Hedi Schick (1906-1999) - London cafe

Hedi (Hedwig) Schick (1906 Vienna - 1999 London) was in her younger years strongly influenced by Oskar Kokoschka and Otto Dix. She studied at the Vienna Kunstgewerbeschule (School of Applied Arts), from which she graduated in the early 1930s (her name could be found among those of professional applied artists in the address book of Vienna Artists issued in 1934 - see our last image).
As a Jewish woman, Hedi Schick escaped Nazi persecution in Austria, came to Britain in the late 1930s and began working, producing theatre backdrops and scene painting. She received British Citizenship in 1947.
She met Clement and Wilfred Hall who ran a gallery in Islington (London) and began working for them as a picture restorer. Later on she exhibited with the Islington Art Circle during the 1950s and 1960s, and became a strong voice in the British post-war Modernist Art movement. Many of her works were based on her family's experiences in the Holocaust.
She worked as an illustrator, illustrated the fairy tales of Hans Christian Andersen, as well as the books such as "Bush and Billabong" and "Australian Tales of Long Ago" by Peter Paxton (1945), etc. She also made further advertising work for theatre and projects of textile. (*this information was borrowed from David Buckman's "Artists in Britain since 1945", Volume 2, page 412, as well as the registry of the Austrian Institute for Science and Art).



Provenance: artist's estate

Condition: good

Creation Year: 1943

Measurements: UNFRAMED: 50.6cm x 38.2cm / 19.9in x 15.0in FRAMED: 58.1cm x 45.6cm / 22.9in x 18.0in

Object Type: Framed pastel

Style: The New Objectivity

Technique: pastel on paper

Inscription: signed and dated: H SCHICK /1943

Creator: Hedi Schick

Creator Dates: 1906 Vienna-1999 London

Nationality: Austrian / British / English