Canadian sculptor and painter Sorel Etrog was born in Romania in 1933, studied in Tel Aviv and moved to Toronto in 1963 from New York, where he had been at the Brooklyn Museum of Art on scholarship.

Sorel Etrog, The Hand, 1972. Image: flickr.com

In 1959, Etrog had his first Canadian solo exhibition at Gallery Moos and shortly thereafter, having become a Canadian citizen, represented Canada at the Venice Biennale in 1966.

The sculptor Sorel Etrog. Image: flickr.com

Sorel Etrog’s work has been exhibited extensively in solo and group exhibitions including at Marlborough Gallery, New York; the Centre Culturel Canadien, Paris; and the Singapore Art Museum, Singapore.

His work has been part of group exhibitions at the National Gallery of Canada; The Carnegie International, Pittsburg; The Museum of Modern Art, New York, The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture garden, Washington, D.C.; Palazzo Vecchio, Florence; Musee des Beaux-Arts, Le Havre; Musee Rodin, Paris; Kuntsmuseum, Basel; and the Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris.

Sorel Etrog, Sunlife (downtown Toronto), 1984. Image: flickr.com

Sorel Etrog has received several important commissions, including those for Expo ’67 and designed Canada’s film award, the Genie.

Canada’s Genie award. Image: filmfestivalworld.com

He was appointed member of the Order of Canada in 1994 and was made a Chevalier of Arts and Letters by the Government of France in 1996.

Sorel Etrog, La Fénice, 1965-1967. Image: gallerymoos.com

Sorel Etrog is also well known for his writings and published plays, poetry and non-fiction. Of his many collaborations, the most acclaimed are his book illustrations for Samuel Beckett in the late 1960s. Sorel Etrog and Marshall McLuhan collaborated on the publication Spiral that was drawn from Etrog’s film of the same title, which was broadcast in CBC television in 1975.

Sorel Etrog, The King and Queen. Image: citywindsor.ca

Etrog is represented by Buschlen Mowatt Gallery, Vancouver - click HERE for gallery website.