Lot description
ARTIST: Isis Kischka (French, 1908 - 1974) TITLE: Portrait of Woman MEDIUM: oil on canvas CONDITION: Some small damages to the corners of canvas. Minor paint losses. Some craquelure. No visible inpaint under UV light. Normal wear along edges. ART SIZE: 18 x 15 inches / 45 x 38 cm FRAME SIZE: unframed (In-House framing available) SIGNATURE: lower right LOCATION: This lot is located at our Mamaroneck, NY office. CATEGORY: old antique vintage painting for auction sale online AD: ART WANTED: Consign, Trade In, Cash Offer SKU#: 135432 US SHIPPING: $60 + insurance. BIOGRAPHY: Isis Kischka was born in Paris on the 26 October 1908 to a Jewish family who had migrated from the Ukraine two years earlier. After completing studies in commerce he became interested in painting and became an artist in 1926, working first as a designer of medals. He married in 1932 and three years later began to study at the Academie de la Grande Chaumiere. His main sources of inspiration were Van Gogh and Cezanne. His paintings and colourful lithographs caught the attention of the prestigious art critics Jean Cassou and George Waldemar, the latter comparing Kischka's style to "the song of the nightingale". In 1938 Kischka's works were exhibited for the first time at the Salon des Independants and subsequently at the Salon d'Automne.In 1941 Kischka was arrested and interned in Compiegne. While there, he painted scenes of the camp and portraits of his fellow inmates, and he encouraged other artists among the inmates to do likewise. He became a central figure in the artistic activity of the camp, organizing exhibitions and winning the highest esteem of fellow artists like Jacques Ostrowsky and Savely Schleifer, who dedicated several of their works to him. From Compiegne he was transferred to Drancy, but managed to avoid deportation to the death camps.In the fall of 1944, after 39 months of internment, Kischka was freed and returned to Paris. Some time after his return he founded, together with art critic Jean Cassou and curator Yvon Bizardel, an association called "Artists Witness their Time". Their first exhibition was held in 1951 and included works by Henri Matisse, Georges Rouault, Raoul Dufy and Moise Kisling. Kischka devoted his time to running the association's gallery, refusing to exhibit his own works there. But this did not prevent him from continuing with his own artistic work and from showing elsewhere. His landscapes, portraits and still life paintings were exhibited from 1956, first in a one-man show at the Nantes gallery and a year later at the Parisian gallery of Saint Placide. Subsequently, his works would be seen in galleries throughout France and in other countries. His extensive artistic and public activities were cut short in December 1973, when he died in Paris after a severe illness.