Touring: The Land of Light and Promise

This exhibition of some 35 works traces Blum's consistent representation of the real over half a century of painting the Holy Land and beyond. Jerusalem was his city and he never ceased to find inspiration in its architecture, holy places, markets, peoples and the extraordinary changes of light and shadow, which bathes its buildings each day of each season.

Ludwig Blum

For the first time since being exhibited in London at the Royal Academy and the Fine Art Society in 1938, Ben Uri brings the art of Ludwig Blum to the United Kingdom for his first European museum survey. The exhibition traces the career of the Czech born Israeli topographical artist Ludwig Blum, who immigrated to Palestine in 1923 and settled in Jerusalem at the age of 32.

Blum was classically trained; first as a young talent under David Khon in Vienna and then, after serving in the First World War, from 1919 at the Academy of Fine Art in Prague.

Blum’s European persona and academic practice never changed in the heat and heart of this very different continent. He is recognised not only as a distinguished artist of the classic mould but also as the finest topographical artist of his time working in the Levant. His was a unique period in history, being the 25 years before and after the founding of the State of Israel in 1948.  He travelled extensively and often across borders to Iran and Iraq, and his work chronicles in realistic and archival fashion the characteristics of different societies during those times.

The exhibition brings together a remarkable body of Blum’s work not seen in London since he exhibited at the Wertheim Gallery in 1933, and at the Ben Uri, The Fine Art Society, and The Royal Academy in 1938. Included are 10 remarkable views of Jerusalem, its landscape and peoples, providing a unique historical glimpse of this majestic and holy city, which are alongside rare views of building sites during the construction of Tel Aviv.

Other subjects covered from his travels show scenes in Iran and Iraq in 1930, pioneering Kibbutzim settlements Kiryat Anavim west of Jerusalem from 1932 and Degania on the Sea of Galilee from 1934, the 1948 War of Independence, farming and new industrial developments contrasting with city life in the 1950s and beyond.

Artists views of Palestine

Blum’s style and palette, his concerns with space and colour, his swift brushwork and sophisticated conveying of the effects of light bring him close to the landscapes of Palestine that were executed by the London-based American painter John Singer Sargent.

The same can be said when comparing Blum’s 1920s panoramas of Jerusalem with those of British artist David Bomberg, who similarly arrived in Jerusalem in May 1923 and painted his now celebrated series between 1923 and 1927. Given that Blum was in London in the early 1920s before immigrating to Palestine , they were both Europeans living and painting in a new and completely different city and climate, and they painted from similar viewpoints and in similar styles, it is perfectly likely they knew each other.

Blum’s work is immediately recognisable whether portrait or still life, landscapes of Nazareth, Jerusalem, Amsterdam or Rome - early or late period. He maintained and refined his classic and distinctive manner throughout his long and distinguished career.

Ben Uri is proud to offer a journey revealing the majesty of Blum’s practice, as we travel with him on an extraordinary topographical journey.

Exhibition curator: Dr. Dalia Manor