Leon Bibel (1913 – 1995)
Born in San Francisco in 1913, Leon Bibel trained at the California School of Fine Arts and under the German Impressionist Maria Riedelstein. He worked in collaboration with Bernard Zackheim, a student of Diego Rivera, to create frescoes for the San Francisco Jewish Community Center and the University of California Medical School.
In 1936 Bibel moved from California to New York City to join the Works Project Administration (WPA) Federal Art Project. Because he could not meet the residency requirement, he applied under his brother Philip’s name. He was assigned to the Graphic Art Project and the Easel Project at Harlem Art Center, where he taught at both P.S. 94 and Bronx House. Consequently, several prints from his early WPA work are signed P.L. Bibel, his brother’s initials.
The hardship of life in New York City during the Great Depression is reflected in much of Bibel’s work and the social-realist politics of the era is reflected in his dignified portrayals of the common worker.
Bibel was also a part of the “chicken and egg farmer” artist’s movement in the early 1940′s in rural New Jersey that was formed as a result of big-business feed companies setting up chicken farms in the Southeast, virtually putting the independent farmers out of business. Having given up his art to support his family, Bibel remained a chicken and egg farmer for 30 years.
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