Photographed by Stanley Batkin

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196 Articles
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43 Exhibition invitations

Moshe (Buky) Schwartz, an Israeli sculptor and video artist, was born in Jerusalem in 1932.
In 1959, he moved to London, where he studied at the St. Martin's School of Art. After returning to Israel in 1963, he created geometrical painted steel sculptures. In 1965 founded "10+" Group with sculptors Pinhas Eshet, Uri Lifshitz, Ika Braun, and others.
In the early 1970s, Schwartz placed mirrors within sculptures, reflecting both their full form and, from certain angles, their amputated parts. In 1971, he moved to New York City, and began making "video structures", filling a room with different shapes which were all projected on a video screen as a unified whole. His video works are widely regarded in the US as a landmark in the development of this medium
He lived and worked in both Tel Aviv and New York until his death in 2009. Buky Schwartz's family donated his archival collection to the Israel Museum, Jerusalem in 2019. The Buky Schwartz Archive is housed at the museum's Information Center for Israeli Art. It contains some 2,000 archival items documenting the work process of the artist. Throughout his career Schwartz collected materials pertaining to his works including: handwritten installation manuals, correspondence, photographs, sketches, prints, negatives, invitations to exhibitions and other documentation. The content of the artist's analog video collection, approximately 50 tapes, consists of documentation of video installations, works in progress, and press releases including interviews with the artist. The video documentation of Schwartz’s installations illustrates the mechanics of the work, and the impact the work had on viewers.

Education

1957-59 Avni Institute of Art and Design, Tel Aviv
1959-62 St Martin's School of Art, London, England

Teaching

1966-67 St. Martin's School of Art, London, Sculpture

Awards And Prizes

1961 Sainsbury Awards, England
1961 House and Garden Prize, London, England
1962 German Critics' Prize, Association of German Critics, Berlin, Germany
1962 Sainsbury Award, England
1965 Dizengoff Prize for Painting and Sculpture, Municipality of Tel Aviv-Jaffa
1971 Purchase Award, Nuremberg Urban Symposium, Nuremberg, Germany
1980 Fellowship, Community Arts Partnership, New York, USA
1983 Video Art Award, New York State Council on the Arts, New York, USA
1983 Artist-in-Residence, Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation, Baltimore, Maryland
1987–88, Fellowship (Sculpture and Drawing), The Dr. Georg and Josi Guggenheim Foundation
1988 Fellowship, National Endowment for the Arts, USA, for sculpture
1989 Annual International Prize for Video Sculpture, L'immagine Elettronica, Ferrara, Italy
1990 Fellowship, The Dr. Georg and Josi Guggenheim Foundation
1991 Painting and Sculpture Prize, Ministry of Education and Culture
1992 Video Sculpture Prize, Pollak Prize
1995 Architect Arie El Hanani Prize for Integration of Art and Architecture, by the Ministry of Culture, Joshua Rabinowitz Fund, Peretz Naftali Fund and the El Hanani Family
1995 Joshua Rabinowitz Foundation Prize for Special Projects in Art

Environmental Sculptures

1969 White from 0 Degrees to 180 Degrees, Israel Museum, Jerusalem, Israel
1997-98 Capital, Isracard Building, Tel Aviv, Israel