Nicky Imber

Nicky Imber was born in 1920 in Vienna

Nicky Imber was born Ignatz Imberman in Vienna on October 20, 1920. He was a relative of Naftali Herz Imber, who wrote the poem that became "Hatikva". He studied at the Academy of Arts in Vienna and drew anti-Nazi cartoons for Jewish student papers.

After the annexation of Austria in 1938, he was sent to the Dachau concentration camp and later escaped. In 1940 he sailed toward Haifa, but the British authorities refused entry and held the passengers in a camp in Mauritius. In 1943 he joined the British Army.

After the war he opened an art school in Nairobi, Kenya. From 1949 to 1954 he lived in Venezuela and made an East African diorama series for the National Museum. In New York he painted oil portraits of figures such as David Ben-Gurion and Golda Meir.

In 1976 he returned to Venezuela and built a park of large sculptures of prehistoric animals. From 1978 to 1981 he built the memorial sculpture park "From Holocaust to Resurrection" at the entrance to Karmiel, along with animal-themed playgrounds in the city. He settled in Karmiel and died in Vienna in 1996.