06/05/2025

Shlomo Katz's ‘The Golden Age’ Exhibit on Display at Roe Green Gallery in Beachwood

Tags: Federation, Arts

Article reprinted with permission from Cleveland Jewish News

by Abigail Preiszig

A result of three generations of collaboration, Israeli artist Shlomo Katz’s first exhibition since his sudden death more than 30 years ago will be on view through Aug. 26 in Beachwood.

His daughter, son-in-law and two granddaughters traveled from New York City and Tel Aviv to commemorate the opening of “The Golden Age” on April 6 in the Roe Green Gallery at the Jewish Federation of Cleveland’s Jack Joseph and Morton Mandel Building.

“This is a lifelong dream and a goal for (his daughter) and her entire family,” Matthew Garson, exhibition curator, says. “So, it’s even deeper than what a typical artist having an exhibition would have. It’s very emotional and special.”

Gilly Rosin provided the exhibition’s first 100 visitors with “clues” about the manifestation of her late father’s characteristics in the paintings and prints on display in the Roe Green Gallery.

“Many tears were shed during the preparations for the exhibition, and today we are overflowing with all different kinds of emotions,” she said to a captive audience. “This seemingly puts a melancholic and heavy air on the entire opening and exhibition, but my father, Shlomo Katz, was a very lively person, a great storyteller, funny, warm and loving, and I want him to be remembered as the person he was.”

Katz’s career spanned from the 1970s until he died in March 1992 in Holon, Israel, at age 55. A Holocaust survivor, he always had talent for drawing and studied art at École des Beaux-Arts in Paris as a young man.

“The Golden Age” is named for his original technique of painting by applying oil on top of gold leaf that he translated onto paper using metallic gold inks to create screenprints, Garson said. Some of his screenprints were created using up to 50 different layers.

Katz combined several styles from different periods in art history into his work and drew inspiration from medieval icons and oriental miniatures. His techniques resulted in a combination of deep vibrant colors combined with a metallic surface that glowed, forming a totally new modern image filled with light.

The exhibition includes three limited-edition portfolios: The Passover Portfolio (1982) with 10 pieces, The Four Seasons Portfolio (1984) with four pieces and The Psyche Portfolio (1988) with four pieces. “April,” is a standalone piece, was created in 1990 using oil paint and gold leaf as part of a series on months cut short due to his death.

“We felt that this exhibition is part of our family story and that we all need to be here together to see it and to go through this together,” Gilly Rosen, visiting Cleveland for the first time, said.

During the COVID-19 pandemic the family bought Katz’s painting, “Jacob and the Angel,” created in 1987 using oil paint and gold leaf, with the purpose of donating it to a “good, permanent home,” his granddaughter, Netta Rosin, said.

As the director of visual arts and literature in the office of cultural affairs for the Consulate General of Israel in New York City, she knew of the Federation and its “amazing work” through the Cleveland Israel Art Connection and reached out via email to donate the piece in 2023, she said.

“The piece itself, it’s a biblical theme, so, it’s something that we knew that we wanted to have a Jewish organization have it,” Netta Rosin said. “Also, one of his biggest projects that he completed in his lifetime is nine big paintings for the Colorado Springs Air Force Academy Cadet Chapel and ‘Jacob and the Angel’ is one of those nine paintings, and this painting is a variation of it.”

The donation, now part of the Federation’s permanent collection, encouraged Garson to delve deeper into Katz’s work, he said. The Lyndhurst resident and Netta Rosin met a few months later in New York City where he learned of more art and Gilly Rosin’s efforts to bring a show of her fathers to fruition.

“I said, ‘I think we want to do a show,’” Garson, chair of the visual arts sub-committee of the Cleveland Israel Arts Connection, said.

Born in 1937 in Lodz, Poland, Katz was very optimistic despite his early childhood spent fleeing and hiding from the Nazis with his mother, Ida, Gilly Rosin, said at the opening. They spent two years in the woods of Belarus with a group of partisans, The Bielski Brothers, before he immigrated to the British Mandate of Palestine when he was 8 years old.

“In ‘The Four Sons,’ look at the innocent one: the way he offers the flower to the wicked, who is aiming his arrow at the defenseless caged bird: the good-hearted and, well, innocent expression on his face, the simple offering of the flower. I think he is the son with whom Shlomo identified the most,” she said, connecting the screenprint to her father’s early childhood.

Katz grew up in Kibbutz Mishmar Ha’emek, an agricultural collective community in Israel, and worked with farm animals from a young age, Gilly Rosin said, recalling that they always had a dog and Katz kept two parrots in his studio.

In his paintings, he conveyed his affection for animals, especially dogs – about 30 of which are seen in the exhibition in addition to birds, bees and other insects, she said.

Katz also had a “great sense of humor” - seen in the feet of baby Moses peeking from the basket in the screenprint, “Moses in the Basket” - loved children and was a humanist, “always curious about people,” Gilly Rosin said. He was a secular man “but he loved reading and illustrating bible scenes because he found the bible a great source of all kinds of human interactions, which was really the core of his interest.”

“He told me once, that in a landscape painting, as soon as there is a human figure in the composition – that’s when the painting becomes interesting to him,” she said. “… In every one of the paintings, we can see demonstrations of emotions and interactions between people.”

Gilly said she hopes the exhibition will open other opportunities in the U.S. and Israel to showcase her father’s art and “regain his name as an important Israeli artist,” she says.

“I hope that it won’t be the end point of our journey, it will be just a starting point,” she said.

Gallery open houses and curator talks will be held twice a month. Upcoming dates include 6 to 8 p.m. June 24 and 1 to 3 p.m. July 13, Aug. 10 and Aug. 24.

Open houses will be accompanied by the 27-minute film, “Shlomo Katz – A World of Symbols,” by Hila Waldman. The film chronicles the life and influences that led Katz to create his unique “Golden Style” of painting. Interviews with family, friends and colleagues trace the artist’s life, including his commission at the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colo., until his death.

Jane Glaubinger, retired curator of prints for the Cleveland Museum of Art, will discuss techniques used by Katz in creating his renowned screenprint portfolios from 9:30 to 11 a.m. July 16 in the Roe Green Gallery.

The gallery is open by appointment for group tours or individual visits.

For more information,email israelarts@jewishcleveland.org, call 216-593-2890 or visit bit.ly/44DSCCt.

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