The Museum of Art, Ein Harod, one of the first art museums to be founded in Israel, was established by members of Kibbutz Ein Harod on the initiative of the artist Haim Atar. Its first home was in a wooden hut that was converted into an art museum in January 1938. Its permanent building, the first museum building to be erected in Israel, was inaugurated in the midst of the War of Independence (October 1948). The museum building, planned by the architect Samuel Bickels, a kibbutz member, is considered to be one of the earliest and prime examples in the world of modernist museum architecture based on natural lighting.The Collection
The Museum has a rich set of collections of Jewish art, Israeli art, and Judaica. Works from these collections are on show concurrently with temporary exhibitions in order to create new perspectives on the past from a present viewpoint and with a view to the future. A major orientation of the Museum's activity is critical treatment of aspects that have not been related to in the official history of Israeli art, while raising questions about identity, both private and collective. The exhibitions shown in the Museum's galleries are a point of departure for meetings among visitors, events in the various art mediums – music, cinema, interdisciplinary art – as well as for the initiating of research and publications, books and catalogues.
The Judaica collection contains religious utensils dating from the 18th century to the present, from numerous Jewish communities throughout the world, and particularly from Eastern and Western Europe, North Africa and the Middle East.
Purim plate, Germany, 18th century, Tin
The Museum's collection of paintings and graphic works includes paintings by Jewish painters, from the late 19th century and the first half of the 20th century who painted in a diversity of artistic styles and modes.
East-European Jewish Realism is represented in works by painters such as Maurycy Gottlieb, Shmuel Hirschenberg, Leopold Horowitz, Maurycy Minkowski, Artur Markovicz, Isidor Kaufmann.
Shmuel Hirshenberg, The Last Prayer, 1897, oil on canvas, 160 x 130 cm
More modern trends are represented by paintings by Expressionists and Cubists from Russia, Central Europe and the School of Paris. The collection also includes works by American Jewish painters.
Hundreds of Jewish artists perished in the Holocaust; an entire generation of painters was wiped out in France, Poland, Germany, Austria, Holland, Belgium, Yugoslavia and Greece. The Museum's collection holds works by some of these artists: Hanoch Barchinsky, Maurycy Trębacz, Regina Mondlak, Roman Kramsztyk, the brothers Ephraim and Menashe Seidenbeutel, Ayzik Feder, Georg Kars, Marcel Slodki, Bore Baruch, Slavko Brill and many others.
Efraim Seidenbeutel, The Apples Seller, oil on canvas, 104 x 87.5 cm
Israeli painting is represented in the Museum's collection in works by leading artists who represent the diverse currents and the many groups that have been active in Israeli art since its beginnings in the early 20th century.
Moshe Kupferman, Painting, 1967, oil on canvas,
130 x 162 cm
In the sculpture gardens and the sculpture collection one will find works by the first Jewish sculptors Mark Antokolski and Hanoch Glitzenstein beside works by early Israeli sculptors, from Zeev Ben-Zvi through Rudi Lehmann, Dov Feigin and Yehiel Shemi to works by contemporary sculptors.
Henryk Glicenstein, Bar Kochva, 1902, bronze
The collection of Israeli art contains works by artists from the early 20th century to the present, including artists and currents that have not been accorded their rightful place in the story of Israeli art.
Mordechai Ardon, Train of Numbers, 1962, oil on canvas, 73.5 x 145 cm.
Active display spaces are devoted to artists whose estates are included in the Museum collection: Meir Agassi (the "Meir Agassi Museum" in the library), Dudu Geva (the "Dudu Geva Studio" in the Museum's studio), Miron Sima (the "Miron Sima Auditorium"), Samuel Bickels ("Bickel's Work Room"). The collection also holds the estates of Haim Atar, Meira Shemesh, and a selection from the Raffie Lavie Collection.
Dudu Geva, The Amazing Zusima, 1981, pencil and
acrylic on plywood, 35 x 45 cm
The Museum regularly presents exhibitions of young artists and of projects that offer an innovative and exceptional experience.