Omri Amrany (born 23 May 1954) is an Israeli-American best known as a sculptor and painter, though he also works in architecture and wall tapestry art. Philosophically a humanist, the human figure is his main subject matter. He is co-founder of the Fine Art Studio of Rotblatt-Amrany in Fort Sheridan, Illinois, a studio that brings to the United States the aims and traditions of the Ateliers of Europe, as well as The Julia Foundation, a not-for-profit arts organization. Works More than 1,000 drawings, paintings, sculptures, wall tapestries, architectural designs, ceramics, murals, and installations, including Battle of the Amaleks (painting), Revealing, Quest for Freedom, and Against the Wind (sculptures); The Spirit: Michael Jordan (heroic sculpture); The Fusion (multi-sculpture installation for Gary, Indiana); Veterans Memorial Park (9-acre site in Munster, Indiana); and recently Dirk Nowitzki statue in Dallas sponsored by Mark Cuban Early life and work Born in the Scottish Monastery Hospital in Tiberias, Israel, and raised in Kibbutz Ashdot Yaakov in the Jordan Valley, Omri Amrany is the son of a Yemenite father and Russian mother, both Jewish immigrants during the post-World War I era. From his father he learned wood sculpting and ceramics. His mother was a clothes designer who influenced his sense of design. Amrany grew up sketching and painting as part of everyday life. During the Yom Kippur War, Amrany served as a paratrooper in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and saw a number of his fellow soldiers killed.Reentering civilian life, he dealt with post-combat stress by focusing on his artwork. In the late 1970s, influenced by his grandmother and aunt, he began to weave wall tapestries. He also began to paint on canvas in a storytelling style he labeled "tribal surrealism" – most notably in Battle of the Amaleks. This work, reminiscent of Picasso's Guernica in its ambition and intent, was Amrany's protest against the war in Lebanon. He humanized a landscape of Vadi Tzealim by integrating figures into the hills, stones, and Acacia trees, and told a story graphically through tanks and dead soldiers below the looming face of Moses. After attending college classes in Tel Aviv, Amrany was assigned by his kibbutz in 1984 to work with the Israeli Scouts organization in Haifa, overseeing the education of 5,000 youths in the vicinity of Mount Carmel. Pietrasanta In 1985 Amrany was sent by his kibbutz to study marble carving in Italy. He traveled to Pietrasanta, where