Nehemia Azaz

Nehemia Azaz ( נחמיה עזז)
Azaz, pictured in late 1950's at Harsa in Beersheba
Born	(1923-10-09)9 October 1923 Berlin, Germany
Died	28 October 2008(2008-10-28) (aged 85) Oxfordshire, England, UK
Known for	Sculpture, stained glass, ceramics

Nehemia Azaz (Hebrew: נחמיה עזז‎‎), also known as Nechemia, Nechemiah, Nehemiah, Henri or N H Azaz (9 October 1923 – 28 October 2008), was an Israeli sculptor, ceramicist and architectural artist, who spent half of his working life in the UK. Best known in Israel as founder of the Department of Artistic Ceramics at the Harsa factory in Beersheba, Azaz made his studio base in Oxfordshire, England from the late 1960s onwards, working in stained glass, wood, concrete, bronze, brass, copper and aluminium.

Born in 1923 and taken to Palestine at an early age, Azaz's early career developed alongside, and in relation to, the formation of the state of Israel. After founding Harsa ceramic art pottery in the country in Beersheva, and designing the first generation of ceramics (and jewellery) as cultural export through the Maskit initiative of Ruth Dayan and others, he began to explore the idea of ceramics as sculpture. His work featured in an exhibition at Wakefield Gallery in 1955, alongside L S Lowry and Josef Herman; his ceramic sculpture is included in London's Victoria & Albert Museum collection

He was the founder and first director of the Department of Artistic Ceramics at the Harsa factory in Beersheba in 1955 where he designed the first generation of ceramics as cultural export through the Maskit initiative of Ruth Dayan. In 1960 he left Harsa to concentrate on large-scale architectural sculpture and stained glass. Influenced by the art of 1950s/60s, he was just as much inspired by the natural forms of the desert, mythology and the human condition.

After a highly successful and high profile architectural art commission at the Sheraton Hotel in Tel Aviv in 1965, he became one of the first Israeli sculptors of his generation to be commissioned internationally. Later, at the invitation of Yitzhak Rabin, then Israeli Ambassador in Washington, DC, Azaz - living in UK as artist in residence at Carmel College, UK, carved a 30 square metre walnut wood wall for the Israel Lounge (along with a ceiling mural by artist Shraga Weil and painted fabric by Ezekiel Kimche) at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

His career as an architectural and stained glass artist then continued largely in US and UK, where he made his studio base and home in Oxfordshire from late 1960's onwards. There are a number of large scale public art pieces still in existence, including at the Loop Synagogue in Chicago; Belfast Synagogue, Pace University in Manhattan NY and in the Israel Lounge at the John F Kennedy Centre in Washington, DC