Harold Tischler

HAROLD TISCHLER (1893-1993)

Harold Tischler studied art in high school in his home country of Russia and in 1910 began to study engineering at the University of Grenoble, France. He moved to New York in 1913 and during WWI served in the army. He was exposed to the enameling art of cloisonné in Hong Kong which stoked a lifelong career in craft of enameling.

Tischler spent 1927 to 1932 in Vienna to study at the Kuntsgewberschule. During his time in Vienna he studied with Michael Powlony and famed architect of the Wiener Werkstatte, Josef Hoffmann. 

Tischler moved to Vienna to study at the Kunstgewerbeschule with Michael Powolny and Josef Hoffmann. He spent five years in Vienna, from 1927 to 1932, returning to the United States during several summers to teach arts and crafts at summer camps in the Berkshire Mountains of western Massachusetts. During his stay in Vienna, Tischler received a letter from a young Edward Winter seeking his help in getting to Vienna to study enameling. Tischler was successful in getting Winter admitted to the Kunstgewerbeschule, where they studied and worked together as well as Edward Winter. Harold returned to New York in 1932 and produced high end goods and teach at the New School for Social Research.

He preferred to work quietly on his craft rather than teaching. Some of his work from that period was included in a 1937 exhibition of silver at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The same year, he also submitted several large enamels to the International Exposition in Paris. He was awarded a gold and silver medal. In 1935 Tischler visited Winter in Cleveland and was introduced to Winter’s enameling method, where the metal is dipped into liquid enamel leading to a more uniform coating. Tischler moved with his wife Sadye to Florida in 1969. He began to focus on fauna and flora over his previous abstract work. He continued to work in enamel until is death in 1993.