14 - David GARFINKIEL (Radom 1902 – Paris 1970)

David GARFINKIEL (Radom 1902 – Paris 1970) Camargue Horses Oil on canvas 64 x 65 cm Signed lower right "D Garfinkiel" Exhibition: David Garfinkiel (1902–1970), July 5–27, 2017, and September 6–30, 2017, at the Polish Historical and Literary Society / Polish Library in Paris David Garfinkiel (1902–1970) was born in Radom, Poland. He studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Kraków and Warsaw under Józef Pankiewicz and Artur Markowicz. He was close to the Kapists, such as Jan Cybis. He participated in an exhibition in Warsaw in 1931. The following year, he arrived in Paris and discovered the Parisian artistic avant-garde in the cafés of Montparnasse, the Rotonde, and the Dôme. War broke out, and he settled in Lyon, where he exhibited in 1942; although Garfinkiel lived in semi-seclusion, he continued to paint and even to exhibit. He also created numerous designs for Lyon’s silk industry. After the Liberation, he returned to Paris in 1946. His family in Poland had perished, his studio had been looted, and a large portion of his work was lost. But life went on, and Garfinkiel opened a photography studio in Belleville, which served as his painting studio—his raison d’être. He painted and drew tirelessly, holding one solo exhibition after another as well as participating in group shows. In 1958, the City of Paris acquired “L’Exode” from the Galerie Zak. He participated in numerous art fairs. In 1970, he died suddenly. A retrospective was organized in 1972 at the Salon des Indépendants. Other exhibitions took place in various galleries and at the Polish Library in Paris on Île Saint-Louis. In October 1960, David Garfinkiel participated in the 4th Taverny Painting and Sculpture Salon and won third prize for the painting presented here, *Landscape of Seine-et-Marne*. Critics were struck by the depth of his work. According to Waldemar-George, “When he arrived in France in 1932, Garfinkiel, a young recruit of the École de Paris, strove to penetrate the age-old secrets of French painting. He was not seeking a style. He studied the laws of color… he imitated no one. He created his own world, his own private realm.” Edouard Roditi noted “his joie de vivre and a painter’s sensuality that was entirely his own; and it is these qualities that distinguish Garfinkiel’s painting not only from the deeply tormented work of Soutine, whom he admired, but also from that of so many other, darker painters of the École de Montparnasse.”