Chess Player (1980)

Chess Player 1980

.18.5"x22"/serigraph/300 pieces-21 colors

"As a boy growing up in what was once Palestine and is now Israel, chess was one of my favorite pastimes, especially on the Sabbath during the long winter months. When I came to New York to attend art school, I discovered Greenwich Village and its many chess clubs. The players are all remarkably interesting. In chess, an elderly man may be found playing a young person…. poor man playing a wealthy man… but the game of chess turns them all into equals." E.S.

By the late 70's, the demand for my father's art grew beyond his ability to meet demand. In 1979 he began studying the process of creating serigraphs. He wanted to create larger, more colorful pieces that he could not achieve for lithography. 

According to a note in his diary, he put the Chess player canvas away so that he could produce the serigraph first. This was the first serigraph of the five he created.  He was never interested in large editions and kept all his serigraphs to 300 pieces. He never finished the "Chess Player" painting(1979).

Shown is the original canvas board for the Chess Player painting. (rare). The canvas displays the technical process he used for all his works of art. Many projects took days to weeks of preparation.

I have been asked many times, why all his editions were small and why it there are so few paintings. As an artist, he could draw and paint anything. He painted what was in his heart, took his time with each picture as if it was a new born baby and never commercialized his gift.