Nyna Polumbaum, pictured here with her first ever painting, died on Sept. 10. Photo by Maddie Bockus
Brookline artist Nyna Brael Polumbaum died last week at 102 years old.
Her daughter Judy Polumbaum, who was with Nyna in her Brookline home when she died of heart failure the morning of Sept. 10, described her as “an activist, an artist and a fighter.”
Nyna Polumbaum was born March 28, 1924, in New York City to her Belarusian mother and Ukrainian father. At 12 years old, she was accepted into the first-ever class of New York’s High School of Music, now known as the famous LaGuardia High School. She went on to study architecture at Cooper Union and completed two of three years in pursuit of a master’s in drama at the Yale School of Fine Arts.
Nyna left her studies early to move to York, Pennsylvania, with her husband, Ted Polumbaum, whom she met at Yale. Ted went on to become a journalist and freelance photographer, working with LIFE magazine and The New York Times, among others. The couple eventually moved into a Coolidge Corner apartment in 1950.
With her architectural training, she designed her family’s mid-century modern home in a cooperative community in Lincoln and renovated a five-unit Cambridge apartment into a single-family home.
“She was a renaissance woman,” said her son, Ian Polumbaum. “She was very learned in a lot of things despite never finishing school.”
Seven years after her husband died, Nyna found her way back to Brookline in 2007. Nyna, Ian and his children shared her home in Brookline Village, which she renovated to her tastes.
But she didn’t slow down.
On Nyna’s 102nd birthday, the family planned to attend a No Kings protest, nationwide demonstrations against the Trump administration, in Newton when Nyna was hospitalized for pneumonia. Judy said they took her sign with her and participated from her hospital bed.
“She was a force of nature,” Judy said.
Ian said his first vivid childhood memory was at a demonstration his mother helped organize in his hometown of Lincoln against the Vietnam War.
While Nyna’s artworks weren’t necessarily political, some collections drew inspiration from personal concerns. One collection, titled “Save Life on Earth,” collaborated with more than 20 other artists, all advocating against nuclear war.
Nyna’s activism portfolio includes a 1977 collection, “Artists in Exile,” which showcases works by artists living in exile, many of whom Nyna met on a visit to Chile before the 1973 U.S. military-backed coup.
As reported on previously by Brookline.News, Nyna’s most recent exhibition — “her last hoorah,” as Judy described it — was titled “Manipulation” and housed in Gallery 93 of the Brookline Senior Center. “Manipulation” showcased 20 prints Nyna made in the 1990s. She created original artwork, mostly paintings, scanned them into a computer and used early Photoshop to manipulate the images, which she then had professionally printed.
“She was a restless, curious artist who was always ready to try the next thing,” said Gallery 93 curator Hilary Tolan.
Indeed, when Nyna began dealing with arthritic pain in her hands, she made the switch from intaglio printing — where ink sinks into carved grooves — to digital.
In her final weeks, Judy said, Nyna found [menial tasks] difficult. A lifelong New York Times reader, she dropped her subscription from daily papers down to the Sunday paper, spending the week reading each section with a magnifying glass.
“She hated not being able to be really engaged in the world,” she said.
While Judy said her mother’s death was unsurprising because of her age, it still felt sudden.
“We thought she’d just go on and on,” Judy said.
Still, even in passing, Judy said she believed her mother tried to avoid inconveniencing anyone.
“I have this conceit that mom didn’t want to interfere with any kind of commemorations,” Judy said of her mother’s death one day before both the 25th anniversary of 9/11 and the anniversary of the 1973 Chilean coup.
Judy said her mother, who could be considered “bossy,” had one main direction after her death: “She didn’t want people moping around in black,” Judy said. She said her mother believed life should be celebrated and, as an artist, she valued color and beauty in everything.
Nyna was cremated, and her remains are to be buried next to those of her husband in Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge, in their plot next to a pond.
Nyna is survived by her three children, Judy, Ian and Miki, as well as four grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.
This story is part of a partnership between Brookline.News and the Boston University Department of Journalism’s Newsroom program.