Yigal Tumarkin

Yigal Tumarkin was born in 1933 in Dresden

He was born Peter Martin Gregor Heinrich Hellberg in Dresden, Germany, in 1933. His father, Martin Hellberg, was a German actor and director. His Jewish mother, Berta Gurevitch, brought him to the Land of Israel at age 2, where she married Herzl Tumarkin, who became his stepfather.

He grew up in Tel Aviv and Bat Yam and attended several schools. In 1946 he enrolled at the Max Fein vocational school. In 1952 he joined the IDF and served in the navy.

After his discharge he studied sculpture with Rudi Lehmann in Ein Hod in 1954. In 1955 he went to East Germany and worked at Bertolt Brecht's Berliner Ensemble. He later lived in the Netherlands and France, where he met Tristan Tzara in 1959 and began working with assemblage.

His first solo show in Israel opened at the Bezalel museum in 1961. His work drew on pop art and protest art, and he created over 80 outdoor sculptures in Israel and abroad. Some works, such as a pig wearing tefillin, caused controversy.

He received the Israel Prize for sculpture in 2004. He died on 12 August 2021. His youngest son is the actor Yon Tumarkin.