Gabriel Zendel

Gabriel Zendel was born in 1906 in Jezov in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, into a family of Polish origin. His father Joseph Zendel, a bookbinder by profession, encouraged him to draw very early and reserved a room for him in the back room of his workshop located on avenue Jean-Jaurès in Paris, where the family moved. In 1925, Zendel joined the Institute of Contemporary Aesthetics where he received instruction from Paul Bornet on copper and wood engraving techniques, training temporarily interrupted by his military service in Morocco. During his student years, Zendel traveled to Holland and Italy and earned his living working in advertising.

Influenced by Cubism and Fauvism, his figurative painting, sometimes monumental, is inspired by the landscapes of Normandy and Burgundy. Zendel is fascinated by the world of entertainment which he depicts in an enigmatic style: circuses, harlequins, masks, portraits of women (The Feathered Hat) and athletes. In the 1950s, he devoted himself mainly to lithography, engraving and posters before purchasing his country house in Clamerey where his workshop opened onto nature. Zendel is the author of literary illustrations for Le Cirque by Léon-Paul Fargue (1947), Lesbachelles by Henri de Montherlant (1964) and Nuits de Princes by Joseph Kessel (1965).