YEKHEZKL NAYSHLOS (EZEKIEL SCHLOSS)

YEKHEZKL NAYSHLOS (EZEKIEL SCHLOSS) (July 27, 1912-March 30, 1987)

            He was born in Dvinsk (Dinaburg, Daugavpils), Latvia.  He studied in religious elementary school, in the municipal Jewish high school, and later in the Jewish evening high school in Riga.  In 1929 he became active in the Bundist youth movement and served as chairman of the self-defense and sports organization named for Y. L. Perets in Riga.  Over the years 1930-1933, he co-edited the monthly Arbeter yugnt (Laboring youth), published by Bundist youth in Latvia.  In 1934 he served in the Latvian army, but he was arrested by the military for political activities.  After the fascist coup of Kārlis Ulmanis in 1934, he worked with the underground Latvian movement.  In 1936 he was forced to flee.  He went through Estonia and Sweden and immigrated to France and lived in Paris, where he was active in the Medem Club.  He contributed to an assortment of group exhibitions of graphic design, and he painted frescoes for the pavilion of the secular Jewish school at the Paris World Exhibition in 1937.  He co-edited (1938-1939) the Parisian Bundist daily newspaper Unzer shtime (Our voice) and Di ilustrirte velt (The illustrated world).  From 1940 he was living in New York.  He published (1941-1942) caricaturist drawings in Forverts (Forward) in New York.  Over the years 1942-1953, he was political caricaturist for the New York-based, French-language newspaper Vie de France (Life in France), Victoire (Victory), and France américaine (Franco-American), He also published caricatures in Anglophone newspapers and magazines: Herald Tribune, New York Times, Nation, and New Republic.  In 1948 he administered a graphic design show for the World Jewish Culture Congress at the Jewish Museum in New York.  With articles on theater, art, literature, politics, and Jewish issues, he contributed to: Arbeter yugnt and Naye tsayt (New times) in Riga; Unzer shtime and Di ilustrirte velt in Paris; and Der veker (The alarm) and Kultur un dertsiung (Culture and education) in New York; among others.  In album format he published: Tipn fun y. y. trunks “khelemer khokhomim” (Types from Y. Y. Trunk’s “Wise men of Chełm”) (Buenos Aires: Yidbukh, 1951), 10 pp.; in English, The E. Schloss Collection of Chinese Pottery Figurines (New York, 1963), 32 pp., with his own introduction and explanations of his figurine collection.  Aside from illustrations and drawings in magazines in a variety of languages as well as books in Yiddish, Hebrew, and English, he also did drawings for works by Sholem-Aleykhem, Y. L. Perets, and for many publications with biblical themes.  Many of these drawings were republished in all manner of Jewish journals in an assortment of countries.  He was active year after year at the Jewish Art Center of the World Jewish Culture Congress in New York.  He was a member of the administrative committee of the Jewish Culture Congress.  Nayshlos was art director of the Board of Jewish Education in New York and from 1942 editor of the English-language Jewish children’s magazine World Over, which the Board of Jewish Education published.  Among his pen names: Y. Nay and Y. Kesl.  He died in New York.

Source: M. Dluzhnovski, in Fraye arbeter-shtime (New York) (January 1, 1964).

Benyomen Elis