Artist Five: Naum Gabo

Naum Gabo, also known as Naum Neemia Pevsner, was born in Russia in 1890.  He grew up one of six children in a Jewish family.  His older brother, Antoine Pevsner was also an artist of the constructivist movement, to avoid confusion Naum changed his name.  Gabo was fluent in German, French and English on top of his native Russian, this allowed him to travel more and become known worldwide.  In 1910 he entered Munich University to study medicine, then the natural sciences, while attending art history lectures.  Two years after starting in Munich he transferred to an engineering school in Munich.  While there he discovered abstract art and met Wassily Kandinsky, by 1913 Gabo joined is brother in Paris.  Due to Gabo’s training in engineering he was able to develop sculptures that had machined elements.  In 1928 Gabo taught at Bauhaus and it was during this time that he designed a fountain in Dresden.  From 1932 to 35 Naum and his brother lived in Paris as members of the Abstraction-Creation group to escape the rise of the Nazis in Germany.  Gabo then moved to England and eventually immigrated with his wife and daughter to America, where he lived until his death in 1977.  The sculpture that Gabo created showed his imaginative and passionate vision through an emotional power.  Because of his experiences living through a revolution, both world wars and having been a Jew fleeing the Nazis, his work was peaceful and ideal.  He looked past the chaos and fear in his life to create art that was fragile and balanced.  His sculpture Guy’s and St. Thomas’s Hospital in London is a perfect example of how he brought together all of his schooling and life experiences to create a piece that shows the beauty in the created.