Harry Lieberman, New York (1876 - 1983), Rabbis in Front of Wall, gouache on paper, 19 1/2"H x 15

Harry Lieberman New York (1876 - 1983) Rabbis in Front of Wall gouache on paper Biography from the Archives of askART: Following is the obituary of Harry Lieberman fromnThe New York Times, June 5, 1983. Harry Lieberman, a primitive-style painter who began his career as an artist in his 70's, died Friday in North Shore University Hospital in Manhasset, L.I., after suffering a cardiac arrest. Mr. Lieberman was 106 years old and lived in Great Neck, L.I. Throughout his 26 years as a painter, Mr. Lieberman completed hundreds of pieces and his work was shown in museums and galleries in Great Neck, in New York and in the Hirshhorn Museum in Washington. His work has also been on display in Houston, Seattle, Los Angeles, La Jolla, Calif., and Rotterdam, Holland. It was the boredom of his retirement after selling his confectioner business at the age of 74 that prompted Mr. Lieberman to try his hand at sketching at an art class at the Great Neck Golden Age Club. Mr. Lieberman soon moved on to watercolors and oil painting, using the two-dimensional primitive style. As a young man Mr. Lieberman studied the Talmud, and stories from that religious work as well as the Bible served as the subject matter for most of his paintings. He once told an interviewer that a man of his age - he was 100 at the time - needed a reason to get out of bed in the morning and that the older he got the better that reason needed to be. Mr. Lieberman was born Naftulo Hertzke Liebhaber in Gnieveshev, Poland, in November 1876. In 1906 at the age of 29 he emigrated to the United States, sending for his wife two years later. The Liebermans, who worked first as cloth cutters, bought a candy store that soon prospered into a wholesale confectioner business. Mr. Lieberman's wife, Sophie, died in 1967. He is survived by a brother, Abraham Liebhaber of the Bronx; two daughters, Helen Popkin of Great Neck and Rose Blake of Los Angeles; four grandchildren and three great-grandchildren. Submitted by Jacob Frank. 19 1/2"H x 15 1/2"W (sight), 21"H x 17"W (frame)