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Metadata
Artist |
Beck, Margit |
Object Name |
Painting |
Title |
The Law Giver |
Date |
ca. 1960 |
Medium |
Oil on canvas |
Dimensions |
35 1/4 x 13 3/4 in. (89.5 x 34.9 cm) |
Accession Number |
99.04 |
Credit line |
Gift of Alvin and Terese Lane in memory of Nettie Daniels |
About This Work |
Margit Beck was born in Tokay, Hungary, in 1911 and studied art there and in Oradea, Romania. After immigrating to the United States, she took classes at the Art Students League in New York. She painted figurative work early in her career, but by the late 1950s, she mostly produced landscapes that reduced forms to their essential geometry and color. A figurative work with a Jewish subject, The Law Giver (ca. 1960), is unusual in her repertoire. Using angles and flat areas of layered color that create a sense of movement, the painting presents an archetypal Moses-like figure wearing a tallit and a skullcap with a tablet clutched firmly in both hands. The portrait is distinctly modernist with its colorful background and saturated green, cerulean blue, pink and orange shadows that fall across the man's face and his clothing. The angular rendering of his face borders on cubist. Despite the vivid colors surrounding the figure, the bearded man's expression is troubled and imbalanced, his eyes at different positions as he stares out at the viewer. The picture evokes an everyman, possibly representing the plight of Jews in the country that Beck had left behind. |
Legal Status |
The artist or artist's estate retains all copyrights to their work. |