Herman Heimlich (June 18, 1904 – November 6, 1986) was a Hungarian-born Canadian painter. He was associated with the Jewish Painters of Montreal.

Biography

Herman Heimlich was born in 1904 in

Hungary Hungary is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning much of the Pannonian Basin, Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the south, Croatia and ...

. His father, a rabbi, emigrated to New York in 1915. Heimlich travelled extensively after studying at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in

Budapest Budapest is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns of Hungary, most populous city of Hungary. It is the List of cities in the European Union by population within city limits, tenth-largest city in the European Union by popul ...

, and spent a year with his father in the United States in the 1920s, during which time he painted a series of murals at the

Cotton Club The Cotton Club was a 20th-century nightclub in New York City. It was located on 142nd Street and Lenox Avenue from 1923 to 1936, then briefly in the midtown Theater District until 1940. The club operated during the United States' era of P ...

. Heimlich settled permanently in

Montreal Montreal is the List of towns in Quebec, largest city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Quebec, the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-largest in Canada, and the List of North American cit ...

around 1930, and set up his first studio above the Jewish Public Library. That same year, he participated in his first Canadian exhibition, winning first prize. He continued to participate in exhibitions throughout the 1930s and 1940s, most notably those organized in 1937 and 1938 by the Art Association of Montreal, the forerunner of the

Montreal Museum of Fine Arts The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (MMFA) is an art museum in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It is the largest art museum in Canada by gallery space. The museum is located on the historic Golden Square Mile stretch of Sherbrooke Street west. The MMFA ...

. While Heimlich drew and painted

landscapes A landscape is the visible features of an area of land, its landforms, and how they integrate with natural or human-made features, often considered in terms of their aesthetic appeal.''New Oxford American Dictionary''. A landscape includes the ...

and

still life A still life (: still lifes) is a work of art depicting mostly wikt:inanimate, inanimate subject matter, typically commonplace objects which are either natural (food, flowers, dead animals, plants, rocks, shells, etc.) or artificiality, human-m ...

s, he favoured

portraiture A portrait is a painting, photograph, sculpture, or other artistic representation of a person, in which the face is always predominant. In arts, a portrait may be represented as half body and even full body. If the subject in full body better re ...

. He also created murals for public and private buildings in Canada and the United States, and produced illustrations for children's books. He taught at various institutions in Montreal, including the Fine Arts Department of the

Saidye Bronfman Centre The Segal Centre for Performing Arts, formerly the Saidye Bronfman Centre for the Arts, is a theatre in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It is located at 5170 chemin de la Côte-Sainte-Catherine, in the borough of Côte-des-Neiges–Notre-Dame-de-Grâ ...

. Among his students were

Esther Wertheimer Esther Wertheimer (née Estera Sheps) (1926 – August 18, 2016) was a Canadian sculptor and educator. She is known for her semi-abstract figurative bronze sculptures and portrait busts in terra cotta. During the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s, Werthei ...

, Peter Whalley, , , and .

Work

Heimlich's artwork is represented in a number of Canadian museum collections, including the

Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec The Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec (), abbreviated as MNBAQ, is an art museum in Quebec City, Quebec, Canada. The museum is located in National Battlefields Park and is a complex of four buildings. Three of them were purpose-built for ...

Museum London Museum London is an art and history museum located in London, Ontario, Canada. It is located near the forks of the Thames River. It started its operations in 1940 with London Public Library and amalgamated with London Regional Art Gallery and Lon ...

, the

Dalhousie Art Gallery The Dalhousie Arts Centre, at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, contains a number of theatres (including an outdoor rooftop theatre), Dalhousie Art Gallery, classrooms, and a sculpture garden. It remains the premier performing arts v ...

, and the

Art Gallery of Ontario The Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO; ) is an art museum in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Located on Dundas Street, Dundas Street West in the Grange Park (neighbourhood), Grange Park neighbourhood of downtown Toronto, the museum complex takes up of phys ...

References

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Citations

{{DEFAULTSORT:Heimlich, Herman 1904 births 1986 deaths 20th-century Canadian Jews 20th-century Canadian male artists 20th-century Canadian painters Painters from Montreal Canadian art educators Canadian landscape painters Canadian male painters Jewish Canadian artists Jewish painters Burials at Baron de Hirsch Cemetery, Montreal