The painter Emil Armin is known for his use of vibrant color.
Armin was born in Radautz, Austria (which later became Romania). His parents died when he was ten, and Armin was forced to work odd jobs to support the family. He waited tables and sketched in his spare time until he was 22, at which time a brother encouraged Armin to join him in Chicago. Upon arrival, Armin enrolled in courses at the Art Institute, where George Bellows and Randall Davey encouraged him to paint spontaneously and expressively. Armin ultimately developed a mature style that reflected his Romanian Jewish heritage.
By the early 1920s, Armin was a star on the Chicago art scene, showing his work, participating in progressive art organizations, and working with the Jewish Board of Education to teach art in the schools.
Art critic Samuel Putnam described Armin in the Chicago Evening Post as “perhaps the most finely sensitized artist in Chicago…with a soul of a peasant and poet and the mind of a philosopher.” Armin is recognized in Peter Hastings Falk’s definitive compendium Who Was Who in American Art (Sound View Press, 1985).
