Gerry Judah was born into a Jewish family in Calcutta (now Kolkata), India, in 1951. Aged ten, he immigrated to London, England, with his family, where he went on to study art to postgraudtae level. He subsequently established his career as an artist and designer, often working on large-scale public installations dealing with themes of history and conflict.
Artist Gerry Judah was born into a Jewish family in Calcutta (now Kolkata), India, on 30 July 1951. His grandparents had emigrated from Iraq to India, and he has reflected: 'Growing up in India in the already established Baghdadi Jewish community at the same time absorbing the cultures of Hinduism, Islam, and Buddhism had a profound effect on me' ('Unravelling Histories', The Artlander, 2021). When he was aged ten, his family migrated to London, England, where he attended Whitefield Secondary Modern School until 1969. Living in England, then a country still emerging from postwar austerity, as a child Judah drew profusely, and drawing has remained central to his artistic practice. After leaving school, he took several jobs, including working as a kitchen porter and an architectural draughtsman, before studying art and design at Barnet College of Art (1970-72). He subsequently completed a BA in Fine Art at Goldsmiths College, University of London (1972-75) and a postgraduate degree in sculpture at the Slade School of Fine Art (1975-77).
After graduating, Judah set up his studio in Shaftesbury Avenue, in London's West End theatre district, often working on an ambitious scale. His large sculpture Succah, inspired by temporary structures built for the Jewish festival of Succoth, was installed in the garden of the Camden Arts Centre in 1978 and exhibited at Yorkshire Sculpture Park the following year. To fund his sculptural work, he found jobs in numerous theatres, including the Royal Opera House and the National Theatre, as a stage hand, prop maker and scenic artist. Working widely in film, television, theatre, museums and public spaces, Judah gained a reputation for innovative design, creating sets for the BBC, British Museum, Museum of Mankind and Natural History Museum, among other clients, and for musicians, including Paul McCartney.
Through his sculpture, installations and three-dimensional paintings, Judah often reflects on history and conflict, the devastations of war and environmental degradation, exploring themes of displacement, impermanence and cross-cultural connections. In 1998, he was commissioned to create a large-scale model of the selection ramp in Auschwitz-Birkenau for the Holocaust Exhibition at the Imperial War Museum, London. Describing his involvement in the project for the Jewish Chronicle, he said: 'The experience of studying and expressing something of the horror of one particularly dark phase of the human story has stretched me greatly as an artist and touched me deeply as a human being' (2 June 2000, p. 29). His working processes often involve creating, and then destroying, models and maquettes, and brutalising his canvasses. For his series Frontiers (2005), influenced by photographs of war zones and natural disasters, Judah constructed miniature buildings from foamboard, broke them up and fixed the pieces onto the canvas, and then covered them in white gesso to create the impression of a coating of the dust of destruction. His Angels series, created after the 2006 bombing of Beirut, featured aerial views of wrecked buildings shown in delicate relief. His 2010 sculpture, Crusader, commissioned by the Imperial War Museum, took the white cross from war graves as a symbol and embellished it with the devastated urban landscapes of contemporary war zones to evoke the damage caused by aerial bombardments. In 2012, Judah returned to Bengal for the first time in decades, commissioned by the Arts Council and Christian Aid to make a series of sculptures engaging with issues of climate change and reflecting on his personal roots. As part of this work, he expressed the themes of displacement and the fragility of human existence through rickshaws loaded with different structures, such as power stations, pylons, temples made from ash, and polluted materials. Works from the Bengal series were exhibited at Wolverhampton Art Museum and the High Commission of India in London, followed by Bengal: The Four Elements in Grizedale and Dalby Forests. In 2014, Judah exhibited two monumental Great War Sculptures at St Paul's Cathedral, London, commemorating 100 years since the beginning of the First World War. Using cruciform structures piled with representations of war-torn cities, he drew connections between history and modern conflict in the Middle East to create universal symbols of the continuing devastation of war.
Judah has held numerous solo exhibitions, including at the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA), London, and Imperial War Museum North. Since 1997, he has worked with major motorcar companies to produce the central feature sculpture for the annual Goodwood Festival of Speed in West Sussex. He has also created monumental sculptures for institutions, including in Texas, New Zealand and the United Arab Emirates, and has designed bridges in Woolwich Dockyard and Cambridge. He considers his sculptures 'pieces of theatre' made to inhabit public spaces (Ditmars, 'Gerry Judah', p. 37). Elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Sculptors (FRSS) Gerry Judah lives and works in London. His work is held in UK public collections including the Imperial War Museum and the Arts Council Collection.
Consult items in the Ben Uri archive related to [Gerry Judah]
Publications related to [Gerry Judah] in the Ben Uri Library