Moses Soyer

Moses Soyer
Born (1899-12-25)December 25, 1899
Borisoglebsk, Tambov
Died September 3, 1974(1974-09-03) (aged 74)
New York
Known for Painting
Movement Social Realism
Untitled painting by Moses Soyer, Honolulu Museum of Art

Moses Soyer (December 25, 1899 – September 3, 1974) was an American social realist painter.

Biography

Soyer was born in Borisoglebsk, Russian Empire, in 1899. His father was a Hebrew scholar, writer and teacher. His family emigrated to the United States in 1912. Two of Soyer's brothers, Raphael (his identical twin) and Isaac were also painters. Soyer's wife, Ida, was a dancer, and dancers are a recurring subject in his paintings.[1] Soyer studied art in New York, first at Cooper Union and later at the Ferrer Art School, where he studied under the Ashcan painters Robert Henri and George Bellows.[2] He had his first solo exhibition in 1926 and began teaching art the following year at the Contemporary Art School and The New School.[3][4] He died in the Chelsea Hotel in New York while painting dancer and choreographer Phoebe Neville.[5]

Legacy

The Brooklyn Museum, the Detroit Institute of Arts, the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden (Washington, DC), the Honolulu Museum of Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art (New York City), the Philadelphia Museum of Art, The Phillips Collection (Washington, DC), the Walker Art Center (Minneapolis, Minnesota), and the Whitney Museum of American Art (New York City) are among the institutions holding works by Moses Soyer.[6] The untitled painting in the collection of the Honolulu Museum of Art is an example of his intimate and psychologically penetrating portraits of ordinary people, for which he is best known.[6][7]

References

"Capturing Artists" by Jeffrey Sussman, published in The East Hampton Star, recounts the author's friendship with Moses Soyer and the photographic studies he did of him.

  1. Jewish Renaissance, October 2009, p. 43.
  2. "Moses Soyer: Biography". American Art at the Phillips Collection. Retrieved April 24, 2013.
  3. "Moses Soyer". Jewish Virtual Library. Retrieved April 25, 2013.
  4. Goodman, Susan T. The Grove Encyclopedia of American Art. Oxford University Press. p. 521.
  5. The London Review of Books, Letters, (Phoebe Neville) 6 March 2014, page 6
  6. 1 2 ACA Galleries
  7. Honolulu Museum of Art wall label

Sources

Further reading


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