“The First Jewish Emigrants of 1650 in New Amsterdam, Under Governor Peter Styvenson [sic]”

ZAKHEIM, BERNARD

1966

Oil on canvas. Signed by the artist and inscribed lower left “Farm Arts, xii, 1966.” Signed and titled on verso.

Best known for his work on the Coit Tower murals in the Telegraph Hill neighborhood of San Francisco, Bernard Baruch Zakheim (1898-1985) was born to a Chassidic family in Poland. After fighting in World War I, Zakheim arrived in San Francisco in 1920. In the early 1930’s, he committed himself to the preservation and interpretation of Jewish-American life and culture through the making of art. He was one of the organizers of the Yiddish Folkschule where he organized the first "Yiddish art" exhibit in San Francisco. Turning more seriously to mural painting as a form of expression, he traveled to Mexico and studied with the great artist Diego Rivera. Zakheim helped found the San Francisco Artists and Writers Union, a group of activist artists who lobbied the US government to create a federally funded arts program during the Great Depression. This program became the celebrated Public Works of Art Project (succeeded by the WPA). In later life, Zakheim moved to the rural town of Sebastopol, where he farmed and continued to paint.