Self Portrait

Created in 1921, this self-portrait captures Reuven Rubin at a pivotal moment in his artistic journey. At 28 years old, the Romanian-born Jewish painter was traveling to the United States with his friend and fellow artist Arthur Kolnik, where they would meet Alfred Stieglitz and hold their first American exhibition at the Anderson Gallery. This was just before Rubin would emigrate to Mandate Palestine in 1923, where he would become one of the founders of the new Eretz-Yisrael artistic style.

The work reflects Rubin's distinctive approach that combined modernist influences—particularly Cézannesque elements—with a naive, sensitive style. Having studied briefly at Jerusalem's Bezalel art school and later at Paris's École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts, Rubin was forging an artistic identity that would integrate his Hasidic upbringing, European training, and Zionist vision. His signature practice of writing his first name in Hebrew and surname in Roman letters symbolized this synthesis. While he would later become famous for sun-bathed depictions of Jerusalem and the Galilee, this early self-portrait offers a rare glimpse into the artist's self-perception as he stood on the threshold of international recognition and his eventual role in shaping Israeli national art.