Irvin Ungar Biography

Irvin Ungar
Irvin D. Ungar is Founder and CEO of Historicana, the noted firm of antiquarian booksellers (established 1987), based in Burlingame, California. Mr. Ungar, a former pulpit rabbi, specializes in historic Judaica including books, maps, broadsides, photographs, autographs and manuscripts.
Irvin's interest in Judaica led to his discovery, in 1989, of the art of Arthur Szyk, the great 20th century illuminator. A Polish Jew who immigrated to the United States in late 1940, Arthur Szyk was the leading political artist in World War II America, yet sadly fell into obscurity following his death in 1951. Recognizing the aesthetic and cultural value of Szyk's artwork and unified message of social justice, Irvin organized a national public education campaign to reintroduce this master illuminator and political caricaturist to the art world and the American public.
After serving as President from 1997-2000, Irvin became Curator of The Arthur Szyk Society, a not-for-profit organization dedicated to the renaissance of Arthur Szyk's art. The Society organizes exhibitions, lectures, publications and other public programs throughout the United States and is succeeding in creating a revival of national and international interest in the artist and his work through its programs and outreach efforts, particularly the traveling exhibition program to college campuses.
Irvin also is a curator of special exhibitions and a widely published writer on subjects relating to Arthur Szyk and Judaica. He served as guest curator for the following exhibitions: The Cartographer's Vision: 400 Years of Holy Land Maps, at the Judah L. Magnes Museum, Berkeley (May 15 - Sept. 11, 1988); Justice Illuminated: The Art of Arthur Szyk, at The Spertus Museum, Chicago (August 16, 1998 - February 28, 1999); Arthur Szyk: Artist for Freedom, at the Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. (December 9, 1999 Ð May 6, 2000). Irvin also served as the consultant to the United States Holocaust Museum for its exhibition: Art and Politics of Arthur Szyk (April 10- October 14, 2002). He is now the guest curator for the major exhibition, Arthur Szyk Ð Drawing Against National Socialism and Terror (opening August 2008), at the Deutsches Historisches Museum in Berlin; he will make a keynote address and contribute a significant English-language essay to the museum exhibition catalogue.
Irvin's published works include: The New Edition of The Szyk Haggadah, Burlingame: HISTORICANA (2008) and its companion volume of scholarly essays, Freedom Illuminated: Understanding The Szyk Haggadah, Burlingame: HISTORICANA (2008); Justice Illuminated: The Art of Arthur Szyk, Chicago: Spertus Institute for Jewish Studies, (1998); The Collector's Haggadah Catalogue, 1695-Present, Burlingame: HISTORICANA (1994); and numerous articles. He has lectured worldwide, from Hebrew University, Jerusalem, to the Library of Congress, Washington, D.C., to the Center for Jewish Culture in Krakow.
Irvin has served as a Scholar-in-Residence for numerous synagogues throughout the United States where he conducts antique Judaica road shows and lectures on historic Judaica and the art of Arthur Szyk. Irvin has produced two documentary films: In Every Generation: Remaking The Szyk Haggadah (2008) and Arthur Szyk: Soldier in Art (2006). Arthur Szyk: Soldier in Art has been screened at both international and domestic film festivals, at locales as varied as Los Angeles, Tucson, Warsaw and Jerusalem. He also appeared on the PBS special, "History Detectives."
Irvin received his MA in education from New York University, a second MA in sacred theology from the New York Theological Seminary, his rabbinical ordination from The Academy for Jewish Religion, and his BA in mathematics and economics from Washington and Jefferson College. A native of Trenton, New Jersey, he now resides in Burlingame, California, with his wife.

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