Lea Nikel

Lea Nikel (Lea Nikelsberg) was born in Zhitomir, Ukraine, in 1918. Her family immigrated to British-administered Palestine in 1920. She had one sister, Sara (Bock), who was born in 1926. She began studying with painter Chaim Gliksberg in Tel Aviv in 1935, later studying with Yechezkel Streichman and Avigdor Stematsky. From 1961 to 1977, Nikel lived in Greenwich Village (one year), Rome (three years) and New York (four years), before returning to Israel in 1977. She was married to Sam Leiman and had one daughter, Ziva Hanan. She lived in Moshav Kidron.Nikel's style was a form of expressionistic abstraction sometimes called lyrical abstraction. She painted with a brusque, generous touch and favored high-keyed colors. She was known for buoyant compositions consisting of rough-edged blocks of color and scribbly, calligraphic lines that together conveyed a sense of imaginative excitement and urgent sensuousness.
In 1972, she was awarded the Sandberg Prize for Israeli Art from the Israel Museum.
In 1982, Nikel was awarded the Dizengoff Prize for Painting.
In 1985, she was awarded a medal from the UNESCO workshop on experimental activities in Nice, France.
In 1987, she won the Gamzo Award.
In 1995, she was awarded the Israel Prize, for painting.
In 1997, she was made a Chevalier of Arts and Letters by the French Minister of Culture