Portrait of the Artist's Sister-in-Law, Elise Reifenberg (Gabriele Tergit), c. 1928
Adèle Reifenberg was born into a Jewish family in Berlin, Germany in 1893 and studied art in her native city under Lovis Corinth and in Weimar. Her work was widely exhibited in Berlin in the 1920s and 1930s and she was highly regarded as a teacher. In 1934, her work (together with that of her artist husband, Julius Rosenbaum), was included in the 'Exhibition of German-Jewish Artists' Work: Painting, Sculpture, Architecture' (1934) organised at the Parsons Gallery, London, which included 86 artists suffering persecution under the Nazi regime. The couple fled to London in 1939, where exhibiting opportunities were limited during the war, but both exhibited in 1943 in the 'Artists Aid Jewry' exhibition at the Whitechapel Art Gallery. Postwar, in 1948, they established a successful painting school, exhibiting alongside their pupils as the 'Belsize Group'. The school closed after Rosenbaum's death in 1956 but Reifenberg continued to paint and exhibit, working in a late Impressionist manner, and showing frequently with Ben Uri Gallery, including a joint exhibition with Rosenbaum (and Ruth Collet), and a solo show at in 1973. She also had a solo exhibition at the Margaret Fisher Gallery, shortly before her death in London, England in 1986. Her work is in public and private collections in Britain and Germany, including the Ben Uri Collection and the Berlin City Art Gallery. Adèle Reifenberg's nephew is the German artist Dodi Reifenberg.
