Gelman was born to Jewish immigrant parents from Petah Tikva, The Ottoman Palestine (present-day Israel).
His painting "Across the Gowanus Canal" is in the collection of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts.
His grandfather, Avraham Yaakov Gelman was one of the 11 founding families of Mazkeret Batya (Ekron).
These emigrant families came from Ruzhany, with support from the Baron de Rothschild, to settle Moshav Ekron.
This article about a painter from the United States born in the 1890s is a stub.