Joseph Kossonogi (variant names Yosef Kossonogy, Yossef Kossonogi) was an Israeli painter.

Biography

Kossonogi was born in Budapest

Budapest

Budapest is the capital of Hungary. As the largest city of Hungary, it is the country's principal political, cultural, commercial, industrial, and transportation centre. In 2011, Budapest had 1,733,685 inhabitants, down from its 1989 peak of 2,113,645 due to suburbanization. The Budapest Commuter...

, Hungary

Hungary

Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...

 in 1908. After studies at the Berlin Academy of Art and advanced studies in France

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

, Holland, Italy

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

 and Spain

Spain

Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...

, he immigrated to Mandate Palestine and settled in Tel Aviv

Tel Aviv

Tel Aviv , officially Tel Aviv-Yafo , is the second most populous city in Israel, with a population of 404,400 on a land area of . The city is located on the Israeli Mediterranean coastline in west-central Israel. It is the largest and most populous city in the metropolitan area of Gush Dan, with...

 in 1926. There he formed the collective of young painters known as Massad

Massad

Massad may refer to:Summer Camps:* Camp Massad , a Jewish summer camp at Winnipeg Beach, Manitoba* Camp Massad , a Jewish summer camp in Ste. Agathe, Quebec, based in Montreal...

.

In 1929, the Massad group had its first exhibition and, in 1935, the group's members joined the Israel Association of Painters and Sculptors. Kossonogi had one-man shows at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art

Tel Aviv Museum of Art

The Tel Aviv Museum of Art is an art museum in Tel Aviv, Israel. It was established in 1932 in a building that was the home of Tel Aviv's first mayor, Meir Dizengoff. The Helena Rubinstein Pavilion for Contemporary Art opened in 1959. The museum moved to its current location on King Saul Avenue in...

 in 1944 and 1954, in which years he was a co-recipient of the Dizengoff Prize

Dizengoff Prize

The Dizengoff Prize for Painting and Sculpture is awarded annually by the Tel Aviv-Yafo Municipality since 1937.The following is a table of Dizengoff Prize laureates in their respective art form:...

 in painting. In 1956, Kossonogi joined the Artists' Colony in Safed

Safed

Safed , is a city in the Northern District of Israel. Located at an elevation of , Safed is the highest city in the Galilee and of Israel. Due to its high elevation, Safed experiences warm summers and cold, often snowy, winters...

. In 1958, the former president of France Vincent Auriol

Vincent Auriol

Vincent Jules Auriol was a French politician who served as the first President of the Fourth Republic from 1947 to 1954. He also served as interim President of the Provisional Government from November to December 1946, making him one of only three people who were heads of state of the French...

 began collecting his work. Kossonogi won the Histadrut

Histadrut

HaHistadrut HaKlalit shel HaOvdim B'Eretz Yisrael , known as the Histadrut, is Israel's organization of trade unions. Established in December 1920 during the British Mandate for Palestine, it became one of the most powerful institutions of the State of Israel.-History:The Histadrut was founded in...

 Prize in 1966 and the Nordau Prize in 1976. He settled in Safed in 1956 and died in 1981.

Colour figures strongly in Kossonogi's oeuvre. He was preoccupied with the bright sun of Eretz Israel and its effect on the lands, crops, and lives of Jewish settlers and native Arabs. Israeli art critic

Art critic

An art critic is a person who specializes in evaluating art. Their written critiques, or reviews, are published in newspapers, magazines, books and on web sites...

 Gideon Ofrat writes of the artist's oeuvre: "Kossonogi launched his career with romantic watercolours rich in brown and green staining; subsequently, under the influence of Raoul Dufy

Raoul Dufy

Raoul Dufy[p] was a French Fauvist painter. He developed a colorful, decorative style that became fashionable for designs of ceramics and textiles, as well as decorative schemes for public buildings. He is noted for scenes of open-air social events...

, they grew lighter and focused on the poetical effects of transparency and fluidity." Kossonogi's focus on light and colour was likely inherited from the Europe

Europe

Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

an influences that marked his formative period, notably Henri Matisse

Henri Matisse

Henri Matisse was a French artist, known for his use of colour and his fluid and original draughtsmanship. He was a draughtsman, printmaker, and sculptor, but is known primarily as a painter...

 and André Derain

André Derain

André Derain was a French artist, painter, sculptor and co-founder of Fauvism with Henri Matisse.-Early years:...

. Along with important Israeli watercolourists Mordechai Avniel

Mordechai Avniel

Mordechai Avniel , variant name Mordecai Avniel, was an Israeli painter and sculptor.- Biography :Avniel was born in 1900 in Minsk, present-day Belarus. He studied fine arts in Yekaterinburg, Russia and at the Bezalel Academy of Art and Design, Jerusalem...

 and Shimshon Holzman

Shimshon Holzman

Shimshon Holzman was an Israeli landscape and figurative painter.-Background:Holzman was born in 1907 in Sambir, Galicia. He immigrated to Mandate Palestine from Vienna, Austria in 1922, settled in Tel Aviv, and began working as a house painter with his father...

, Kossonogi was considered a master of the aquarelle medium.

Selected exhibitions

• 2004: University of Haifa Art Gallery, Haifa: Our Landscape: Notes on Landscape Painting in Israel (online catalogue)
• 1944: Tel-Aviv Museum of Art

Further reading

• Ayal, Avishay, and Yoram Bar-Gal. Our Landscape: Notes on Landscape Painting in Israel [exhibition catalogue]. Haifa: University of Haifa Art Gallery, 2004.
• Lask, I.M. (ed.). Joseph Kossonogi: Landscapes of Israel [portfolio of colour plates]. Tel-Aviv: Y. Tsitsik, [195?].
• Ofrat, Gideon. One Hundred Years of Art in Israel. Boulder: Westview Press, 1998.

External links

• Israeli Art Centre (Israel Museum, Jerusalem - Yosef Kossonogi)
• Smithsonian Libraries Art & Artists Files (Joseph Kossonogi)