Emil Orlik

• Born: 21 July 1870

Emil Orlik was a German-Jewish artist who spent time in Japan in 1900 and again in 1911, and who produced a number of works in a style influenced by ukiyo-e.

Born in Prague in 1870, Orlik studied art in Munich, and later became active as a painter, lithographer, and etcher. He worked as an illustrator for several German publications, as well as designing books, posters, and theatre sets.

He traveled to Japan in 1900, where he studied woodblock printing, and after his return to Europe played some role in reviving color woodblock printing there. He moved to Berlin in 1905, and took up a job at the School for Graphic and Book Art of the Museum of Decorative Arts, where he remained until his retirement in 1930. While employed by the School, he traveled again to Japan in 1911, as part of a longer voyage visiting Russia, Egypt, Nubia, China, and Korea; he also visited New York in 1924.

Orlik died in 1932. A number of his works are today in the collection of the Center for Jewish History in New York City.

References

• Database entries, Center for Jewish History collections database.