Fayga Ostrower | |
|---|---|
 Fayga Ostrower (1956) | |
| Born | Fayga Perla Krakowski (1920-09-14)14 September 1920 Łódź, Poland |
| Died | 13 September 2001(2001-09-13) (aged 80) Rio de Janeiro, Brazil |
| Education | Getúlio Vargas Foundation |
| Known for | Engraving, printing, painting, illustration |
| Movement | Abstract expressionism |
| Spouse | |
Fayga Perla Ostrower (néeKrakowski; 14 September 1920,Łódź — 13 September 2001,Rio de Janeiro) was a Polish-Brazilianengraver, painter, designer, illustrator,art theorist and university professor.[1][2]
Fayga Ostrower was bornFayga Perla Krakowski to a Jewish family at Łódź. In 1921, the family moved toElberfeld andBarmen in Germany, where Ostrower attended primary and secondary schools. In the early 1930s, following difficulties with the German authorities, the family sought refuge in Belgium, and emigrated to Brazil in 1934, where they took up residence inNilópolis. Ostrower began work as a secretary while studying art at the Fine Arts Association, and in 1946 attended design classes at theGetúlio Vargas Foundation’s Brazilian Society of Fine and Graphic Arts, where she studiedmetal andwood engraving, andart history, with tutors Axel Leskoschek, Tomás Santa Rosa, Carlos Oswald, and Anna Levy. In 1955, she spent a year in New York through aFulbright Scholarship, engraving under the tutelage ofStanley Hayter.[1][2][3]
Ostrower exhibited and won prizes in the international Art Biennials ofSão Paulo (1951 to 1967),Venice (1958 and 1962) and Mexico (1960).[1][2]
In 2002, the Fayga Ostrower Institute was founded in Rio de Janeiro in memory of Ostrower, to house her works and documents, and to provide for creative, fine art andinterdisciplinary study.
In 1941, Fayga marriedMarxist activist Heinz Ostrower, both becomingnaturalized in 1951. They had a son Carl Robert (b. 1949), and daughter Anna Leonor (b. 1952).[1][2]
Between 1954 and 1970, Ostrower lectured in Composition andCritical Analysis at theMuseum of Modern Art, Rio de Janeiro. In the 1960s she taught at theSlade School of Fine Art, London, and in 1964 atSpelman College,Atlanta. Subsequently, she held posts withinpostgraduate programmes within various Brazilian universities. Consecutively she developed art courses for workers and community centres, and gave lectures at various cultural institutions.[1][2]
In 2023, her work was included in the exhibitionAction, Gesture, Paint: Women Artists and Global Abstraction 1940-1970 at theWhitechapel Gallery in London.[4]
