Philip Rantzer

born 1956, Romania

Signature Description: Hand-signed in English and dated "1977" lower left

Technique: Ink on paper

Image Size: 24 x 18 cm / 9.45" x 7.09" inch

Frame: The painting unframed

Condition: Very good condition

Artist's Biography:

Philip Rantzer, painter and sculptor. b. 1956, Romania.
Immigrated to Israel 1960.
Public Painting: 2004 Painting portrait of Avraham Even Shoshan in the facade of the Tel Aviv city hall.
Lives and works in Tel Aviv.

Education
1979-81 Art Teachers' College, Ramat Hasharon
1993  MA, Art Teachers’ Training College, Beit Berl

Teaching
1995  Senior Lecturer, Department of Fine Art, University of Haifa
2002-2007 Head of the Department of Fine Art, University of Haifa 
Sculpture, Haifa University; art in various schools
Decorative designs for theatre and cinema

Awards and Prizes

1988 Prize for a Young Artist, Ministry of Science, Culture and Sport
1989 Beatrice Kolliner Prize for a Young Israeli Artist, Israel Museum, Jerusalem
1990 Prize for Painting and Sculpture, Ministry of Education
1993 Prize for Creativity, America-Israel Cultural Foundation
1994 Prize for Completion of Project, Ministry of Education and Culture
1997 The Mendel and Eva Pundik Foundation Prize for an Israeli Artist, Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Tel Aviv
2012 Prize in visual arts, Ministry of Culture and Sport.

The concepts and terms customarily used to describe the artistic medium, such as "painting", "sculpture", "collage", "assemblage", "readymade", etc., do not befit the carnivalesque, circus-like wealth typifying Philip Rantzer's work.
Overflowing, it calls to mind Emir Kusturica's cinema or Mikhail Bakhtin's literary theory.
Rantzer addresses such themes as immigration, absorption difficulties, failure to assimilate, and lamentation of a lost world, while challenging the viewer's static, often patronizing set of notions. More than any other Israeli artist, his work discusses the biography of the artist and the immigrant. (In this context, one should bear in mind that Israeli art rejected the biographical as a theme in art for many years). Rantzer's eternal iconic image of the house on wheels insinuates (possibly like Meir Pichhadze's man sitting on a suitcase) a constant state of migration, non-belonging; immigration as a mental state.
His body of work is unique in Israeli art. In recent years he has created series of collages and assemblages indicating a rare, virtuoso sculptural ability and ingenuity.

Selected Solo Exhibitions 

1980 Shinar Gallery, Tel Aviv
1984 "Family Paintings", Prose Gallery, Tel Aviv
         The Aquarium Gallery, Tel Aviv
1985 Ehad Haam 90 Gallery, Tel Aviv
1987 "Down with Progress", Artifact, Tel Aviv
1988 "From the Diary of a Freedom Fighter", Janco Dada Museum, Israel
          Rega Gallery, Tel Aviv
          "Window Displays & Flower Arrangements", Sara Levi Gallery, Tel Aviv
1990 "Hands", Artifact Gallery, Tel Aviv
         "Question Mark Exclamation Mark", Oranim, the Art Institute’s Gallery
1991 "The Gun, the Knife, the Candle and the Notebook", Tel Aviv Artists’ Studios
1992 Artifact Gallery, Tel Aviv
         "Sometimes I Get a Hankering for My Wife", The Israel Museum, Jerusalem
1993 Artifact Gallery, Tel Aviv
         Hof & Huyser Gallery, Amsterdam
1994 "I Love Art and Art Loves Me", City Museum, Gottingen, Germany
1995 Artifact Gallery, Tel Aviv
         Ashlers Gallery, Gottingen, Germany
         Municipal Gallery, Bremen, Germany
1996 City Gallery, Gutersloh, Germany
         "The Nes Ziona Box", the Tel Aviv Artists’ Studios
         City Museum, Erfurt, Germany
1997 Municipal Gallery, Bremen, Germany
1998 "White Dreams", Bineth Gallery, Tel Aviv
         Municipal Gallery, Celle, Germany
         'Drawings", Ashlers Gallery, Gottingen, Germany
         "Drawings", Galerie David, Bielefeld, Germany
1999 Venice Biennale Italy
2000 "La Cura di Bellezza di Philip Rantzer" (‘Beauty Treatment’), La Casa la Marrana, Montemarcello, Italy (cat)
         "The Class", Alon High School of Arts Gallery, Ramat Hasharon
         "Work from the Venice Biennale", Herzliya Museum
2001 Philip Rantzer-Beauty. Beauty. Beauty. Beauty, Alon Segev Gallery, Tel Aviv
2001-2003 "3 projects" (limited editions), Loushy Art Editions, Tel Aviv
2002 No No No Don't Leave Me Alone Here, Tel Aviv Museum, Helena Rubinstein Pavilion
2003 The National Museum for Contemporary Art, Bucharest Romania
         Nachshon Gallery, kibbutz Nachshon
2005 "The Five Continents", Gordon Gallery, Tel Aviv
2007 Phillip Rantzer, Le Grand Bazar, Gordon Gallery, Tel Aviv
2008 "So, What Do You See Now?" Gordon Gallery, Tel Aviv
2010 "Look Back in Anger", Tefen Open Museum, Tefen
2010 Manic Organic, P8 Gallery, Tel Aviv
2011 "Fleur De Savane", Gordon Gallery, Tel Aviv
2012 Composition, Now, Fresh Paint, Contemporary Art Fair, Tel Aviv
2014 May Day, Gordon Gallery, Tel Aviv
2019 Philip Rantzer - New Works, Gordon Gallery, Tel Aviv
2021 Shall I Bring the Circles? Gordon Gallery, Tel Aviv

Selected Group Exhibitions 

1982 "Invited Guests", Naomi Givon Art Gallry, Tel Aviv 
1983 Ehad Haam 90 Gallery, Tel Aviv
         Artists’ House, Jerusalem
1984 Eighty Years of Sculpture, The Israel Museum, Jerusalem|
1986 Kalisher 5 Gallery, Tel Aviv
1987 "Available Materials", Art Workshop Gallery, Yavne
          Rega Gallery, Tel Aviv
          Julie M. Gallery, Tel Aviv
1988 Israel Museum, Jerusalem
         Brooklyn Museum, New York
1989 Ramat Gan Museum
1990 Sculpture Biennale, Ein Hod
1991 Ramat Gan Museum
         "Place and Mainstream: Contemporary Israeli Sculpture", Hara Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo
         "Fresh Paint: The Younger Generation in Israeli Art", The Israel Museum, Jerusalem
1992 Documenta IX, Kassel, Germany
         Anlix Gallery, Geneva
1993 The Artists’ Museum, Lodz, Poland
         "Antipathos: Black Humor, Irony and Cynicism in Contemporary Israeli Art", The Israel Museum, Jerusalem
          Artists’ Studios, Tel Aviv
          "Sculpture Exhibition", Tel Aviv Museum of Art
          "Artists’ Shoes", Antwerp, Belgium
1994 "Halal" ('Space'), Sala 1 Gallery, Rome
          Tel Hai 94, Sculpture Mountain, Tel Hai
          Sagacho Exhibit Space, Tokyo
          "The Mirrors Room", Art Focus
          "Friends", Haifa Museum of Art
          "The Opening Show of the Gallery and Artists Studios", Pyramida, Haifa
          "Exclamation Mark", City Gallery, Kfar Sabba
1995 "Object / Subject", Herzliya Museum
           Artists’ Studios, Tel Aviv
          "Dialogues of Peace", UN Building, Geneva
           "From the Rita and Arthuro Schwarz Collection of Israeli Art", The Israel Museum
           "Small Sculpture", Chelouche Gallery, Tel Aviv
1996 The Jewish Museum, Melbourne, Australia
          Link Gallery, Berlin, Germany
          Limbus Gallery, Tel Aviv
1997 "A Passion for Books", Tel Aviv Museum
          "Desert Cliché: Israel Now – Local Images", Bass Museum of Art, Miami; Grey Art Gallery, New York University
          Klugman Gallery, Paris
           Stad(t)t-art", Guterslo, Germany
1998 "Video Art", Ludwig Museum, Cologne, Germany
1999 "The 20th Anniversary of the Heitland Foundation Award", Kunsthalle, Darmstadt, Germany
          "Good Kids, Bad Kids: Childliness in Israel Art", The Israel Museum, Jerusalem
          "Art Focus: International Biennale of Contemporary Art", Jerusalem
          "T-Shirt", Ramat Gan Museum
          "To the East", The Israel Museum, Jerusalem
2000 Alon Segev Gallery, Tel Aviv
         "Israeli Sculpture", The Open Museum, Tefen
         "Love at First Sight: Works from the Arthuro Schwarz Collection", The Israel Museum, Jerusalem
         "Object of Desire", The Israel Museum, Jerusalem
2001 "Sponky", Exit Art, New York
         "A Wall of My Own", Benno Kalev Collection, Tel Aviv Museum
2002 "September 11th", The Berlin Culture Center
         "The Height of the Popular", Tel Aviv Museum
         "The Borders of Sculpture", The Open Museum, Tefen
2002-2003 "The Return to Zion: Beyond the Place Principle", Time for Art, Tel Aviv
2003 "Biblical Sandals", Comme Il Faut, Tel Aviv2005 "Handwriting", Gordon Gallery, Tel Aviv
2006 "Consider This…", Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA)
         "Detail", Gordon Gallery, Tel Aviv
2009 "The Three Loci", Gordon Gallery, Tel Aviv 
2012 "After", Gordon Gallery, Tel Aviv
         Local Color: Art from the Helela Tal collection, The Negev Museum of Art, Be'er Sheva
2013 Print Time: Works from the Jerusalem Workshop and the Gottesman Center, The Open Museum, Tefen Industrial Park
         Ready Made, Haifa Museum of Art
         Ready-Set-Go, The Centennial of the first Ready-Made, Janco-Dada Museum, Ein Hod
         The Winners 2012: Exhibition for Ministry of Culture and Sports Arts and Design Awards, Ashdod Museum of Art
2014 New Works - Spring 2014 / Group Exhibition, Gordon Gallery, Tel Aviv
2015 The Wandering Jew: Artistic Reflections, Mane Katz Museum, Haifa
2016 (Dis)Place, Ashdod Museum of Art
2017 Pearls, Art Space TLV, Tel Aviv
         No Place Like Home, Israel Museum, Jerusalem
2018 No Place Like Home, Museu Coleção Berardo, Lisbon, Portugal\
         15 Sculptures, Gordon Gallery, Tel Aviv
         Metoo#, Binyamin Gallery, Tel Aviv 2019 First Person Singular, Ashdod Museum of Art

Selected Publications 

Aharonson, Meir. Memory as History, History as Memory. Venice: Israeli Pavilion, Venice Biennale, 1999. 

Direktor, Ruth. The Nes Ziona Box. Tel Aviv: Tel Aviv Artists' Studios, 1996. 

Edelsztein, Serjio. Exhibition at Artifact Gallery. Tel Aviv: Artifact Gallery, 1993. 

Giacinto, Di Pietrantonio. Beauty Treatment. Milano: Libri Scheiwiller, 2000. 

Herns, Kerstin. I Love Art and Art Loves Me. Gottingen: City Museum, 1995. 

KCHO + Rantzer. Neve Zedek: Hamivne Gallery, 2000. 

Manor, Dalia. From the Diary of a Freedom Fighter. Ein Hod: Janco Dada Museum, 1988. 

Salhuv, Shva, and Varda Steinlauf. Solo Exhibition Catalogue. Tel Aviv: The Tel Aviv Museum of Art, 2002. 

The Gun, the Knife, the Candle and the Notebook. Tel Aviv Artists’ Studios, 1991. 

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