Moïse Kisling

Moïse Kisling was a Polish-born French painter born in Krakow, then Austria-Hungary, in 1891. Kisling was encouraged by teachers at the Academy of Fine Arts, Krakow, to pursue an artistic career in Paris. He moved to Paris at age 19 and volunteered service for the French Foreign Legion at the onset of World War I. After being wounded in the Battle of the Somme, Kisling was made a French citizen.

Working in Montparnasse, Paris, Kisling joined an émigré community of artists where he became friends with Amedeo Modigliani, Jules Pascin, and Leopold Zborowski. Kisling was a master at painting the female body, and his landscape style parallels that of Marc Chagall. Modigliani, his friend and contemporary, painted a portrait of Kisling that is now part of the Musée d’Art Moderne’s collection in Paris.

At the age of 49, Kisling volunteered again to serve in the French army during World War II. Once the French army was discharged, Kisling, a Jew, emigrated to the United States to escape occupied France. He went to Southern California and held his first art exhibition there in 1942. After World War II had ended, Kisling returned to Paris to find his studio destroyed. He remained in France at his home in Southern France until his death in 1953.