Jacob Kramer

Kramer's mother, Cecilia, was also artistic being a trained singer who was well known for touring a regional network of theatres established by her father, at which she performed traditional Slavic and Hebrew folk songs.

[2] When they arrived in the UK is not clear: they do not appear in the 1901 England and Wales census, but Jacob's sister Millie was born in Leeds in February 1904.

[2] During this time he was also to become involved in the radical modernist organisation the Leeds Arts Club, which introduced him to the ideas of expressionist artists, such as Wassily Kandinsky and the spiritual beliefs that came to underpin his work.

Writing to his close friend and fellow Arts Club member Herbert Read in 1918, Kramer stated that when he looked at an object he saw both its physical appearance and its spiritual manifestation.

Nonetheless, several of his woodcuts did appear in the Vorticist literary magazine BLAST, and other periodicals including Colour, Rhythm and Art and Letters.

[1] As a portrait painter, his sitters included Mahatma Gandhi and Frederick Delius[1] Kramer was commissioned to illustrate portions of the Soncino edition of the Bible and Prophets He died 4 February 1962, unmarried and with no children, and was buried in the Jewish cemetery at Gildersome.

A small selection of personal material belonging to Jacob Kramer was donated to Leeds Central Library by his sister and nephew.