Sheba Jacobson

Seeking Photo, Biography, and quality artwork by Sheba Jacobson. Contact us. Thank you.

Milwaukee census has a Sheba Jacobson birth record below.

BORN: About 1898 in Minnesota

If accurate, she was living in Whitefish Bay, WI at 42 years old.

DIED: (She was still living in 1991 at age 93

Wisconsin Painter and Sculptor.

She studied art and painting at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee - about mid 1940s (?)

Sheba Jacobson’s work has been exhibited at the “Wisconsin Women in the Arts” in 1972 and Wisconsin Artists: A Celebration of Jewish Presence” in 1994.

Excerpt Below from Dec. 11,1975 - Wisconsin Jewish Chronicle, Milwaukee, WI - page 23

Artist Sheba Jacobson casts her Ideas in bronze. She has only been creating bronze sculptures for two years. Her work is being presented through Dec.22 (1975) in the Center's one-woman show, The petite woman with the wide smile traces her beginnings in art to experiences as a kindergarten teacher. "In telling stories, I illustrated the characters with colored chalk on the blackboard," she recalled. "And I drew children's figures on the walls for my own. 

Often, you can find wax figures cooling in her bathtub or solidifying in her "At night you pour (the molten bronze into the model) is very exciting," Mrs. Jacobson said animatedly.

"The furnaces are belching out fire, the crucibles and tools are being heated and there are the masks and the asbestos gloves." Within a-couple of hours a bronze pouring, the shell can be cracked open and the rough edges are sandblasted to make them smooth. Most artists are thrilled when someone buys their work, but the first few pieces of sculpture that Sheba Jacobson sold made her miserable. "When somebody bought pieces of my work, I was very, very unhappy," she admitted, while sitting among her work in the JCC Nickoll Lounge. "There is a part of me in each. It was difficult to see them go."

Although Mrs. Jacobson has US. children," she continued. "When they became teenagers, I drew teenage figures. "You could say I grew up with them." Later, she studied art and painting at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. "I became interested in sculpture," she said, "but found it physical. So I went back to painting."

Another sculptor told her about an accredited school in Mexico, San Miguel de AUende, where Mrs. Jacobson studied for six months. Many of her bronze figures display this Mexican influence flowing' capes with large, sombrero-like hats atop giving the illusion of a full figure. However, even these figures are extremely, heavy and Mrs. Jacobson, whose animation and enthusiasm would certainly remove her from the category of "senior citizen," hires someone else to do the metal casting for her. Using her Milwaukee apartment as a studio, she uses a Wax-ceramic shell method of casting. Basically, the sculpture form is shaped with hot wax, which is then cooled.

A ceramic form is made, then wax is melted out, and the molten bronze is poured in.  Because the mold has to be cracked, all of her sculptures are "one of a kind." A green patina is then applied because "it looks like it's weathered," she said. "I like sculpture more than painting," she said without hesitation, "although painting is interesting and it's easier". It's the tactile quality of this (sculpting) that I like." Although much of the work in the JCC show is sculpture, including bronze menorahs, there also are recent paintings. 

"Artist Sheba Jacobson discusses the brass menorah and figures in her one woman show at the Jewish Community Center. The bronze caped figures gives the viewer a feeling of flowing movement".