Anna Avigail Brahms' exquisite doll characters have graced Christmas scenes in the windows ofSaks Fifth Avenue and Tiffany's and have been on display at Lincoln Center's Gallery of the Performing Arts in New York City and at Le Musee des Arts Decoratifs In the Paris Louvre.

Anna Brahms has been instrumental in taking dolls beyond the accepted concept of playthings and into the realm of an art form. Her work has been described as "ethereal and life-like" and "poetic."

Born in Israel, Anna Brahms studied art history at the University of Jersusalem. Upon graduation she began work as a television studio scene designer. An encounter with puppet-making there led her to join a puppet theatre and she spent the next two years traveling with the troupe, making puppets and performing.

Brahms was next commissioned to create life-like figures for the Ethnological Museum of Israel, representing the diversity of Jerusalem's residents. Here Brahms brought her puppet-making skills to bear, carving large life-like figures from wood and costuming them in authentic native dress. This massive project took three years to complete.

Brahms began experimenting with materials on her own and made her first doll from Fimo, a newly developed plastic clay. Her original doll creations were quickly bought up by a well-known Tel-Aviv Gallery, Bathsheba-Des Rothchild.

Brahms headed to Paris where on the banks of the Seine, for the first time she saw antique dolls and their delicacy of mood and period costume inspired her doll-making. Galleries throughout Europe began to carry her work and Europe's most exclusive toy store, L'Naime Bleu, featured her dolls.

A resident of the U.S. since 1981, Anna Brahms has exhibited widely in the Unites States, where her dolls acquired an immediate and devoted following. Commissioned by the Metropolitan Opera and Lincoln Center's Gallery of the Performing Arts, Brahms sculpted the family of Czar Nicholas II, Nijinsky dancing "Petrushka," and ballerinas from Stravinsky's "Firebird" for an exhibit on Russian art and culture.

For the The Museum of the City of New York's exhibit "Flights of Fancy," Brahms fashioned whimsical magical creatures--fairies and assorted woodland beings.

A later show at the Gallery of Performing Arts at Lincoln Center centered on the theme of French operas. For this, Brahms devised colorful characters from the operas "Tales of Hoffman," "Manon" and others. Soon after, Brahms was invited to exhibit at Le Musée des Arts Decoratifs, at the Louvre, in 1991.

Brahms' dolls stand between 22 and 30 Inches tall and are made of gauze on a metal armature, Fimo and acryllc paint. The costumes are sewn from antique fabrics. The hair is hand-dyed angora and the glass eyes are imported from Germany.

Anna Brahms' doll universe is peopled with fairies, angels, romantic young girls, dancers, circus performers, and sensual women.