Sam Szafran, pseudonym of Samuel Berger (Paris, 1934-2019) was a French artist.
Biography
Sam Szafran was born in Paris in 1934, a son of Polish Jewish immigrants.
He grew up in the Quartier des Halles.
As a child, he knew that art was what he wanted to do.
During World War II he was hidden in the countryside and later in Switzerland, but returned to Paris in 1944 to live with his mother.
He was captured there by the Nazis and sent to a camp in Drancy.
He was freed by the Americans and then left Europe, spending four years in Australia.
He returned to Paris in 1951.
Following abstract beginnings at the Atelier de la Grande Chaumière, where the young artist studied under Henri Goetz, he discovered pastel in the early 1960s.
During the postwar period he encountered as well Jean Arp, Yves Klein, Jean-Paul Riopelle, Joan Mitchell, Alberto Giacometti, Henri Cartier-Bresson and Martine Franck.
In 1963 he married the Swiss-born Lilette Keller, and their son Sébastien was born the following year.
After spending several years in studios provided by their friends, they finally moved to Malakoff in 1974.
Artwork
The discovery of the pastel was of great significance to Sam Szafran.
Since the beginning of the 1960s he has been using the pastel chalks of "Pastels Roché" which were fabricated based on the family recipe by the three sisters of the Roché-family at the Maison du Pastel.
From now on this technique has been dominating his work either alone or in combination with charcoal or watercolor.
At the same time the themes of his paintings intensified as well.
The numerous series of staircases, jungle-like greenhouses and studios ("Ateliers") are the result of his obsession with mastering perfectly the somewhat anachronistic technique of pastel.
By focusing on figurative themes and technical precision this kind of painting contradicts most of the abstract and gestural tendencies of contemporary art; this is an art beyond concepts, trends and ephemeral styles.
As a result, the artist's work has rarely been seen in exhibitions and almost exclusively in his home country and in Switzerland.
In 1993, he received the Grand Prix des Arts de la Ville de Paris.
First retrospectives were organized by Jean Clair and Jean-Louis Prat in 1999 and 2000 at the Fondation Pierre Gianadda in Martigny/ Switzerland and at the Fondation Maeght in Saint-Paul-de-Vence.
The first exhibition in a Paris Museum was held in 2001 at the Musée de la Vie romantique ("L'atelier dans l'atelier").
In 2008, two of his pastels were shown at the exhibition "Le mystère et l'éclat / Mystery and Glitter. Pastels from the Musée d'Orsay" at the Musée d'Orsay in Paris.
In 2011, he was awarded the 3rd Prix Piero Crommelynck.
In December 2019, Sothebys sold Szafran's Imprimerie Bellini for €876,000 from the Louis-Dreyfus Family Collection. | Source: © Wikipedia
Sam Szafran - pseudonimo di Samuel Berger (1934-2019) occupa un posto molto singolare nella storia dell'arte della seconda metà del XX secolo.
Questo artista ha consacrato la sua opera ad un approccio figurativo e poetico-onirico del reale che ha elaborato lontano dal mondo dell’arte e delle sue mode, nel ritiro dell’atelier.
Un’infanzia particolarmente difficile, segnata dalle catastrofi della Seconda guerra mondiale in una famiglia di origini ebraiche-polacche, ha fatto sì che preferisse la solitudine, focalizzandosi sulla propria esistenza e il proprio sentire per dare vita ai suoi temi prediletti.
L’economia parsimoniosa delle rappresentazioni è controbilanciata da una febbre di sperimentazione avvincente, che funziona come un’ancora gettata nella storia dell’arte.
Autodidatta dall’insaziabile curiosità, Sam Szafran si è iniziato prima al pastello e poi all’acquerello, terreni di ricerca artistica che ha ardentemente esplorato.
Szafran mette alla prova lo sguardo, deformando e decostruendo la prospettiva, all’interno, in spazi ermeticamente chiusi su se stessi.
Col tempo, essi si aprono, si frammentano per dare vita a visioni spaccate, dai molteplici piani temporali, in cui si coniugano e si confrontano gli spazi, emblema di un ordine scomparso per sempre. | Fonte: Museo dell'Orangerie, Parigi
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