David Palombo
David Palombo
Israel, 1920-1966
David Palombo was born in 1920 in the Nahalat Shiva neighborhood of Jerusalem to a traditional family of Turkish extraction. In 1934 he began to work in the telephone department of the Israel Postal Authority erecting telephone poles. During this period he was also a member of the “Histadrut HaNoar HaOved VeHaLomed” (The General Federation of Students and Young Workers in Israel). In the 1940s he took art lessons at night. In 1948 he went to Paris, where he visited the studio of the sculptor Brunozzi, whose work influenced him. Around 1958 he married the artist Shulamit Sirota. In 1960 he quit his job to devote himself to art. In 1964 he married for the second time to the artist Yona Palombo. The two of them went to live in an abandoned home on Mount Zion in Jerusalem. In 1966 he was killed when the motorcycle on which he was riding ran into a chain the ultra-orthodox Jews had stretched across the street to prevent the desecration of Shabbat. His widow opened a museum in their home that was active until the year 2000.
Palombo’s early works, in the 1950s, were influenced by modernist sculptors such as Brancuzi. These works were composed of abstract images from nature and were carved out of stone or wood. At the end of the 1950s he began making metal sculptors, using the technique of welding. His work took on a more abstract and expressive character. Among his famous works are the entrance gates to the Yizkor Tent in Yad Vashem, the old entrance gates to the Knesset, etc.
Education
1940 Painting with Isidor Ascheim, New Bezalel School for Arts and Crafts, Jerusalem
1942 Sculpture with Zeev Ben Zvi, Jerusalem
1956 Mosaic, Ravenna, Italy
1958 Welding Course
Awards And Prizes
1966 UNESCO Award
Person TypePerson
