Hendel Lieberman was an artist. Born in 1901 to a Lubavitcher family in the village of Pleshinitz (Pleshchenitsy) in what was then the Russian Empire, Lieberman doodled as a child on scraps of paper and the inside of his siddur and chumash. He lost his father as a young boy, and at the age of 12 was sent to study in the village of Lubavitch, which had been the center of the Chabad movement for nearly a century. There, his artistic talents continued to flower.1

This was a time of great spiritual and political upheaval throughout Eastern Europe, when many young Jews were being lured away from traditional Jewish life by avant garde culture, radical politics and the promise of a utopian new world. The Lubavitcher yeshivah was founded in 1897 as a bulwark against this revolutionary tide, and Lieberman’s artistic predilections were frowned upon. The yeshivah’s fears were not unwarranted, as Hendel found himself “attracted to the outside world which beckoned with increasing intensity.”2

“The conflict was deep and seemingly fundamental,” the Chassidic writer Heyshke Dubrovsky recounted. For Hendel, “the dilemma appeared irreconcilable: either he remain a Chassidic Jew or renounce his tradition and enter the ‘outside’ world.” He tried running away from Lubavitch a few times, only for his mother to bring him back.

Eventually Lieberman did leave, and by 1920 he was studying art in Moscow. Within a few years, he was married with children and struggling to support his family. A turning point in his artistic career came in 1927, when Lieberman’s sketch won first prize in a national art competition and a scholarship to the Moscow Academy of Art.

"The Skating Rink" by Hendel Lieberman, pencil on paper, 1927. The piece won Lieberman a scholarship to the Moscow Academy of Art. - Via Zev Markowitz / Chai Art Gallery
"The Skating Rink" by Hendel Lieberman, pencil on paper, 1927. The piece won Lieberman a scholarship to the Moscow Academy of Art.
Via Zev Markowitz / Chai Art Gallery

Lieberman’s career progressed. He was even exhibited in the Soviet capital’s famed Tretyakov Gallery. Then came World War II, when the artist was drafted into the Red Army and wounded multiple times. He returned home to find that his wife and two daughters had been murdered by the Germans. With nothing left of his previous life, Lieberman headed to Samarkand in Soviet Uzbekistan, where a large number of Lubavitcher Chassidim had found refuge during the war.3 In 1946, Lieberman joined Chabad’s Great Escape from the USSR using falsified Polish identity papers. At one station along the journey, a DP camp in Austria, a trunk containing whichever of his paintings he’d manage to salvage was temporarily lost. “[W]ith that almost went my last reason for wanting to live,” Lieberman told an interviewer in 1952.4

Upon reaching Paris, Lieberman found himself confronted by the only things left of his shattered life—his art and his religion. He desperately wanted to know: Could the two be reconciled?

1. Does Art Conflict With Chassidic Life?

What was Lieberman’s dilemma? Why indeed did he feel such a conflict between being a devout Chassid and an artist?

The fact is, at that point the very idea of a Chassidic artist simply did not exist. The Second Commandment declares: “You shall not make for yourself a graven image, nor any manner of likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.”5 This prohibition is further delineated in the Oral Torah and has been codified in Jewish law over the centuries. To cite but the basics:

First and foremost, one may not create or own any form related to idolatry. Anything pertaining to three-dimensional art is thus treated particularly stringently, and so a bas relief or sculpture may not portray the four faces of the Divine chariot, angels or the complete human form (which excludes busts and the like). It is also forbidden to paint the sun, moon and stars (unless for educational purposes).6

While these restrictions are significant in their own right, the very arts of painting, and particularly sculpting, were for much of history co-opted by idolaters and placed in the service of foreign religions, becoming associated with them almost exclusively.7 As a result—even while they engaged in handicrafts, created ceremonial objects, built ornate synagogues, and decorated them—Jews did not prize art as a high form of cultural expression. Instead, the highest form of Jewish cultural expression was always the word. It was with learning and literature, rather than with easel and brush, that we made our most profound contributions to the world. We are, after all, the People of the Book.

When Jewish artists finally did begin emerging in the 19th century, it came as a result of emancipation and the economic and cultural opportunities newly available to Jews. This was no less a threat, however, than Hellenization and other forms of apostasy had been in the past. The Jew who became a painter or sculptor in Frankfurt in the 1800s or Paris in the early 1900s joined the accompanying cultural scene, and was thus in most cases not likely to remain committed to his faith. “Some even converted to Christianity, either to smooth their career paths to the new opportunities within their reach or simply to conform to the dominant society… Even the many who did not go to this extreme relaxed their ties to religion and favored a general education over a traditional Jewish one.”8

This generally remained the case until after World War II. With the secularization of society, engagement with art was no longer tied up with apostasy. But given the historic negative associations, it still felt alien to Judaism’s religious ethos. It just wasn’t something for an observant boy or girl to engage with—and was certainly not an acceptable form of serving G‑d Almighty.

Rooted, as always, in classical Jewish sources, the Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, of righteous memory, articulated a new understanding of the role of art in Judaism.

Since the era of the Baal Shem Tov, the Rebbe explained, the Chassidic movement had emphasized the importance of implementing the Divine charge to “Know [G‑d] in all your ways.”9 This means, the Rebbe wrote to a Jewish artist in 1960, “that all the daily aspects of physical life, including eating, drinking, etc., and certainly aspects connected with the emotions such as in art, etc., can and should be elevated to a higher spiritual level if carried out in accordance with Mosaic Law … .”10

Negating the assumption that the committed Jew is forbidden from creating any art, the Rebbe taught that G‑d gives every individual creativity and special talents with which to positively impact his or her surroundings. While art may have its particular sensitivities, had G‑d not wanted it utilized in His service He would have forbidden it altogether.

“An artist, male or female, has a wide variety of ways to utilize his or her talents to their fullest extent, without trespassing on the laws of the Torah, which is the Torah of life, i.e. instructions for life in this world—life that should be worthy of its name in every way,” the Rebbe wrote to a young woman in the late 1960s. “On the contrary; through the visual arts one can add enthusiasm, as well as a deeper understanding in matters of the world in general, and in particular a deeply-felt understanding of the words of Israel’s composer of sweet songs [King David], ‘How great are your works, G‑d,’ ‘How manifold are your works, G‑d.’ In this way, one develops admiration, respect, and awe towards the Creator in a wondrous way.”11

While the Jewish world had its own reasons for staying away from the creation of high art, the outside world saw in it an inherent conflict as well. If art is meant to be an honest, unencumbered expression of its creator’s innermost spirit, then how could it conform to any rules, in particular those delineated by the Torah? Wouldn’t art created by an observant Jew, and all the more so a committed Chassid, be too didactic, even propagandistic, to be considered actual art?

Indeed, in the 1970s, by which time Chassidim were actively creating and exhibiting art as a result of the Rebbe’s encouragement, society still saw it as a novelty at best. “Are these relatively drab-looking, strict people allowed to indulge in such colorful work?” the Village Voice wanted to know.12 Though a superficial question, in reality it masked a deeper argument: Wasn’t something called Chassidic art, by definition, an oxymoron?

As we shall soon see, the Rebbe rejected this argument, too. The limitations established by the Torah, he consistently explained, are in no way debilitating to the Jewish artist. In fact, they are the key to his or her success.

"Chassid with Glasses," by Hendel Lieberman, pencil on paper, 1920s. "Some of [Lieberman's] earlier sketches show a thorough understanding of cubism, while others reflect the sophistication of Bakst,” The New York Times wrote of the Chassidic artist in 1952. - Via Zev Markowitz / Chai Art Gallery
"Chassid with Glasses," by Hendel Lieberman, pencil on paper, 1920s. "Some of [Lieberman's] earlier sketches show a thorough understanding of cubism, while others reflect the sophistication of Bakst,” The New York Times wrote of the Chassidic artist in 1952.
Via Zev Markowitz / Chai Art Gallery

2. A New Light For a New Era

The Rebbe’s new perspective on art was deeply rooted in the Chassidic movement, which since its birth had been a cradle for innovative thought.

In 1736, after years of underground work among the broken and downtrodden Jews of Eastern Europe, the saintly Rabbi Yisrael Baal Shem Tov began openly propagating his new Chassidic teachings. Highlighting the importance of joy, sincerity, and oneness, the Baal Shem Tov brought a new vitality into every aspect of Jewish life. Every word of Torah, of prayer, and even of interpersonal conversation, could be filled with a pure and wholesome light. Likewise, every human activity, no matter how mundane it might seem, could now become a mystical point of connection between G‑d and creation.

As the new Chassidic movement swept through Europe, it attracted scholars and righteous men but also undistinguished people—small merchants, farmers, cobblers. “[U]ntil the coming of my [spiritual] grandfather, the Baal Shem Tov, the world was a dim and sunless house,” Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi, the founder of the Chabad-Lubavitch movement, once explained. “Though Torah scholars had ‘light in their dwellings,’ for the ordinary people (and even more so for the unlettered folk) the world was a dark house—until the Baal Shem Tov emerged and ‘began to radiate light.’”13

Previously, many thought that the only acceptable path to serving G‑d was Torah study, the purview of the lucky few. But Chassidism made spiritual greatness accessible also through prayer, story, and song.14 The misnagdim, the traditional opponents of Chassidism, were seen as imperious, staid, and joyless. The Chassidim, on the other hand, were full of imagination and life, an ecstatic brotherhood happily seeking G‑d in the spiritual and the mundane alike. Their burning, creative spirit expressed itself in everything. Centuries later, the Liozhna-born Marc Chagall, who had grown up in the Chabad Chassidic milieu that dominated White Russia, would divide artists into the categories of misnagdim and Chassidim. Stepping out of the Berlin home of the German-Jewish painter Max Liebermann in 1930, Chagall turned to his wife and said: “Liebermann and his generation were misnagdim in art. But the new art among Jews began with Chassidim.”15

That the arts are a powerful and G‑dly mode of expression is an inherently Chassidic idea. “In numerous talks, my father-in-law, [the Sixth Rebbe, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn, of righteous memory] discusses the impression and deep contemplation of his father, the Rebbe [Rabbi Sholom DovBer of Lubavitch], when he saw paintings that were the handiwork of an expert artist,” the Rebbe recounted. “To the extent that despite his every moment being precious, as is well-known, nevertheless, while he was in Paris, he spent several hours visiting the Louvre … .” Rabbi Sholom DovBer later told his son and successor Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak of the Chassidic concepts that had entered his mind as he viewed the works.16

For the Rebbe, America presented new possibilities.17 Upon arriving in New York from Nazi-occupied Europe in the summer of 1941, he immediately took the helm of Merkos L’Inyonei Chinuch, Chabad’s educational arm recently established by the Sixth Rebbe. Sometime soon thereafter, the Rebbe hired a teenage artist named Michel Schwartz to illustrate the childrens’ publications he oversaw and to design some of Chabad’s logos.18 Once, the Rebbe asked him to create a character about whom adventure stories could be written. “I [remember] vividly that the Rebbe had wanted something to ‘look like Dick Tracy,’” Schwartz wrote. “I kept hearing his words, ‘Ess zul oyszehn vee Dick Tracy.’”

“Illustration, in the Rebbe’s view, was a key factor in translating to children the visual essence of the written word,” Schwartz explained. High art, which Schwartz would go on to create as well, was just the next stage, the medium by which adults could learn a deeper truth about themselves and the world around them in a way that went beyond words.

On the 10th of Shevat 5711 (Jan. 17, 1951), the first anniversary of Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak’s passing, the Rebbe formally accepted leadership of the Chabad movement. In his very first Chassidic discourse, Basi Legani, he declared it was this generation’s mission to reveal the world to be a garden of G‑d. Every individual was tasked with harnessing his or her own unique skills and passions to make it so. “Indeed,” the Rebbe said in that first discourse, “the dwelling made for G‑d in this world through the subordination and transformation of materiality — [so that the Creator can say,] ‘I have returned to My garden’ — is superior to [that which existed] before the sin [of the ‘Tree of Knowledge’].”19

"Histalkus," by Hendel Lieberman, oil on canvas, 1950s. Lieberman painted the haunting piece in the aftermath of the 1950 passing of the Sixth Rebbe, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn, of righteous memory, who is depicted at its center. - Via Zev Markowitz / Chai Art Gallery
"Histalkus," by Hendel Lieberman, oil on canvas, 1950s. Lieberman painted the haunting piece in the aftermath of the 1950 passing of the Sixth Rebbe, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn, of righteous memory, who is depicted at its center.
Via Zev Markowitz / Chai Art Gallery

With this mission statement the Rebbe heralded a new epoch of Jewish life, and it illuminates his approach to life’s many facets. Art, which at its essence is humanity transforming the material world, exemplifies how he put this vision into practice.

“[T]hose who have been Divinely gifted in art, whether sculpture or painting and the like, have the privilege of being able to convert an inanimate thing, such as a brush, paint and canvas, or wood and stone, etc., into living form,” the Rebbe wrote in a 1967 letter to organizers of a Chassidic art exhibit held at Wayne State University, in Detroit. “In a deeper sense, it is the ability to transform to a certain extent the material into spiritual… .”20

This was nothing short of a revolution in Jewish thought and practice. It was no accident that it was in the New World that the Rebbe set it in motion. “You can’t compel [American Jews] to do anything,” he once told the novelist Herman Wouk, “but you can teach them to do everything.”21 To compel is to force, to bend, to change the nature of that which is being compelled. Teaching someone something, on the other hand, is to patiently unlock their potential and reveal their true essence. In a 1951 Yiddish letter to an anonymous depressed artist, widely known to be a response to the aforementioned Lieberman, by then living in London, the Rebbe made the same observation about art:

The primary talent of an artist is his ability to step away from the externalities of the thing and, disregarding its outer form, gaze into its innerness and perceive its essence, and to be able to convey this in his painting. Thus the object is revealed as it has never before been seen, since its inner content was obscured by secondary things. The artist exposes the essence of the thing he portrays, causing the one who looks at the painting to perceive it in another, truer light, and to realize that his prior perception was deficient.

The artist does not impose his vision on reality, but rather exposes its essence. Chassidut teaches that this is the role of every Jew, as the Rebbe goes on to explain:

And this is one of the foundations of man’s service of his Creator. … Our mission in life—based on the simple faith that “there is none else beside Him”22 —is that we should approach everything in life from this perspective. That we should each strive to reveal, as much as possible, the divine essence in every thing, and minimize, to the extent that we are able, its concealment by the externalities of creation … .23

Art is a unique gift from G‑d which, like all of His creations, must be utilized for good. Indeed, it is more than just an acceptable vocation for the artistically-gifted Chassid—it can actually be fused with the spiritual work of revealing G‑d’s essence within this physical world.

3. Blueprint for a New Genre

"A Chassidic Dance," by Zalman Kleinman, oil on canvas, 1981. Kleinman was a Soviet-born Chassidic artist who was likewise encouraged by the Rebbe to express himself through his work. - Courtesy Rosa Kleinman | Via Zev Markowitz / Chai Art Gallery
"A Chassidic Dance," by Zalman Kleinman, oil on canvas, 1981. Kleinman was a Soviet-born Chassidic artist who was likewise encouraged by the Rebbe to express himself through his work.
Courtesy Rosa Kleinman | Via Zev Markowitz / Chai Art Gallery

From the earliest days of his leadership, the Rebbe began setting the necessary pieces in place for the creation of a new genre which might be called Chassidic art.

He did this first by encouraging Jewish artists, both Chassidic and not, to hone their skills and use their talents to share a vision of Jewish life that could only be communicated through art.24 Not long after Lieberman settled in Brooklyn in 1952, he had a private audience with the Rebbe. “Each person on this earth is allotted a task,” the Rebbe told him. “You have a talent... use it. Use it to encourage Jews to return to their Judaism. True, in the old days, painting was not considered an acceptable way to achieve this aim. Today it is. It is your way.”25

Zalman Kleinman was another Chassidic artist whom the Rebbe took under his wing. Born in Leningrad, USSR, in 1933, Kleinman, like his older colleague, had always been attracted to art—drawing, painting, even paint itself. As a six-year-old, Kleinman recalled, he watched with fascination as the superintendent slathered the front entrance way of his apartment building with red paint in preparation for May Day.26

Kleinman’s parents, Polish Jews who became Lubavitcher Chassidim when Communism rendered it the only surviving religious community in the USSR, perished in the Nazi’s siege of Leningrad. Zalman and his two sisters were adopted by Rabbi Nachum Shmaryahu and Malka Sossonkin in Samarkand, where he studied Torah at the underground Chabad yeshivah.27 Like Lieberman, Kleinman left the Soviet Union during the Great Escape, resuming his yeshivah studies in Paris and then Israel. Throughout this long journey, Kleinman kept drawing.

Charged with caring for the young orphan, Sossonkin wrote to the Rebbe in the early ’50s to share his concerns about the boy’s preoccupation with art. The Rebbe responded that Kleinman should be evaluated, and if found to possess true talent, allowed to pursue it.28 Kleinman served as an illustrator in the Israeli army and by 1956 was back in Kfar Chabad and being referred to in the press as the Chassidic village’s in-house artist.29 Israel’s future president Zalman Shazar was particularly taken by Kleinman at work in his little studio.30 After Chagall visited the village the next year, the Rebbe wrote to inquire whether the great artist had visited Kleinman on his tour, stating that if such a meeting had not yet occurred then it should.31

A few months later the Rebbe wrote directly to Kleinman, telling him he’d seen his illustrations in an Israeli periodical and was impressed. In the letter the Rebbe advised Kleinman to paint scenes of Kfar Chabad, not only in its contemporary form, but as it looked when Chassidim first arrived there. “The main point … is that the illustrations appear in their simplicity, as they actually are,” he wrote. “You should not be swayed by anyone saying that a photograph would be suitable for this purpose and an illustration unnecessary, for the difference is clearly apparent between a photograph and an illustration drawn by an artist, even one drawn realistically.” As will be explored later, this does not mean the Rebbe believed Realism to always be the most appropriate style, but apparently he felt it was the best fit for Kleinman.

In a point he would make to other artists over the years, the Rebbe also encouraged Kleinman to paint living, breathing people, in this case the Chassidic survivors of Stalinism joyfully going about their lives building the village of Kfar Chabad in the Land of Israel. “It is superfluous to add that I do not mean only the houses and the like, but also—and primarily—illustrations of the life of the Kfar, from the most sublime spiritual life down to the most mundane material life.”32

Kleinman headed to Paris to study art in the late 1950s, where he met and married his wife. Shortly thereafter he moved to New York, eventually finding work as an illustrator and making a name for himself as an artist. During this same period the Rebbe urged both Lieberman and Kleinman to exhibit their work in public. Lieberman, who was exhibited in prestigious galleries such as Manhattan’s House of Duveen, often mentioned that he would never have done so without the Rebbe’s active encouragement and blessings.33

Rabbi Yehuda Krinsky reads the Rebbe's letter at the opening of the Chassidic Art Exhibition at Wayne State University in Detroit in 1967. The sculptor Jacques Lipchitz (not seen) opened the event. Hendel Lieberman can be seen second from the right. - Rabbi Yehuda Krinsky
Rabbi Yehuda Krinsky reads the Rebbe's letter at the opening of the Chassidic Art Exhibition at Wayne State University in Detroit in 1967. The sculptor Jacques Lipchitz (not seen) opened the event. Hendel Lieberman can be seen second from the right.
Rabbi Yehuda Krinsky

A milestone came in 1967, when Lubavitch of Michigan held a Chassidic art exhibit at Wayne State University featuring the works of Kleinman and Lieberman, to which the Rebbe sent the above-mentioned letter. The exhibit was opened by the world-renowned Jewish sculptor Jacques Lipchitz, who traveled specially to Detroit with his wife for the occasion.34 A member of the Rebbe’s secretariat, Rabbi Yehuda Krinsky, likewise flew there with his wife to attend. All of this took place at the Rebbe’s behest and with his explicit blessing.35

Similar Chassidic art exhibits followed in Philadelphia and Los Angeles, leading eventually to the landmark 1977 exhibit of Chassidic art at the Brooklyn Museum. Featuring works by Kleinman and Lieberman, as well as Raphael Eisenberg, Yaakov Moshe Schlass, and Michoel Muchnik, “Chassidic Artists in Brooklyn” ran for six weeks and drew 10,000 visitors. Later that year, the Chassidic Art Institute, or CHAI, opened its doors in Brooklyn’s Crown Heights neighborhood.36 Today, CHAI, the first Chassidic art gallery in history, cultivates Chassidic artists while exhibiting and distributing classics of the genre. The Rebbe personally contributed funds towards the institution’s founding, expressing his support in many other ways as well.37

“The artists we worked with got feedback and encouragement from the Rebbe,” said Zev Markowitz, who has directed CHAI since its founding. “He was always very interested, very involved in the artists’ work; I saw this was very important to him.”38

Chassidic art was not to remain the purview of a select few. The Rebbe also encouraged seasoned religious artists to teach art in an appropriate setting within the community. Lieberman did so for decades at the YM-YWHA in Brooklyn’s Williamsburg neighborhood. After CHAI’s opening, Kleinman likewise taught oil painting there.39 As a rule, the Rebbe dissuaded young Jews from attending secular universities, but particularly disapproved of the libertine atmosphere in secular art schools. “A school of art does more than teach art,” the Rebbe explained to a young woman who desired to attend such a program, “it has a unique atmosphere, a distinctive environment for students and teachers which is not agreeable with the spirit of Judaism.”40 He noted that though Lieberman and Kleinman had studied in such places, in their time they had no choice. “Now this should not be the case,” the Rebbe commented.41

The Chassidic Art Exhibition featured the works of Hendel Lieberman and Zalman Kleinman and was opened by Jacques Lipchitz. It was held in support of Jewish educational institutions in Michigan and Israel. - The Detroit Jewish News
The Chassidic Art Exhibition featured the works of Hendel Lieberman and Zalman Kleinman and was opened by Jacques Lipchitz. It was held in support of Jewish educational institutions in Michigan and Israel.
The Detroit Jewish News

Just a few years later, the Rebbe asked the Israeli artist Yossi Rosenstein to establish “kosher” art schools in Israel. “Many people have this gift,” Rosenstein recalled the Rebbe telling him, “and you have an obligation to help them develop it in the right direction.”42

Besides encouraging Chassidic artists, creating an infrastructure for their success, including contexts for exhibiting their work, the Rebbe apparently played a part in utilizing the press to promote Chassidic artists, enabling them to share their unique message. This can be seen in particular with Lieberman, the first to synthesize the two worlds of Chassidism and art.

For example, in 1954 Gershon Kranzler published a review of Lieberman’s work titled ‘Art of the Soul,’ writing that the artist “tried to recapture and record the beauty of the poor, yet happy Jewish community of the Shtetl.” Kranzler was a German-born sociologist, educator, journalist and author who arrived in New York after the Holocaust and formed a close connection with the Rebbe and Chabad, publishing more than a dozen books through Chabad’s Kehot Publication Society and Merkos Publications over a period of some four decades. As a Chassidic artist, Kranzler noted, “[Lieberman] is not satisfied with recording something that is irrevocably lost, like the anthropologist who preserves the primitive or quaint culture of a lost tribe. On the contrary, what he is after is the ‘Nitzchiyut,’ the eternal aspect of life in the Shtetl that transcends the locale of time and space.” Kranzler’s assessment of Liberman’s work clearly articulates the Rebbe’s insistence that we not simply cry about the lost past but draw inspiration from it to act in the present and the future.43

Jacques Lipchitz in his studio at Hastings-on-Hudson, N.Y., 1961. - Archives of American Art
Jacques Lipchitz in his studio at Hastings-on-Hudson, N.Y., 1961.
Archives of American Art

Amazingly, though he was virtually unknown and penniless, Lieberman was already profiled just six days after arriving in the US.44 Another interview was published in the Forverts a month later. It describes the bearded artist being brought to the paper’s office on the Lower East Side, together with his art, by the Yiddish essayist and critic Chaim Lieberman (no relation). The latter was not a Chassid, but also no stranger at 770 Eastern Parkway, and may very well have been asked to facilitate the interview.45

"What is Done in Parotzok?" by Zalman Kleinman, acrylic on canvas, 1991. In a 1957 letter the Rebbe advised Kleinman to paint scenes of Kfar Chabad, not only in its contemporary form, but as it looked when Chassidim first arrived there. The painting's name draws from a Chassidic song, the chorus of which Kleinman incorporated as graffiti in the upper left corner. - Courtesy Rosa Kleinman | Via Zev Markowitz / Chai Art Gallery
"What is Done in Parotzok?" by Zalman Kleinman, acrylic on canvas, 1991. In a 1957 letter the Rebbe advised Kleinman to paint scenes of Kfar Chabad, not only in its contemporary form, but as it looked when Chassidim first arrived there. The painting's name draws from a Chassidic song, the chorus of which Kleinman incorporated as graffiti in the upper left corner.
Courtesy Rosa Kleinman | Via Zev Markowitz / Chai Art Gallery

And wherever Hendel Lieberman went, he articulated a unique vision for Chassidic art, a new movement for which he was at the time the only existing spokesman. “According to the Chassidic tradition, each individual contains a hidden spark which yearns to come to the surface,” he told the Forverts. “This G‑dly spark finds its tikkun [rectification] when the individual harnesses his superficial skills to praise G‑d and the world He created.”46

The Forverts profile published on Feb. 6, 1952, the Jewish date being the 10th day of Shevat.47 It was the second anniversary of the Rebbe’s ascension to leadership of the Chabad movement, and exactly one year since he’d delivered his first discourse, Basi LeGani. Whether this was a coincidence or not, it is clear that the Rebbe envisioned a unique new genre called Chassidic art, and Lieberman was the first of many artists who would make it a reality.48

A full-page spread of Hendel Lieberman's work in the Sunday, March 9, 1952, arts section of The Forvertz. Hendel Lieberman received a remarkable amount of press coverage from nearly his first day on American soil.
A full-page spread of Hendel Lieberman's work in the Sunday, March 9, 1952, arts section of The Forvertz. Hendel Lieberman received a remarkable amount of press coverage from nearly his first day on American soil.

But what exactly is Chassidic art, and what are its parameters? While some might limit it to Chassidic men and women depicting classic scenes of the shtetl or Jewish life, the Rebbe had a much broader idea of what Chassidic art could mean. Over the course of the coming decades, he would articulate a new theory of Jewish art, grounded in classical Jewish sources and vivified by Chassidism’s revolutionary philosophy.

With the Rebbe’s neverending encouragement, what had once been an unresolvable conflict for someone like Lieberman became almost obvious. “Why shouldn’t a religious Jew paint?” Lieberman exclaimed in a 1976 interview. “He sees things, hears things, understands things. Shouldn’t he tell the world about them?”49

4. Communicating for the Other

"From Khaslavitch to Lubavitch" by Zalman Kleinman, oil on canvas, 1983. The large-scale work, which sold in 2022 for $600,000, has become an icon of Chassidic art. - Courtesy Rosa Kleinman | Via Zev Markowitz / Chai Art Gallery
"From Khaslavitch to Lubavitch" by Zalman Kleinman, oil on canvas, 1983. The large-scale work, which sold in 2022 for $600,000, has become an icon of Chassidic art.
Courtesy Rosa Kleinman | Via Zev Markowitz / Chai Art Gallery

As an artist guided by the Rebbe, Zalman Kleinman understood deeply that the concept of art for art’s sake is anathema to the Chassidic way of life. “They are all very pretty, Op Art, Pop Art, Non-Art, but what does it say? And who cares?” Kleinman told an interviewer in 1977, as he skimmed through an album of contemporary art. “These things do not remain; they are too accidental, too raw.”

The Chassidic artist is different: “G‑d gave me this talent, so I paint,” Kleinman continued. “But to paint is to communicate, to inspire others with feelings that you yourself feel. A painting is just a piece of canvas or wood with paint applied to its surface. It’s nothing mystical; yet when you look at it, it opens an internal world. Through brush stroke and color, a portrayal of life appears.”50

Lieberman likewise explained that his work was animated by the desire to share and communicate Jewish meaning. “See, this is Pleshinitz, what is most important from it …,” he explained as he pointed to a study depicting a wedding, bris, shofar blowing and a seder. “This is what it meant to be a Jew then, to share in these events. I want the people to know, to understand, and even to experience that kind of Judaism.”51

The need—the responsibility—to communicate something higher is essential to the Rebbe’s viewpoint and can be regarded as the soul of Chassidic art. Just as the artist has been moved to action, so too must the viewer. “Indeed,” the Rebbe wrote in the letter to the Chassidic art exhibit in Detroit, “this is the ultimate purpose of the Exhibition, which hopefully will impress and inspire the viewers with higher emotions and concepts of Yiddishkeit imbued with the spirit of Chassidut, and make them, too, vehicles of disseminating Yiddishkeit in their environment … .”52

“As an artist, it was Lieberman who defined it,” Markowitz told me. “Number one, each artist must have the ability to see the world in his own way. Number two, he needs to have a feeling for it. Last, he must have an understanding of what he is doing. Many people try to make a copy of a Jewish ceremony or holiday or whatever, but if you yourself don’t have these things, I don’t think you can really connect people to your art.”

"Shabbos Afternoon in Shul" by Zalman Kleinman, acrylic on canvas, 1981. “When I paint someone in prayer, I pray with them. It is my prayer,” Kleinman told an interviewer in the late 1970s. “Anyone who has experienced prayer knows this. They immediately see it and respond. Then the art has succeeded.” - Courtesy Rosa Kleinman | Via Zev Markowitz / Chai Art Gallery
"Shabbos Afternoon in Shul" by Zalman Kleinman, acrylic on canvas, 1981. “When I paint someone in prayer, I pray with them. It is my prayer,” Kleinman told an interviewer in the late 1970s. “Anyone who has experienced prayer knows this. They immediately see it and respond. Then the art has succeeded.”
Courtesy Rosa Kleinman | Via Zev Markowitz / Chai Art Gallery

In his 45 years of promoting Chassidic art, Markowitz often saw how honestly executed art could in fact change its viewer. “You could introduce someone who is not observant at all, sell them a Jewish subject and one day something will click in their head,” he said. “A Jewish painting, it could change them. It might take time but one day they become different people.”

But communicating clearly with the viewer does not mean that Realism is Chassidic art’s style of choice. Though Lieberman is known particularly for his colorful, purposefully naive Realism, he skillfully explored a wide range of styles, including Cubism and Abstract Expressionism. Taking inspiration directly from his palette, in 1966 he made a painting consisting of an abstract swirl of colors. As he did with much of his work, when it was done he presented the unnamed piece to the Rebbe. Rejecting the “Untitled” that might have otherwise been printed on an accompanying note card, the Rebbe instead named it “Creation: Past and Future.” The implication here is clear: The Rebbe wanted Lieberman to orient the viewer in some way, give him a framework within which to understand the artist’s vision and in this way allow for the possibility of being moved. Of Lieberman’s many works, “Creation” was reportedly one of the Rebbe’s favorites.53

Obviously, if communicating from the deepest part of the soul means painting traditional scenes for Lieberman and Kleinman, that does not mean this is everyone’s path. What is essential, however, is for the artist to share his or her personal, vibrant, authentically Jewish vision of reality in a way that the viewer can understand.

"Creation: Past and Future" by Hendel Lieberman, oil on canvas, 1966. When Lieberman showed the then-untitled abstract piece, the Rebbe gave it a name, another example of his emphasis on the importance of artists communicating with their viewers in a way that they can understand. - Zev Markowitz / Chai Art Gallery
"Creation: Past and Future" by Hendel Lieberman, oil on canvas, 1966. When Lieberman showed the then-untitled abstract piece, the Rebbe gave it a name, another example of his emphasis on the importance of artists communicating with their viewers in a way that they can understand.
Zev Markowitz / Chai Art Gallery

Against this background, the Rebbe’s framing of his own appreciation for the art under consideration takes on additional meaning. “[T]hank you for the wonderful album,” the Rebbe wrote to the experimental painter and sculptor Yaacov Agam in 1977, after the latter sent him a 500 page album of his work.54 “[E]ven though it’s completely outside my field, the overall impression is striking even to someone who is not an art expert. But surely, your work is aimed not only at experts.”55 This is not the only time the Rebbe refers to his being a non-expert in art. Importantly, this emphasizes his vision for art as a medium not only of elitist self-expression, but of transcendent communication with a wide and varied audience.56

This was a vision shared by Agam, who saw his abstract, kinetic works, as an attempt to communicate the Oneness of G‑d. “Art is a mirror of reality,” he wrote, and thus man had for millenia used it to try capturing his image of the Divine, the ultimate reality. Jews, as we have seen, opposed this application of art in the strongest terms.57 For Agam, this is intrinsically related to Judaism’s unique concept of G‑d: “The special significance of Judaism is the unity of G‑d and its conception that all the world is Him. The Jewish art form, then, must be special for it must reflect the Hebraic conception of reality. Little wonder that the Second Commandment … thus negates any artistic visual expression which is opposed to the view of life that is Judaism.” His own works, Agam explains, which cannot be seen in their totality and unfold in stages before the viewer, are an attempt to capture this most central of all Jewish ideas. “In this sense, my works are reality, not abstraction, for to the observer is revealed a world that is ‘One, yet unique in unity.’”58

A previously unpublished image of the experimental painter and sculptor Yaacov Agam's 1977 inscription to the Rebbe. “Shadow, at first glance, appears to be the result of something that conceals light and its source,” the Rebbe wrote to him (Igrot Kodesh vol. 32, pp. 233-5.) “However, according to our Torah … which states that ‘everything the Creator made in His world, He made for His glory,’ this includes shadow. This means that if one places the shadow in its appropriate form and in its appropriate place, then it too becomes a source of positive influence, just like light.” - Library of Agudas Chasidei Chabad
A previously unpublished image of the experimental painter and sculptor Yaacov Agam's 1977 inscription to the Rebbe. “Shadow, at first glance, appears to be the result of something that conceals light and its source,” the Rebbe wrote to him (Igrot Kodesh vol. 32, pp. 233-5.) “However, according to our Torah … which states that ‘everything the Creator made in His world, He made for His glory,’ this includes shadow. This means that if one places the shadow in its appropriate form and in its appropriate place, then it too becomes a source of positive influence, just like light.”
Library of Agudas Chasidei Chabad

Agam—who, it should be noted, designed Chabad’s famous Fifth Avenue Menorah—presented the album to the Rebbe in honor of the latter’s 75th birthday. In its front cover he inscribed a colorful dedication to the Rebbe, an original artwork in its own right. In yellow marker he writes, in Hebrew: “To Rabbi Schneerson/On the occasion of his birthday/With faithful blessings.” In blue marker, representing the shadow of these letters of “light,” Agam adds, line by line: “To the esteemed leader of the generation/And light unto Israel who blesses/His faithful with hope and prayer/With great respect.”

In his response, the Rebbe draws a lesson from the interplay of light and shadow which Agam deploys in his heartfelt inscription, the shadow of which contains the far deeper message. “Shadow, at first glance, appears to be the result of something that conceals light and its source,” the Rebbe explains. “However, according to our Torah … which states that ‘everything the Creator made in His world, He made for His glory,’ this includes shadow. This means that if one places the shadow in its appropriate form and in its appropriate place, then it too becomes a source of positive influence, just like light.”59

In this there is a concrete lesson, the Rebbe continues: “That even in days of ‘shadow,’ days that are ‘gray,’ in our physical and material world, where at first glance the shadows outnumber the lights and matter prevails over spirit, etc., a person is still required to fulfill their mission in this world according to the statement of our Sages, that even shadow should be for the honor of the Creator. On the contrary, the advantage of light over darkness then becomes apparent, meaning that through, and by, and in combination with darkness … it is within man’s capacity to ‘turn darkness into light.’”

5. Tikkun: The Art of Correction

"Geulah" or "Light and Joy" by Baruch Nachshon, oil on canvas, 1983. The first time they met the Rebbe told Nachshon he would "repair" the world of art. This painting was gifted by Nachshon to the Rebbe and can be found in the Library of Agudas Chasidei Chabad. - Library of Agudas Chasidei Chabad
"Geulah" or "Light and Joy" by Baruch Nachshon, oil on canvas, 1983. The first time they met the Rebbe told Nachshon he would "repair" the world of art. This painting was gifted by Nachshon to the Rebbe and can be found in the Library of Agudas Chasidei Chabad.
Library of Agudas Chasidei Chabad

To see the world through the eyes of a Chassidic artist is not simply to be exposed to a deeper perspective on reality. It is also to participate in a powerful mystical correction. In a 1953 letter, the Rebbe wrote of an ecstatic dimension referred to by the Kabbalists as Chaya, which “was much in evidence with our prophets old.” Today, he wrote, it finds expression in those who have “attained close communion with G‑d,” or dveikut. "Something of this nature,” he added, “is experienced by an artist in expressing his art.”60

It is precisely because of its ecstatic power that art has for all of history so tantalized humanity. Recognizing its unparalleled power to breathe life into the inanimate, people have often harnessed it for their own ends, or worse, for idolatrous ones. Could there be anything worse than the denial of G‑d in His own world?

The Rebbe believed this immense wellspring of creative energy could no longer be left for the forces of egotism and unholiness. Since the revelation at Mount Sinai, Jews had been tasked with elevating the material into the spiritual via physical mitzvot. If used correctly, art could serve as a representation, even a fulfillment, of this phenomenon.

The Rebbe’s most direct call for the “correction” of art was issued not to a typical Chassid but to a native Sabra named Baruch Nachshon. Born and raised in a Religious Zionist family in Haifa, Nachshon became attracted to Chabad as a student, when he happened into a farbrengen and was captured by the niggun sung by the crowd. Rather than a Chassid drawn to art, Nachshon was an artist drawn to Chassidut. After years of correspondence, Nachshon met the Rebbe for the first time in 1964, sharing with him his life story and internal struggles. “Many generations have passed and the faculty of painting has not been corrected,” the Rebbe told him, using the Hebrew word tikkun for “correct.” “You shall set it right.” The Rebbe then assisted Nachshon with finding a suitable art school in New York, and provided him and his family with a monthly stipend for the next two years.61

During that first audience, Nachshon asked what “kosher” meant in this context. “The Rebbe directed me to consult with a rabbi,” he recalled. Nachshon then sat with Rabbi Zalman Shimon Dvorkin, the rav of Crown Heights, and Rabbi Yosef Eliyahu Henkin of Ezras Torah, who carefully went over with him what is and isn’t allowed according to Halacha.

These Halachic guidelines applied to the type of art he could and couldn’t engage in, but also to the classes he would be taking. While searching for a suitable place to study, Nachshon was introduced to the sculptor Chaim Gross, who offered Nachshon a scholarship for a course he taught. When Nachshon discovered that some of the classes would for reasons of modesty not be in line with Jewish law, he backed out. “Young man,” Gross told him, “the Lubavitcher Rebbe knows Halacha, but Chaim Gross knows art.” In the end, Nachshon found a suitable course of study at the School of Visual Arts.62 When Nachshon again met Gross some years later, the sculptor told him he’d been right. “Because you took your inspiration from Heaven, you are not bound by the conventions of professors,” Gross told him. “You are a free man!”63

In the winter of 1978, a financially-struggling Nachshon returned to New York from Israel for the first time since he’d studied there. He planned to see the Rebbe and hoped to perhaps sell some of his work. When he asked to show the Rebbe a piece or two of his, the Rebbe suggested instead that he put on a full exhibition and that he would himself attend the opening. Exhibit space for Nachshon was quickly found in the offices of Lubavitch World Headquarters at 788 Eastern Parkway, adjacent to the Rebbe’s synagogue in 770. The Rebbe then spent 45 minutes with Nachshon looking at his paintings and commenting on them—an altogether unprecedented event. Nachshon’s Kabbalah-infused works, abounding with fantastical spiritual symbolism, don’t fit the stereotypical mold of Chassidic art, embodying an expansive new stage in the creation of the genre.

In winter of 1978 Baruch Nachshon asked the Rebbe if he could show him a few of his pieces. The Rebbe instead suggested that he put on a full exhibit and he would come to the opening. Space was found at Lubavitch World Headquarters and on 6 Kislev, 5739 (Dec. 6, 1978), the Rebbe spent 45 minutes with Nachshon looking and commenting on his art. - Nachshon Art
In winter of 1978 Baruch Nachshon asked the Rebbe if he could show him a few of his pieces. The Rebbe instead suggested that he put on a full exhibit and he would come to the opening. Space was found at Lubavitch World Headquarters and on 6 Kislev, 5739 (Dec. 6, 1978), the Rebbe spent 45 minutes with Nachshon looking and commenting on his art.

Just as the Rebbe set communication as a foundational element in the work of Lieberman and Kleinman, so it was for Nachshon, a Surrealist whose mystical symbolism can be difficult to understand. Among the Rebbe’s first questions to the artist at the exhibition was why there were no cards explaining each painting. Towards the end of the Rebbe’s visit, he also told Nachshon to put up price tags so that people could actually buy the art, and make lithographs and copies available for sale as well. “It would be particularly good to have an explanation on the back describing the picture,” the Rebbe told him, “even better if there could be a practical application in tangible mitzvos. By the pictures of tefillin, tzitzis, Shabbos candles, and so on, an explanation of the painting and the mitzvah that is connected to it.”

Before they parted, the Rebbe told Nachshon that though his works successfully presented metaphysical realities experienced by the Jewish soul, a Jew has a body as well, and the artist should not lose sight of the physical, material reality of this world. Nachshon had been inspired by Chassidut’s lofty ideas. He later explained that until that point he’d been trying to capture his own feelings of yearning for the Ein Sof—a Kabbalistic term for the infinite dimension of G‑dliness, which ultimately precedes and exceeds all cosmic reality. He took the Rebbe’s words to mean he should bring that quest back down into this world.64

"Purim" by Baruch Nachshon, oil on canvas, 1971. Just as the Rebbe set communication as a foundational element in the work of Lieberman and Kleinman, so it was for Nachshon, a Surrealist whose mystical symbolism can be difficult to understand. - Nachshon Art
"Purim" by Baruch Nachshon, oil on canvas, 1971. Just as the Rebbe set communication as a foundational element in the work of Lieberman and Kleinman, so it was for Nachshon, a Surrealist whose mystical symbolism can be difficult to understand.

Additional dimensions of the Rebbe’s perspective are revealed in his relationship with the sculptor Jacques Lipchitz, who, you might recall, the Rebbe had sent to the opening of the Chassidic Art Exhibition in Detroit. Born Chaim Yaakov Lipchitz in a Lithuanian town in the Russian Empire and trained in Paris, where Picasso and Modigliani were among his friends and colleagues (in 1916 the latter painted a picture of him and his then-wife), he came to New York before the war. In 1958 Lipchitz suffered a life-threatening medical episode and his wife, Yulla, rushed to the Rebbe for a blessing. When Lipchitz miraculously recovered, he came to the Rebbe to thank him in person. Over the next decades, the sculptor frequently visited the Rebbe, and the two carried on an extensive and instructive correspondence. There is hardly an interview in which Lipchitz does not mention his meeting with the Rebbe and subsequent relationship with him as a turning point in his life.65

Like the Rebbe’s other artists, Lipchitz—whose works can be found everywhere from the Metropolitan to the Tate—could not escape the expectation, as the Rebbe wrote to him in 1963, “that you use your gifts to the credit of our Jewish people, and of our Jewish values in particular.” Here too, communication emerges as a crucial element. “There are many ways in which a Jew can serve G‑d, and one must serve Him in all, in accordance with the principle ‘Know Him, and make Him known, in all your ways,’” the Rebbe wrote to him. “You have a unique privilege of doing so through your own medium, which to certain circles is the only medium of learning something about Jews and Judaism.”66

While the Rebbe gave Nachshon detailed feedback on his work—for example, asking him to correct the way he had portrayed the cherubs on the Holy Ark, whose wings he had depicted in accordance with Christian iconography and not according to the words of the Torah67—his comments to Lipchitz were much more general in scope. “[T]he crucial point is that of approach and attitude,” the Rebbe explained to him. “If there is a recognition that such a talent is a gift from G‑d, Who, together with this gift, has given the instructions, then surely the proper medium of expression will be found that is consonant with the Torah, and is therefore good, both for the artist as well as for humanity at large.”68

This could express itself in radical ways. In 1959 the German-born, American-Jewish sculptress Erna Weill visited the Rebbe, together with her husband, during what appears to have been a period of great change in her life. The main subject of their discussion was Weill’s quest to sculpt the Baal Shem Tov. In a January 1960 follow-up letter which he also sent Lipchitz, the Rebbe takes “the liberty of making the following observations.”

"Chanukiah" by Erna Weill. Weill (1904-1996) was an American German-Jewish sculptress who first met the Rebbe in 1959 and frequently corresponded with him over the next three-plus decades. Among the many works she gifted the Rebbe is this menorah. "I deeply appreciate the anniversary gift, the Menorah that you sculpted," the Rebbe wrote to Weill in 1970. "It is impressive in its ancient-looking form and is, of course, highly symbolic." - Library of Agudas Chasidei Chabad
"Chanukiah" by Erna Weill. Weill (1904-1996) was an American German-Jewish sculptress who first met the Rebbe in 1959 and frequently corresponded with him over the next three-plus decades. Among the many works she gifted the Rebbe is this menorah. "I deeply appreciate the anniversary gift, the Menorah that you sculpted," the Rebbe wrote to Weill in 1970. "It is impressive in its ancient-looking form and is, of course, highly symbolic."
Library of Agudas Chasidei Chabad

“To be sure, an artist has the prerogative of certain so-called artistic license, and may use his imagination in a work of art representing a person according to his mind, especially where no authentic likeness exists, as in the case of the Baal-Shem-Tov … ,” the Rebbe wrote to her. “However, I safely assume that in your sculpture you wished to represent in a symbolic way the ideological person, namely, the founder of the Chassidic movement. Hence … it should be borne in mind that the soul of Chassidism is ecstasy and inspiration, and the ability to see even in simple material objects the Divine ‘Spark’ and the Divine ‘Light’ which is their true reality. Such ideas would be reflected, as might well be imagined, in rather refined facial features, which express a longing for the sublime together with profound inner spiritual strength, coupled with serenity and gentleness. Thus, one would imagine the Baal-Shem-Tov to be of a patriarchal type, with a flowing beard and, perhaps disheveled locks of the head, crowning highly refined facial features, etc.”69

That a Chassidic rebbe would tell a Jewish artist how to paint anything, let alone how to depict the Baal Shem Tov, let alone a sculptress seeking to put his image in three-dimensional form, is nothing short of revolutionary. At the same time, the “tikkun” of art that the Rebbe wanted artists to accomplish was not something that could be accomplished through the liberalization or reinterpretation of Halacha.

“I emphasize this point,” he wrote to her in a second letter, “because the subject under discussion is an art which is connected with the basic prohibition of idolatry, and which, on the other hand, if utilized in a way which accords with the Torah, could have a strong impact on the emotional world of the sensitive beholder and inspire him. At the same time, it is a well-known principle of our Living Torah, that the end does not justify the means … .” The Rebbe concludes by explaining that in his experience, when individuals resolve “to be guided by the Torah, they found their road much easier than anticipated and it has brought them more peace and harmony than they thought possible.”70

In a lengthy exchange that stretched a little more than two years, the Rebbe tried to dissuade Lipchitz in the strongest terms from donating some of his sculptures to what became the Israel Museum’s Billy Rose Art Garden in Jerusalem.71 Elements like history, aesthetics, and taste, the Rebbe taught, do not stand in contrast to the Torah, but are part and parcel of its infinite wisdom. Accordingly, a consistent thread in the Rebbe’s argument to Lipchitz is that a sculpture garden in Jerusalem is wrong from the artistic point of view.

Jacques Lipcitz sent Encounters by Irene Patai to the Rebbe in 1962. "For our beloved Rebbe, with admiration and respect, Chaim Yaakov Lipzhitz," he inscribed. "I was particularly interested to note in it the photographs of your parents," the Rebbe in his response. - Library of Agudas Chasidei Chabad
Jacques Lipcitz sent Encounters by Irene Patai to the Rebbe in 1962. "For our beloved Rebbe, with admiration and respect, Chaim Yaakov Lipzhitz," he inscribed. "I was particularly interested to note in it the photographs of your parents," the Rebbe in his response.
Library of Agudas Chasidei Chabad

“A ‘Sculpture Park’ in Jerusalem is quite incongruous with the character of the Holy City, which has a tradition of holiness, not only for Jews but also for gentiles, for a period of the past 4000 years,” the Rebbe wrote to Lipchitz in the late spring of 1960. “It has always been the symbol of monotheism, free from graven images in any shape or form. You surely know … how much blood was shed by the Jews for the preservation of this sacred status of the city when the Romans tried to make it Aelia Capitolina. Thus, even from the point of view of esthetics and art, a public display of this kind would not only be in bad taste, but a real dissonance.”72

In essence, the Rebbe argues that Lipchitz of all people ought to understand that every piece of art must be placed in its proper context. Jerusalem, according to art’s own logic, is the absolute wrong place for a sculpture garden.73 The Rebbe did not want Lipchitz to participate in the Jerusalem art garden project because it contradicted who he was as a man and as an artist, both aspects being included within his true identity as a Jew. The Jewish artist falters when he is detached from his true self, and succeeds when he is firmly rooted in who he really is, living and working to the best of his abilities as a Jew.74

“I hope,” the Rebbe wrote to Lipchitz towards the end of their sculpture garden exchange, “that you will reconsider your position in the light of the above, and may G‑d grant you many happy and healthy years to serve the cause of traditional Judaism by using your Divinely given gifts to strengthen the eternal values of our people, in full harmony with the Torah, along the lines which we had occasion to discuss.”75

No art adorned the Rebbe’s spartan, wood-paneled office at 770. Yet, on a shelf in the small apartment adjacent to the synagogue where the Rebbe and his wife, Rebbetzin Chaya Mushka, stayed on Shabbat and Jewish holidays, stood one significant piece: a bronze cast of one of Jacques Lipchitz’s works, a gift from a Jewish expressionist sculptor to his Rebbe.76

6. Closing the Circle

Lipchitz, an abstract sculptor, gifted the Rebbe a number of bronze reproductions of his work. This one, perhaps a study for "Our Tree of Life," is seen sitting on a shelf in the small apartment adjacent to the synagogue where the Rebbe and his wife, Rebbetzin Chaya Mushka, stayed on Shabbat and Jewish holidays, circa 1986. - Shamshon Junik
Lipchitz, an abstract sculptor, gifted the Rebbe a number of bronze reproductions of his work. This one, perhaps a study for "Our Tree of Life," is seen sitting on a shelf in the small apartment adjacent to the synagogue where the Rebbe and his wife, Rebbetzin Chaya Mushka, stayed on Shabbat and Jewish holidays, circa 1986.
Shamshon Junik

During Jacques Lipchitz’s first meeting with the Rebbe, which stretched for hours, the Rebbe asked the sculptor to begin donning tefillin every day.77 Deeply moved by the encounter, Lipchitz sent the Rebbe a note along with a book about his work and a reproduction of his sculpture, “The Miracle.”

“Noting your address in your letter, it enables me to fulfill my promise to send you the Tefillin,” the Rebbe responded, “which I trust you will use every weekday in good health for many years to come.” Referencing their recent conversation, the Rebbe goes on to reiterate tefillin’s particular significance as what he calls “an all-embracive mitzvah,” with its two parts—one placed on the arm and the other on the head—tying together the emotions and intellect, i.e. the whole man, in “submission to the Supreme Authority, the Creator and Master of the Universe … .”

By man “fulfilling the Divine Will and shaping his life accordingly,” the Rebbe continues, “he transcends the gap between Creator and created and unites with Him, elevating, at the same time, his part of the physical world in which he lives. This, in fact, is the deeper meaning of all the Divine precepts, and the awareness of this enables man to strive constantly for the supremacy of mind over matter and ‘spiritualize’ gross matter. The sculptor and his art offers a ready parallel. For he, even more than the artist who paints, takes a shapeless piece of gross matter, whether stone, wood, or metal, and gives it form and idea which belong entirely in the realm of the spiritual, thus breathing a spirit and vitality into something which was no more than a lump of matter before. The Jew’s creativeness is on similar lines… .”78

Jacques Lipchitz at work at his home and studio in Pieve di Camaiore, Italy, 1967. His Tuscan villa was later donated to Chabad-Lubavitch of Italy and is today home to Camp Gan Israel. - Archives of American Art Smithsonian
Jacques Lipchitz at work at his home and studio in Pieve di Camaiore, Italy, 1967. His Tuscan villa was later donated to Chabad-Lubavitch of Italy and is today home to Camp Gan Israel.
Archives of American Art Smithsonian

Using G‑d’s blueprint and blessing, we sculpt the tefillin, and the inanimate cowhide becomes the physical articulation of G‑d’s will—a mitzvah. The tefillin, in turn, sculpts us—uplifting our daily routine, binding our hearts and minds in the service of the Almighty, and bringing more mitzvahs in its wake. Our lives are as a result transformed, as are the lives of those around us. The artist does this, too, his art reaching its apex when it moves its viewer to do a physical mitzvah, for example put on tefillin, and thus “transform matter into something sublime and holy” in its truest sense.79

On the left, a print by Jacques Lipchitz of the sacrifice of Jacob, gifted by him to the Rebbe on Shushan Purim, 1968. On the right, a print of "Our Tree of Life" that he likewise gifted and inscribed to the Rebbe. - Library of Agudas Chasidei Chabad
On the left, a print by Jacques Lipchitz of the sacrifice of Jacob, gifted by him to the Rebbe on Shushan Purim, 1968. On the right, a print of "Our Tree of Life" that he likewise gifted and inscribed to the Rebbe.
Library of Agudas Chasidei Chabad

Lipchitz faithfully put the Rebbe’s words into practice, donning tefillin in prayer—which he recited in French—every day until the end of his life.80 Every artist, he explained at the Chassidic art exhibit in Detroit, needs to wait for inspiration—the “holy spirit” he called it—to come down upon him. The tefillin he donned every day, he said, was what gave him that inspiration.81 The circle was complete.

Chassidic art, then, is not a genre but a spirit, an ethos that is to be shared beyond the card-carrying membership of Chassidic communities. Chassidic art is work created by the artist who seeks G‑d in the world—in the holiness of a mother and daughter lighting Shabbat candles or in the mundane shadows of this worldly life—and finds a way to communicate that Divine meaning to others.82 To see the world for what it is, the Jewish artist must embrace the Torah and rebel against the bonds of nature, stripping away its superficial veneer to find its essence.

Art of this sort takes on the spirit of the mitzvot, and the mitzvot themselves are revealed to carry the transformative spirit of art. From this perspective, each of us is called to be a Chassidic artist.