Iconic Israeli Artist Menashe Kadishman Dies at 82
Image by Kadishman.com
By Lior Zaltzman May 8, 2015
Iconic Israeli artist, Menashe Kadishman, at Tel ha’Shomer hospital.
A sheep herder in his youth, he was most famous for his paintings of sheep. Of his obsession with sheep he said: “The sheep is a secular icon, that, in my eyes, is metaphorically connected to soldiers who died in wars.”
Kadishman is also known for his installation, ‘Fallen Leaves’, at the Jewish Museum in Berlin, which is composed of a thousand metal faces that visitors of the museum can walk on.
Kadishman's 'Fallen Leaves' Image by Getty Images
Kadishman graduated from St. Martins College of Art. In the 60s, he was affiliated with Warhol and Rauschenberg and was renowned in the international art scene. In 1968, he was Israel’s representative at the Venice Biennale, where he brought a herd of sheep, painted spots on them, and became a sheep herder for the installation.
Kadishman’s sculptures can be seen all across Israel and the world. His most famous one is ‘Uprise’, in HaBima Square, Tel Aviv. In 1995 he was awarded an Israel Prize for his sculptures.
He is survived by a son and a daughter.
A message from our Publisher & CEO Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
Readers like you make it all possible. We’ve started our Passover Fundraising Drive, and we need 1,800 readers like you to step up to support the Forward by April 21. Members of the Forward board are even matching the first 1,000 gifts, up to $70,000.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism, because every dollar goes twice as far.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
