Eli Lancman

Eli Lancman was born in 1936 in Tel Aviv

Eli Lancman was born in Tel Aviv in 1936. His daughter is the physicist Hagar Landsman-Peles.

He studied in Japan for 7 years. He graduated from Jochi University, where he studied from 1960 to 1963, and from Tokyo University, where he studied from 1964 to 1966. He trained in curating and conserving Japanese art at the Yamato Bunkakan Museum in Nara.

While in Japan he wrote art criticism for the newspapers Yomiuri and Mainichi. In 1966 Haifa mayor Aba Hushi invited him to direct and develop the city's Museum of Japanese Art and to serve as its chief curator. That year he also published the book Chinese Portraiture, on the differences between Western and Chinese approaches to drawing.

He wrote entries on Japanese and Chinese art for the Hebrew Encyclopedia and edited a Hebrew encyclopedia on Japanese culture and art. He taught at the University of Haifa and at the Technion. He helped found the Israel-Japan Friendship Society and chaired it until 2007.

In 2001 the Emperor of Japan awarded him the Order of the Sacred Treasure for promoting Japanese culture. In 2009 he became honorary chairman of the Israel-Japan Friendship Society. He died on December 2, 2024.