# Harold Rubin > Mediated Wiki article. Canonical URL: https://mediated.wiki/source/Harold_Rubin > Markdown URL: https://mediated.wiki/source/Harold_Rubin.md > Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harold_Rubin > Source revision: 1357118905 > License: Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/) {{Short description|South African-born Israeli artist and free jazz clarinetist (1932–2020)}} {{For|the twentieth century American writer|Harold Robbins}} {{Use dmy dates|date=April 2020}} {{Refimprove|date=April 2020}} {{Infobox musical artist | name = Harold Rubin | image = Harold Rubin.jpg | caption = Harold Rubin at Levontin 7, Tel Aviv, 2013. Photo by Mark Segal. | native_name = הארולד רובין | native_name_lang = he | birth_name = | birth_date = {{Birth date|df=yes|1932|5|13}} | birth_place = Johannesburg, South Africa | death_date = {{death date and age|df=yes|2020|4|1|1932|5|13}} | death_place = | genre = Jazz | occupation = Musician | instrument = Clarinet | years_active = }} '''Harold Rubin''' ({{Langx|he|הארולד רובין}}; 13 May 1932 – 1 April 2020) was a South African-born Israeli artist and [free jazz](/source/free_jazz) [clarinetist](/source/clarinetist). ==Life and career== Rubin was born in [Johannesburg](/source/Johannesburg), South Africa on 13 May 1932. He attended the [Jeppe High School for Boys](/source/Jeppe_High_School_for_Boys) and received private instruction in the [fine arts](/source/fine_arts)."Rubin, Harold" (1970). In Esmé Berman (Ed.), ''Art and Artists of South Africa: An Illustrated Biographical Dictionary and Historical Survey of Painters and Graphic Artists Since 1875'', Third Edition. Cape Town: A. A. Balkema. p. 115. Instructed in the [classical](/source/Classical_music) [clarinet](/source/clarinet) as a teenager, he developed a fascination with [jazz](/source/jazz) and began playing at the Skyline Night Club at eighteen. Enrolled as an architecture student at the [University of the Witwatersrand](/source/University_of_the_Witwatersrand), he completed his professional studies after further education in London. Rubin's creative endeavours in South African society during the 1950s and 1960s dissented against the [apartheid](/source/apartheid)-era [Afrikaner](/source/Afrikaner) establishment by defying the country's racist social norms. Rubin organised his own jazz group in the 1950s, snuck into [black townships](/source/Township_(South_Africa)), and played alongside black musicians. Rubin's visual artwork was first exhibited in 1956. Among Rubin's contributions to the South African fine arts in this spirit was the 1961 ''Sharpeville'', a series of drawings devoted to the brutality of the Apartheid-era authorities during the [Sharpeville massacre](/source/Sharpeville_massacre) in 1960. Rubin's most controversial project on the South African art scene of the 1960s was ''My Jesus'', a provocative rendering of the [crucifixion](/source/crucifixion) in which [Jesus Christ](/source/Jesus_Christ) appeared as a nude black figure with the head of a monster.Martin, Marilyn (2006). Introduction. In Ronald Harrison, ''The Black Jesus: A Journey to Freedom'' (p. xii). Claremont, South Africa: New Africa Books. {{ISBN|0-86486-687-9}}, {{ISBN|978-0-86486-687-5}}.{{cite news|author=Uys, Stanley|title=Student in Blasphemy Trial|work=[The Age](/source/The_Age)|date=9 February 1968|page=3|url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1300&dat=19680209&id=LgYRAAAAIBAJ&pg=4727,1504467|accessdate=20 May 2010}} The work contained the inscription "I forgive you O Lord, for you know not what you do" – a sardonically reversed ["Father forgive them, for they know not what they do"](/source/Sayings_of_Jesus_on_the_cross) – and depicted the naked figure with a slight hint of an [erection](/source/erection).(9 March 2008). [https://www.jpost.com/Home/Article.aspx?id=94458 "A Mainstream Embrace".] ''The Jerusalem Post''. Retrieved 21 May 2010. The controversial image was put on display alongside other anti-establishment works at a Johannesburg gallery in 1962. The exhibition caused such furore that the government sent [the police](/source/South_African_Police) to shut down the exhibition and referred its artwork for an examination by its censorship board.{{cite news|author=Albert, Don|title=Eclectic Jazz Mix That Ties All Bonds|work=Tonight|date=31 July 2007|url=http://www.tonight.co.za/index.php?fArticleId=3960795&fSectionId=385&fSetId=251|accessdate=21 May 2010}}[https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=oqYnAAAAIBAJ&sjid=ZMoEAAAAIBAJ&pg=3984,203148&dq=harold+rubin+south+africa&hl=en "Paintings Moved"] (2 August 1962). Associated Press. ''Daytona Beach Morning Journal'' p. 5. Retrieved 21 May 2010. Rubin became the second South African to be charged with [blasphemy](/source/blasphemy). Acquitted in court of the alleged blasphemy in March 1963, Rubin protested the repressive political environment by leaving the country for [Israel](/source/Israel). He quickly re-established himself in [Tel Aviv](/source/Tel_Aviv), and was employed as an architect in the office of [Arieh Sharon](/source/Arieh_Sharon), on projects in Israel and abroad. He taught at an academy of architecture and design between the 1960s and his retirement in 1986. Rubin began creating visual art as a critique and commentary on the [militaristic](/source/militaristic) aspect of Israeli society as early as the 1960s. The anti-war subject was a prime subject of Rubin's work during the 1980s – a decade witnessing the [1982 invasion of Lebanon](/source/1982_Lebanon_War) and the tensions aroused by the increasingly visible [peace movement](/source/Israeli_peace_camp), and marked by the creation of such works as ''The Anatomy of a War Widow'' (1984), a series of twenty-two black-and-white pictures. The caustic ''Homage to Rabbi Kahane'', which portrayed the outspoken [ultra-nationalist](/source/ultra-nationalist) [Rabbi](/source/Rabbi) [Meir Kahane](/source/Meir_Kahane) as a Jewish [Nazi](/source/Nazi), was pulled off the wall by a [Knesset](/source/Knesset) member when hung at a [Haifa](/source/Haifa) gallery in 1985.Shipler, David (2002). [http://www.wnyc.org/news/articles/899 "Holocaust"]. In ''Arab And Jew: Wounded Spirits In A Promised Land''. London: Penguin Books. [WNYC](/source/WNYC) New York Public Radio. Retrieved 21 May 2010. The proceeds raised from an August 1987 exhibition and auction of art by Rubin and other Israeli artists at the [Meimad Gallery](/source/Meimad_Gallery) in Tel Aviv were donated to a fund for educational activities and promotion of the values of democracy and freedom of speech dedicated to [Emil Grunzweig](/source/Emil_Grunzweig), an Israeli teacher and [Peace Now](/source/Peace_Now) activist murdered in 1983 by a grenade thrown at a Jerusalem peace rally.[http://www.adaminstitute.org.il/emil.pdf "Emil Greenzweig: In Memoriam".] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110721141254/http://www.adaminstitute.org.il/emil.pdf |date=21 July 2011}} The Adam Institute. Retrieved 21 May 2010. Rubin's drawings and paintings have been exhibited in Israel, South Africa, the United States, and Germany since the 1960s. Rubin returned to playing jazz in late 1979, having previously given up performance for more than a decade after his emigration from Africa. He became a founding member of the 1980s [Zaviot](/source/Zaviot) [jazz quartet](/source/jazz_quartet), which recorded albums with the label [Jazzis Records](/source/Jazzis_Records) and performed at festivals and clubs in Israel and Europe until its break-up in 1989. Rubin's more recent appearances have included performances with [Ariel Shibolet](/source/Ariel_Shibolet), [Assif Tsahar](/source/Assif_Tsahar), [Daniel Sarid](/source/Daniel_Sarid), [Maya Dunietz](/source/Maya_Dunietz), and [Yoni Silver](/source/Yoni_Silver).{{cite news|author=Shalev, Ben|title=It's Important to be a Neanderthal|work=[Haaretz](/source/Haaretz)|date=28 February 2008|url=https://www.haaretz.com/general/it-s-important-to-be-a-neanderthal-1.240349|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121024160828/http://www.haaretz.com/general/it-s-important-to-be-a-neanderthal-1.240349|url-status=dead|archive-date=24 October 2012|accessdate=22 May 2010}} Awarded the [Landau Award](/source/Landau_Award) in tribute to his contributions to jazz music in 2008, he continued to play jazz with musicians of the younger generations in Tel Aviv. Harold Rubin and his first wife, Riva Wainer, married in 1957, separated in the 1970s and divorced in 1975. Since 1976 he has been married to [Miriam Kainy](/source/Miriam_Kainy), a well-recognized Israeli dramatist particularly known for plays concerned with the subject of [Jewish–Arab relations](/source/Arab%E2%80%93Israeli_conflict) and feminist themes.Feiler, Yael (2005). [http://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/kainy-miriam "Miriam Kainy b. 1942".] ''Jewish Women: A Comprehensive Historical Encyclopedia''. [http://www.jwa.org/ Jewish Women's Archive]. Retrieved 21 May 2010. His family included two sons from his first marriage, as well as one daughter and two stepdaughters from his second. Rubin was an avowed [atheist](/source/atheist). He died on 1 April 2020, aged 87. {{Cite news|url=https://www.haaretz.co.il/gallery/music/.premium-1.8731941|title=מת הרולד רובין, מחלוצי הג'ז החופשי בישראל|newspaper=הארץ|date=April 2020 |language=he|access-date=1 April 2020 |last1=שלו |first1=בן }} ==References== {{reflist}} ==External links== * [https://web.archive.org/web/20100807074613/http://www.haroldrubin.net/home.asp Harold Rubin – Musician] * [https://web.archive.org/web/20110606120421/http://www.sahistory.org.za/pages/people/bios/rubin_h.htm Harold Rubin, 1932–] * [http://www.jazzis.com/records/discography.asp Jazzis Records' catalogue of Zaviot recordings] * [https://web.archive.org/web/20101225043407/http://www.highlight.co.il/pages/A%20Magnificent%20Failure ''A Magnificent Failure''] * [https://archives.albany.edu/description/catalog/apap032 Harold Rubin Papers], 1958-2004. M.E. Grenander Department of Special Collections and Archives, University Libraries, University at Albany, State University of New York (hereafter referred to as the Rubin Papers). {{Authority control}} {{DEFAULTSORT:Rubin, Harold}} Category:1932 births Category:2020 deaths Category:Jewish South African anti-apartheid activists Category:South African anti-apartheid activists Category:Censorship in the arts Category:Israeli architects Category:Jewish Israeli atheists Category:Israeli atheists Category:Israeli jazz musicians Category:Israeli painters Category:Israeli people of South African-Jewish descent Category:Jewish Israeli musicians Category:Musicians from Johannesburg Category:Artists from Johannesburg Category:People charged with blasphemy Category:Religious controversies in art Category:Obscenity controversies in art Category:South African atheists Category:South African jazz musicians Category:South African secular Jews Category:South African emigrants to Israel Category:White South African anti-apartheid activists Category:20th-century South African architects Category:20th-century South African painters Category:20th-century Israeli male artists Category:Burials at Yarkon Cemetery Category:Jewish painters Category:Free jazz clarinetists Category:Israeli clarinetists Category:South African male painters Category:Alumni of Jeppe High School for Boys --- Adapted from the Wikipedia article [Harold Rubin](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harold_Rubin) by Wikipedia contributors ([contributor history](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harold_Rubin?action=history)). 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