Filmed in her studio, Chana Orloff meticulously prints the shape of her fingers in the clay to draw the contours of a future work. She seems embarrassed by the camera. She who defined her work as a means of “sculpt the era” never wanted to be its face. “She felt that it was not her life that mattered, but what she created,” tells us his grandson, Éric Justman, who leads tours of Chana Orloff’s workshop in Paris. The sculptor has never confided her past, her exiles, to her grandchildren or to anyone.
“She believed that if One could endure hardship and leave it behind to continue living, one should do so.” insists Eric Justman. The life of this Ukrainian-born Jew, a national treasure in the eyes of Israel, nevertheless seems to echo our times. His sculptures are very visible in the capital this year: in his workshop, at the Museum of Art and History of Judaism, where a looted sculpture, The Didi Child, has been on display since November. It is one of four found out of the 143 left in Paris on July 15, 1942, the day before the Vél’ d’Hiv roundup. Warned by her founder that she was going to be arrested, the artist had time to flee to Switzerland in the company of her son.
Anthony Gormley: “Sculpture has abandoned its responsibility to represent the world”
The break is obvious between her first works, essentially portraits popular with the Parisian elite, and the sculptures she executed once she left. They lose their smooth finish and become plagued by handprints lingering in the material. One of them will particularly mark this turning point at the end of 1945: sculpted in jet black bronze, The return is inspired by concentration camp survivors. The one that once represented peaceful motherhoods and powerful women represents a man broken in body and spirit. She will explain having “sought to sculpt nothingness”. This Swiss exile is not the first.
She who defined her work as a means of “sculpting the era” never wanted to be its face
Born in a small town in Ukraine in 1888, Chana Orloff and her family suffered the first pogroms. The Orloff clan, with their nine children, decided to leave for Ottoman Palestine in 1905, where Chana saw her sisters forced into arranged marriages to secure their future. And decides to dispose of hers alone. There is only one way to do this: work. Already introduced to sewing, she chose Paris to perfect her training. It was in 1911, in the French capital, that his talent for sculpture was revealed.
His life revolves around his creations and his son. The premature death of her husband, the poet Ary Justman, in 1919, having been the starting point of this balance. Yet another twist of fate for someone who has already started everything again twice, and who saw France as a land of hope. She will see her resilience rewarded. She makes a living from her art, receives commissions, rubs shoulders with Modigliani and Apollinaire. In 1925, the State granted him French nationality. Her fame spread, to the point that she exhibited in New York.
(Credits: © LTD / ATELIER-MUSÉE CHANA ORLOFF)
After the war, his new style was less popular in Paris. It is in Israel that it is most in demand. She had already participated in the creation of the Tel Aviv Art Museum, and therefore responded to orders for numerous portraits, including that of David Ben-Gurion. At the end of 1968, she stopped at the kibbutz of Be’eri, founded by her brother and her niece, during the organization of a retrospective in Tel Aviv. She will not leave, victim of a heart attack at 80 years old.
Decades later, the kibbutz would also be touched to the heart. On October 7, 2023, Hamas men killed more than 100 victims there, including three members of the sculptor’s family, and took around fifty hostages. Among them, seven are linked to Chana Orloff. One of them is still captive. While she wanted her works to be her standard, History caught up with Chana Orloff.
Chana Orloff workshop-museum, permanent exhibition. At the Museum of Art and History of Judaism: ““L’Enfant Didi”, itinerary of a looted work by Chana Orloff, 1921-1923”, until September 29.
