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Astrid Zydower

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Astrid Zydower
Born4 August 1930
Germany
Died27 May 2005(2005-05-27) (aged 74)
Kentish Town, London
NationalityBritish
Education
Known forSculpture
AwardsMBE, 1968

Astrid Zydower (4 August 1930 – 27 May 2005) was a British sculptor.

Biography

Zydower was born in 1930 in a small village in the Galicia region which at that time was within the borders of Germany.[1][2] As a Jewiah family, the Zydowers faced discrimination and oppression under the Nazi government such that in 1939 the three Zydower children were evacuated to Britain on the last Kindertransport train to leave the territory before the start of World War II.[1][2] During The Holocaust both of Zydower's parents were deported to and then killed in the Auschwitz concentration camp.[1][2] In England the three Zydower children were taken into foster care by a Quaker family, the Freemans, in Sheffield.[1] At first unable to speak English, Astrid Zydower struggled at school but did show a talent for drawing and went on to study at Sheffield School of Art.[1] From there she won a scholarship to the Royal College of Art in London where she was taught by Leon Underwood and John Skeaping and developed her ability as a sculptor.[2]

Virgin and Child; part of the Nativity installed at Lincoln Cathedral

During the 1960s, Zydower taught at the Hornsey School of Art in north London and undertook a number of high profile, and often very large, sculptures commissions. In 1964, for the 400th anniversary of the birth of William Shakespeare, she completed a series of life-size figures for Stratford, Ontario.[2] Works by Zydower were commissioned for the Expo '67 world trade fair in Montreal and subsequently for Expo '70 in Osaka.[2] Among Zydower's students at Hornsey was Shirley Ann Shepherd, the wife of Charlie Watts, the Rolling Stones drummer. This led to a number of commissions for Zydower from Watts and other members of the band. For Watts she produced a bust of Ulysses and for Mick Jagger a head of Actaeon.[2] She produced a large Nativity scene for St Paul's Cathedral which was displayed there each Christmas for many years until it was transferred to Lincoln Cathedral.[2] For the Museum of the Jewish Dispora in Tel-Aviv, Zydower created a scene of group of ten men, a minyan, preparing to enter a prayer room.[1] A 1970 commission to create a bronze bust of Dame Marie Rambert, founder of the Ballet Rambert, led to a lifelong friendship and several other studies of ballet dancers, including members of the New York City Ballet.[3][1] In 1984, for the fountain on the central terrace of Harewood House in Yorkshire Zydower created a nine foot high bronze of Orpheus carrying a leopard.[1] In later life she concentrated on etching, mainly of figures from Greek mythology, rather than sculpture.[1]

Works by Zydower are held in both the Victoria & Albert Museum and the National Portrait Gallery in London.[4][3] In 1968 she was awarded an MBE and for many years lived in a large house, that contained her studio, in Kentish Town in north London and it was there that she died in 2005.

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i Madeleine Harmsworth (6 December 2005). "Astrid Zydower". The Independent. Retrieved 6 September 2018.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h David Buckman (2006). Artists in Britain Since 1945 Vol 2, M to Z. Art Dictionaries Ltd. ISBN 0 953260 95 X.
  3. ^ a b "Marie Rambert". National Portrait Gallery. Retrieved 6 September 2018.
  4. ^ "A Tragedy of Fashion". Victoria & Albert Museum. Retrieved 6 September 2018.

Further reading

  • Astrid Zydower Her Life & Works by Peter Amsden, (ASAT Productions, 2009)
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Astrid Zydower.
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