“What makes this #exhibition and celebration of #ArthurSzyk important for 2026 — 250 years on from the #AmericanRevolution and subsequent #DeclarationofIndependence — is how he framed freedom as something to fight for. He loved #America and was granted citizenship in 1948,” said Sara Softness, the #museum’s director of curatorial affairs. “The title ‘#Art of Freedom’ has a double meaning: not only that the #artist made pictures about or featuring themes of democratic ideals, #antiFascism, and pro-pluralism, but that freedom itself is a practice, a metier, a life’s work.”
Born in #Łódź, #Poland in 1894, #Szyk experienced major upheavals of the 20th century: two world wars, the rise of #totalitarianism, and #Nazism, the founding of the State of #Israel, #McCarthyism, as well as deeply entrenched #American #racism and #antisemitism."
https://forward.com/culture/792856/arthur-szyk-museum-of-jewish-heritage/

An activist Jewish artist who used his work to fight fascism
The heroic image of George Washington standing in a boat as it cuts through the icy Delaware River on Christmas Eve in 1776 is etched into the collective American consciousness. But when Polish-born political artist Arthur Szyk painted the scene in 1942, he recast it for a nation at war. In his Washington Crossing the...




