Artwork Page for Etrog Box

Details / Information for Etrog Box

Etrog Box

1956

Ilya Schor

(East European/American, 1904–1961)
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Culture
America
Medium
silver
Measurements
Overall: 16.6 x 12.5 cm (6 9/16 x 4 15/16 in.)
Weight: .86 kg
Credit Line
Sundry Art - Judaica Fund 2024.143
Copyright
© artist or artist's estate
This artwork is known to be under copyright.
Location
225 German Expressionism & Surrealism
Print
?

Did You Know?

Schor in Hebrew means “ox,” but the artist used a bird as his logo, inspired by the meaning of the similar sounding word “shir”—a song, as in a songbird.

Description

An etrog box protects and stores the etrog, a citrus fruit used in the Jewish festival of Sukkot, which celebrates the fall harvest and the Israelites’ exodus from enslavement in ancient Egypt. The decoration of this box includes Jewish historical and religious figures, a scene of a family celebrating Sukkot, the zodiac, and Hebrew inscriptions referring to Sukkot and Simchat Torah. The latter is a joyous holiday following the festival of Sukkot, marking the conclusion of the annual cycle of public Torah readings and the beginning of a new cycle.

Ilya Schor trained in metalcrafts and engraving before enrolling at the Warsaw Academy of Fine Arts to study painting. In 1937, he was awarded a grant by the Polish government to study in Paris. During the Second World War, he fled France and came to the United States.
A silver etrog box, made to protect citrus fruit during the Jewish Sukkot festival, has two levels. The box has an oval base on top of which a lid slants into a platform with a rectangle framing a scene of a family seated around a table, the rectangle flanked by trees with birds on top. On the base, four people, all bearded, stand within a rectangle, foliage between them with a Hebrew inscription below (see "Inscriptions"). In flanking columns a person stands on top of a treelike structure, trunks extending beyond the base to compose the box's four legs.

Etrog Box

1956

Ilya Schor

(East European/American, 1904–1961)
America

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