Shmuel Levi

Shmuel Levi was born in 1884 in Sofia

Shmuel Levi was born on 14 March 1884 in Sofia, Bulgaria, to Abraham and Naomi Levi. For a time he used the pen name Ophel, which he later dropped.

After finishing gymnasium, he studied at the National Academy of Art in Sofia from 1901 to 1905. When Bezalel was founded in 1906, he moved to the Land of Israel at the invitation of Boris Schatz and joined the school. There he organized the first choir at Bezalel.

An exhibition in the Russian Empire in 1912 brought him income that let him study at the Académie Julian in Paris from 1913. In Paris he took part in an Orientalist exhibition. He returned to the Land of Israel at the start of World War I and was active in local art.

In 1920 he helped found the Jewish Artist Association. He exhibited at the house of Yosef Eliyahu Chelouche in Tel Aviv in 1927 and at the Galerie Sélection in France in 1931. He taught at Bezalel, the Hebrew Teachers' College and schools in Jerusalem.

In 1960 the Tel Aviv Museum and the Jerusalem Artists House held a retrospective of his work. His works are held in collections including the Musée du Luxembourg in Paris. He died in Jerusalem in July 1966 and was buried at Har HaMenuchot.