Moshe Castel 1909-1992

Surface: generally good condition, colors bright and fresh; slight allegatoring of paint lower left and across lower edge but inherent to his technique of layering paint. Under UV: signature and table legs fluoresce but likely this is the nature of the pigment.
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This work belongs to a series of interiors that the artist produced in Safed, "...a picturesque city of old synagogues in the mountains of Galilee, a centre of cabbalistic learning and the Zohar. His early work often dealt with Jewish communal and religious customs - Passover meals, Sabbath meals conducted in vaulted halls... and was decidedly influenced by Rouault and Chagall." (Avraham Kampf, Chagall to Kitaj, Jewish Experience in 20th Century Art, London, 1990, page 125).