pen inside the Israeli Pavillion, and marked the sheep’s wool with paint as is done in traditional sheep herding.

In October 1982 the Lebanon War broke out and his son was drafted. He began to paint large compositions of heroism and death, the horrors of war and the Binding of Isaac. Kadishman felt he was Abraham – sacrificing his own son on the altar of the Supreme Order – the Country’s order.
In 1988 Kadishman began a new series: Birth, with a silhouette of a mother giving birth, and created hundreds of variations of the theme. He linked the birth with the sacrifice. In the Sacrifice of Isaac Sarah becomes an active partner, as she symbolizes the mothers of the fallen soldiers.
He passed away in 2015.