Shmuel Bonneh: From the Land of the Bible to the Great Sea

In 1971, the Haifa Museum of Art held a retrospective exhibition for Shmuel Bonneh. Almost 50 years later, the Mané-Katz Museum is proud to present Bonneh's rich artistic career, in an exhibition showing a selection of his best works.

In 1936, when Bonneh was a child, his family left the town of Mezrich, Poland, and immigrated to Palestine. The land was first revealed to him in Haifa – a city both Eastern and European, Mediterranean and cosmopolitan. Here he was captivated by the light and colors of the East and absorbed the Mediterranean atmosphere.

The exhibition focuses on three central themes that recur in Bonneh's work: the open spaces of the Eretz-Israeli landscape, which he came to know in Haifa and while working as a land surveyor in the Galilee; the personal and domestic space; and the spiritual and mystical space, with works related to Biblical myth.

Most of Bonneh's paintings are large-scale and employ a rich visual idiom that combines several styles, some of which belong to specific periods while others appear throughout his artistic career. These vibrant works contain both figurative and abstract elements, reflecting an aesthetic exploration of color and form. They feature stylized figures and strong, expressive colors that alternate with light and clean hues.

His early works show the artist's deep affinity for Persian art, particularly Persian miniatures, alongside ancient Byzantine painting. Over the years he absorbed stylistic influences from international modern art. In the 1980s and 1990s his work took a sharp turn towards abstract geometric painting.

These paintings exhibit a simplicity that is almost naïve, negating the laws of reality and leading the viewer into a world of symbol and legend. They draw inspiration from Bonneh's deep connection with the cultural heritage of the Jewish people, above all the stories of the Bible, and from his love for Eretz Israel and its landscapes.

Expressing a sense of spontaneous, unpredictable creative freedom, Bonneh based his works on a variety of styles and sources of influence unaffiliated with any specific artistic movement. To create his artistic world, which at times seems primeval, Bonneh combined his love of nature, interest in ancient epic works, and enigmatic inner experience. In his diverse corpus, which does not obey any organized structure, every work is a pure, unique event.