Sigmund Joseph MENKES 1896 — 1986Зігмунт МЕНКЕШ • Зигмунт МЕНКЕШSigmund Menkes (Polish spelling Zygmunt) was born in a Jewish family in Lviv, Ukraine in 1896. He began his artistic studies in 1912 at the Industrial School in Lviv. At the same time he worked as a restorer of rural churches. Between 1919 and 1922 the artist supplemented his studies at Krakow`s Academy of Fine Arts and in 1922 expanded on this education and broadened his artistic skills in the private studio of Alexander Archipenko in Berlin. In 1923 Menkes settled in Paris, where he became a member of the École de Paris and settled in the "La Ruche" building in the Montparnasse district. Menkes developed close friendships with Eugeniusz Zak and Mark Chagall. The artist participated in a series of the city`s salons, including the Salon d`Automne (1924, 1925, 1927), the Salon des Independants (1925-1928), and Tuileries Salon (1928, 1929, 1931, 1938). He presented his works in a number of Parisian galleries, among them, the Bernheim, de France, and Le Portique. In 1930 the artist traveled to the United States to present his work in Cleveland and New York. He also exhibited his paintings in Canada and England. He visited Poland frequently, spent time in Berlin in 1928, and toured Spain with Artur Nacht-Samborski in 1935, moving to the United States the same year. In 1936 Menkes had his first solo exhibition in New York at the Sullivan Gallery on 57th Street. Solo exhibitions of his work were organized by the Galerie Le Portique in Paris (1928), the Friends of Fine Arts Society in Lviv (1930), and at the Jewish Society for Support of the Fine Arts in Warsaw (1931). Menkes died in Riverdale, New York, 1986. |
