Moshe Ripner
Autodidact. Participated in group exhibitions at the Central Gallery in Tel Aviv, Art Shelter Gallery in Jerusalem and NYA, New York. Is currently working on a solo exhibition at the Jerusalem Artists House, and at The Janco-Dada Museum. Ripner is a painter and draftsman whose works often engage with motifs from Jewish culture and Torah studies while referencing contemporary culture. For a living, Ripner works as a construction worker, where most of his art also takes place. When inspiration strikes he pauses his work, spreads his paper rolls and creates art with whatever materials are available to him, as well as ink and watercolors. He generates Hasidic self-portraits, hybrid creatures which merge the holy with the profane, Jewish elements with animalistic ones, the fantastic with the local. The dissonance between Jewish culture and the contemporary, secular, and artistic one stimulates Ripner and encourages him to create. Ripner selected water as his medium, and inks and watercolors – which spread, spill, splash and dry - express his creative temper, his humility and willingness to surrender control to the work itself.
