Freda Koblick (1920 – 2011) was an American artist, sculptor, and educator, she was known for

plastics engineering Plastics engineering encompasses the processing, design, development, and manufacture of plastics products. A plastic is a polymeric material that is in a semi-liquid state, having the property of plasticity and exhibiting flow. Plastics engineeri ...

, acrylic arts, and designing

decorative art ] The decorative arts are arts or crafts whose object is the design and manufacture of objects that are both beautiful and functional. It includes most of the arts making objects for the interiors of buildings, and interior design, but not usual ...

. Koblick introduced cast acrylic as a medium for sculpture.

Early life and education

Freda Koblick was born on 26 August 1920 in

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the ...

, into a Jewish,

Russian American Russian Americans ( rus, русские американцы, r=russkiye amerikantsy, p= ˈruskʲɪje ɐmʲɪrʲɪˈkant͡sɨ) are Americans of full or partial Russian ancestry. The term can apply to recent Russian immigrants to the United Stat ...

family. She attended

City College of San Francisco City College of San Francisco (CCSF or City College) is a State school#United States, public community college in San Francisco, California. Founded as a Junior college#United States, junior college in 1935, the college plays an important local ...

(CCSF) and San Francisco State College (now San Francisco State University). In 1939, Koblick continued her studies at Plastics Industries Technical Institute in Los Angeles.

Career

She returned to San Francisco in the early 1940s. Her first job was designing plastic molds for an office machinery factory in Emeryville. Early in her career she worked in collaboration with architects and created functional acrylic decorative objects for the home, including Lucite doorknobs, candle holders, trays, and lighting accessories. Eventually by the 1960s, architects started asking for larger sculptural works made of acrylic, and she started transitioning into the acrylic arts. Koblick held her studio in the North Beach neighborhood at Battery Street and Clay Street. In 1956, her work space burned down and she had a period of studio displacement. However 1980, with the help of her friend Mariquita West she was able to purchase the 4,300-foot former Congregation B'nai David building in the

Mission District The Mission District ( Spanish: ''Distrito de la Misión''), commonly known as The Mission ( Spanish: ''La Misión''), is a neighborhood in San Francisco, California. One of the oldest neighborhoods in San Francisco, the Mission District's name i ...

and maintain the space as both an art studio and residence. For many years she taught her acrylic casting techniques at the

Royal College of Art The Royal College of Art (RCA) is a public research university in London, United Kingdom, with campuses in South Kensington, Battersea and White City. It is the only entirely postgraduate art and design university in the United Kingdom. It of ...

. She received the

Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to those "who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the ar ...

in 1970, in fine art.

Death

Koblick died on 18 June 2011 in San Francisco, California, from renal failure due to

diabetes Diabetes, also known as diabetes mellitus, is a group of metabolic disorders characterized by a high blood sugar level (hyperglycemia) over a prolonged period of time. Symptoms often include frequent urination, increased thirst and increased ...

. She never married. For 30 years she had an affair with a married man, which she openly discussed.

References

External links

Freda Koblick papers, 1934-2011
from

Archives of American Art The Archives of American Art is the largest collection of primary resources documenting the history of the visual arts in the United States. More than 20 million items of original material are housed in the Archives' research centers in Washing ...

Smithsonian Institution The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums and education and research centers, the largest such complex in the world, created by the U.S. government "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge". Founded ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Koblick, Freda 1920 births 2011 deaths City College of San Francisco alumni San Francisco State University alumni American people of Russian-Jewish descent Academics of the Royal College of Art Artists from San Francisco