Art and designמרסל ינקו

Marcel Janco

Marcel Janco was a Romanian and Israeli painter and architect, a co-founder of Dada and the founder of the Ein Hod artists' village.

1895 to 1984Co-founding the Dada movementFounding the Ein Hod artists' villageModernist architecture in BucharestThe New Horizons group

Born: 24 May 1895, Bucharest
Died: 21 April 1984, Ein Hod
Occupation: architect, painter, poet, musician
Education: Gheorghe Lazăr National College, ETH Zurich
Founded: Ein Hod (1954), Ein Hod Art Gallery (1953), Ein Hod artist colony (1953)

Marcel Janco was born in 1895 in Bucharest

Marcel Janco was born on 24 May 1895 in Bucharest to a Jewish family. His father, Hermann Zui Iancu, was a textile merchant, and his mother was Rachel née Iuster. He was the oldest child and studied drawing with the painter Iosif Iser.

In high school he met Tristan Tzara and Ion Vinea, and in 1912 they edited the magazine Simbolul. In 1915 he went to Zurich to study architecture at the Federal Institute of Technology. There he took part in the Cabaret Voltaire events, making masks and decor, and helped give rise to Dada.

He left Dada and returned to Romania in 1922, where he worked with Vinea on the avant-garde magazine Contimporanul. He designed buildings in Bucharest, including Beit Iuster in 1929. Facing antisemitic persecution, he emigrated to the British Mandate for Palestine in 1941.

In Israel he painted local subjects in a style drawing on Cubism and Expressionism. He worked for the Tel Aviv municipality and the Prime Minister's Office, organized the New Horizons group and founded Ein Hod. He won the Israel Prize in 1967 and died on 21 April 1984 in Ein Hod.