The Experience of Color

David E. Rozenson

November 06, 2024

Bringing back influences from Paris, Pinchas Litvinovsky found great success on Israel’s art scene

Encouraged by fellow artists who had experienced the wonders of the Parisian scene, in 1929 Litvinovsky set off for that artistic Mecca, where in those years the Jewish school ruled in Montparnasse. This trip would have great influence on Litvinovsky’s future creative path.

For a certain period, his passion for Matisse gave way to an interest in the style of Italian-French Jewish artist Modigliani. Nude woman with elongated necks, standing or reclining, appear in many of Litvinovsky’s paintings of that time. He shifted toward Expressionism, neglecting facial features, being free with his canvases as he played with color, light, and broad brushstrokes. Once back in Israel, he continued to paint and participated in a variety of different exhibitions, returning to Paris over the next decade to become more intimately acquainted with the works of Goerges Rouault, to whom he would dedicate an exhibition, as well as those of Soutine, Matisse, Picasso, Joan Miró, and others.

In 1944, reviewing the solo exhibition of Litvinovsky’s works at the Tel Aviv Museum, A.D. Friedman wrote in Davar:

“...This is passionate art, whose fire and heat have not dulled even for a moment. […] There are few real colorists among our artists, and he is the most colorful. He is as if in some state of constant drunkenness, drunkenness from colors. Because for him the experience of color is one of the primary experiences.”

Undated, oil on canvas, 133 x 83 \ Pinchas Litvinovsky

In the years that followed, Litvinovsky’s art would reflect the influence of the great masters he learned from, moving seamlessly from one subject to another. He depicted Arabs and Jews, landscapes, portraits of Israeli and world cultural and public figures, families, animals, Jewish symbols, Hebrew letters and words. He also worked with simplified forms, pure color, and textures, creating an enduring symphony that resonates with the viewer like a piece of music.

In 1960, a large solo exhibition of Litvinovsky’s works took place on three floors in the recently opened Helena Rubenstein Pavilion of the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, with 250 oil paintings, gouache, and chalk drawings. This was to be his last large solo exhibition.

In the years that followed, Litvinovsky spent much of his time in solitude, secluded at home and painting energetically. He did not even attend the 1980 ceremony to receive the Israel Prize, sending a granddaughter to receive the coveted prize on his behalf.