Gabriel Benhaim

Gabi BEN-HAIM
The eye of memory
From earliest childhood, Israeli artist Gabi Ben-Haim was a people watcher. Born in 1940, he grew up in Morocco, where his grandfather- a Jewish sheikh.-- was the main communication; link between the Arab munici.pality and the Jewish quarter. Young Ben-Haim's affection for all sorts of people was cultivated in part by living in a three¬generation household with his grandparents and their eleven children and thirty-two grand¬children. The youngster also roved the entire city on his own, attentively observing its panoply of humanity.
Many of his sculptures are drawn from indelible memories of his childhood. But today he con¬tinues to find inspiration in the everyday life of Haifa. After his family moved to Israel in 1955, Ben-Haim trained as an artist and for some years was a jewelry maker. In time he opened a small antique shop at one end of the Haifa flea market. But in a cor¬ner of the dim little shop, sur¬rounded by antique furniture and works by past artists, he set about following his true love, making sculptures. At first they were made in terra-cotta, but about ten years ago he graduated to bronze.
To this day Ben-Haim main tains his shop, and keeps sculpt¬ing in it. Not for him t...