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Artwork Tombstone
ArtistJennings Tofel (American, 1891–1959)
TitleThe Red Hand
Date1954
MediumOil on canvas
DimensionsOverall: 40 x 33 in. (101.6 x 83.8 cm)
Framed: 42 5/16 × 35 3/8 × 1 5/8 in. (107.5 × 89.9 × 4.1 cm)
Credit LineGift of Arthur & Anne Granick, Eskenazi Museum of Art, Indiana University
Accession Number97.45
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After emigrating from Poland, Jennings Tofel forged a successful artistic career in New York. Many of his paintings from the 1940s and 1950s obliquely address the trauma of the Holocaust. The Red Hand, depicting a tangled group of anguished figures, contains a probable reference to the Zohar, a work of medieval Jewish mysticism. The Zohar defines ten manifestations of God, known as Sefirot. The sefirah of gevurah (power or judgment) is associated with the color red, which dominates this composition. Jewish mysticism contends that while gevurah is necessary to ensure a just society, too much power can lead to evil. With this work, Tofel may have had the evil of the Holocaust, but also the justice survivors deserved, in mind.

Provenance research is ongoing for this and many other items in the Eskenazi Museum of Art permanent collection. For more information about the provenance of this artwork, please contact the department curator with specific questions.

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"The Red Hand | Collections Online." Collections Online. Sidney and Lois Eskenazi Museum of Art, Indiana University, 2025. https://artmuseum.indiana.edu/collections-online/browse/object.php?number=97.45