About Claire Maratier and Michel Kikoïne
Michel Kikoïne and the Kikoïne Wing
Portraits from the Michel Kikoïne Collection
Portraiture occupies a central place in the oeuvre of artist Michel Kikoïne (1892–1968), one of the foremost painters associated with the School of Paris. The works presented here include self-portraits, portraits of fellow artists and their children, as well as portraits of his daughter, Claire Maratier, who in 2004 donated her father's collection to Tel Aviv University. In an expressive and imaginative idiom, through stain, color, and line, Kikoïne gave form to his inner world and captured the emotional intensity of the people he drew – whose faces are furrowed and lined, flickering with light and movement, and suspended between reality and dream.
Kikoïne, who was born in Gomel (Belarus) to a Jewish family, studied in Vilna and moved to Paris in 1912. There he quickly integrated himself into the local art scene, alongside othr Jewish artists such as Chaim Soutine, Marc Chagall, and Jacques Lipchitz. His painting was initially influenced by the art of Paul Cézanne and Camille Pissarro; later he developed a personal style based on intense color, emotion, and free brushwork. His oeuvre weaves together painterly expressiveness with the charged experience of Jewish life in Eastern Europe. Kikoïne's paintings were exhibited in the leading galleries and salons in France and abroad, and in the 1950s he visited Israel.
The Yad Michel Kikoïne Wing was established in 2004, adjacent to the Genia Schreiber University Art Gallery, through the generous donation of his daughter, the late Claire Maratier, in his memory. The wing includes an exhibition space, an auditorium, and classrooms for academic and artistic activity. Upon its inauguration, the university received a donation of 40 of Kikoïne’s artworks.
Between 2008 and 2015, Claire Maratier initiated an annual award for an outstanding Israeli painter, presented during the university’s Board of Governors meetings. Among the recipients were Maya Cohen Levy, Ruth Dorrit Yacoby, and Gilad Efrat.
