Petach Tikva Landscape; Oil on Canvas, 60×75 cm

Samuel Goldstein

Samuel Goldstein was born in Pinsk, Poland in 1921, to a family of four siblings. When he turned 14, in 1935, he immigrated to Palestine with his family. They settled in Petah Tikva and opened “The Goldstein Brothers Bakery”. The bakery quickly became popular due to the quality of the cakes and its pleasant atmosphere. Goldstein’s cousins remained in Pinsnk. Most of them died in the Holocaust, while Samuel and his brothers joined the “Etzel” (a Zionist paramilitary organization).

In his youth, he excelled in various arts: he played the violin, the accordion, the organ, the mandolin and was continuously drawing. During the First Arab-Israeli War he was accepted to the Army Choir. However, after his release he refused to develop a singing and acting career. He married his wife – Bat Sheva; together they had two daughters: Yafa and Dalia, and at the age of 41 he was already a grandfather.

Samuel Goldstein began seriously painting only at the age of 40, and from that moment onward painting played an important role in his life. He studied with artist Zvi Shor at his atelier in Petah Tikva, and at the Avni Institute of Art in Tel Aviv. He exhibited his works in various shows along with his brother – Yaacob Goldstein, and in numerous solo-exhibitions. His most prominent solo-exhibition “Pinsk, My Town”, held at Yad LeBanim Museum in Petah Tikva, portrayed the landscapes of his childhood – a typical Eatern-European Jewish “shtetle”. Most of his works were painted in the spirit of Impressionism.

Samuel died at the age of 85, in 2006. He left a wife, two daughters and several grandchildren. On his tombstone it says: “Painter, Artist, a Lover of Humor and Men, Honest, Lived of the Fruit of his Labor”.