Shai Azoulai

Shai Azoulay (; born in 1971) is an Israeli painter. Azoulay lives and works in Jerusalem and is a faculty member of the Fine Art Department of The Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design.

Biography Azoulay was born in 1971 in Kiryat Shmona. His family moved to Arad when he was a child. After his army service, he traveled to the Far East, where he began to paint. He began his art studies at the Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design in the mid-1990s and graduated in 2000 with a BFA degree and in 2007 with an MFA degree.

Azoulay has exhibited both in Israel and worldwide including Tel Aviv Museum of Art (2011), ARATANIURANO Gallery, Tokyo (2013), Herzliya Museum of Contemporary Art (2018), The Israel Museum Jerusalem (2019) as well as group exhibitions in New York, London, Paris, Berlin and Rome. His works are included in public and private collections including The Israel Museum, The Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Ashdod Museum of Art, Bank Hapoalim, Israel Discount Bank, and Bank Leumi.

Azoulay is a faculty member of the Fine Art Department of the Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design (“Oman" Haredi Extension)

Among the awards that he has received are Legacy Heritage Fund Prize for a Young Artist, Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Tel Aviv (2007), The Osnat Mozes Prize for Painting for a Young Artist, The Artists House, Jerusalem (2007), Creative Encouragement Award, Ministry of Culture and Sport (2011), Ministry of Culture Award (2018) and The Israeli Lottery 'Landau Prize' for arts and science (2020)

Azoulay lives and works in Jerusalem. He is married to Daniella Azoualy, a ceramic artist. Together they have six children. His brother is the actor Golan Azoulay.

Work In their recommendation to reward Azoulay with the prize for a young artist, the members of the Osnat Mozes committee commented that they "...were deeply impressed by Azoulay’s command of painterly skills, his knowledge of the history of painting, and of the contemporary critical discourse." They further noted: "In his paintings, Shai Azoulay moves along a narrow thread stretched between historical narrative and intimate-human stories. With a seemingly gentle and ironic touch he deconstructs modernist and national mythologies, while reconstructing from them refreshing pictures lacking pretension which reveal as if for the first time the possibility of creating a dynamic world.

In her essay for Azoulay's exhibition "Closer to the Sun", Michal Shachani Yacobi states "The relationship between the painting and Hasidism, or between painting and tradition and faith, occupies Azoulay in his works. He uses them to reexamine concepts, rabbinical homilies, and stories borrowed from the worlds of Torah and Jewish mysticism."

Azoulay's has a spanish mother and a moroccan father.

Upon completion of his requisite three-year army service, Azoulay traveled across Asia, being inspired to become an artist while in Thailand.

Exhibitions

Select solo exhibitions Shai Azoulay – Outpost, Jerusalem Artists House, 25 October – 7 December 2003 Shai Azoulay, Jerusalem Artists House, 13 October – 24 November 2007 A Whole Heart is a Broken Heart, Sotheby's, Tel Aviv, 17 May –7 June 2012 Guided Imagery, Inga Gallery of Contemporary Art, Tel Aviv ,20 March – 15 May 2014 Dos, Inga Gallery of Contemporary Art, 14 April – 21 May 2016 Shortcuts, Meislin Projects, NY, USA, 10 November 2016 – 27 January 2017 Shai Azoulay: A Dwelling Down Below, Herzliya Museum of Contemporary Art, Herzliya, 24 February – 3 June 2018 Shai Azoulay: Kitzur Schulchan Aruch, Inga Gallery of Contemporary Art, 6 September – 2 November 2019

Group exhibitions Group Exhibition, Art Cube, The Artists' Studio, Jerusalem, December 2003 Lights, Israel Museum, Jerusalem, 2005 Group Exhibition, Art Cube, The Artists' Studio, Jerusalem, 5–19 May 2006 Mermaid, Inga Gallery of Contemporary Art, Tel Aviv, 17 July- 23 August 2008 'Rupture and Repair, Artists' House, Jerusalem, 8 May - 10 July 2010 Comfort Scapes, Art Cube, The Artists' Studio, Jerusalem, 25 November 2010 - 15 January 2011 Superpartners, Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Tel Aviv, 8 September - 8 October 2011 Artists: Azoulay, Shai | Israel, Reuven The Museum Presents Itself 2, Israeli Art from the Museum Collection, Dina and Raphael Recanati Family Foundation Galleries Herta and Paul Amir Building, Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Tel Aviv, 2015 Akhshav, Stein Rose Fine Art Gallery, NY, USA, 23 April - 3 May 2015 Group Exhibition, The Judaica Museum, Tel Aviv University, 2019 'Naked Soul: Chaïm Soutine and Israeli Art, Mishkan Museum of Art, Kibbutz Ein Harod, 11 September 2019 - 21 March 2020 Group Exhibition, Ashdod Museum of Art, 2019 The Artist's Choice, Inga Gallery of Contemporary Art, Tel Aviv, 21 February - 23 March 2019

Awards and prizes

2006-2007 Creativity Grant, Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design, Tel Aviv 2007 Legacy Heritage Fund Prize for a Young Artist, Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Tel Aviv 2011 Creative Encouragement Award, Ministry of Culture and Sport 2020 The Israeli Lottery 'Landau Prize' for arts and science 2020 The Foundation for Independent Artists

Collections The Israel Museum, Jerusalem Tel Aviv Museum of Art Salsali Private Museum, Dubai Rivka Saker & Uzi Zucker Art Collection The Dubi Shiff Art Collection Oli Alter Private Collection Zila & Giora Yaron Art Collection Hagit & Ofer Shapira Collection Rose Art Museum, Brandeis University, Waltham, MA Matthew Bronfman Private Collection Bank Leumi Art Collection Israel Discount Bank Art Collection Bank Hapoalim Art Collection