Margaret Ponce Israel (1929-1987) was a painter and ceramist who lived and worked in New York City. She was born in Cuba but brought to New York while still an infant. She attended the High School of Music and Art and went to Syracuse University, where she met and married Marvin Israel. Ponce Israel continued her studies in Paris when she and Marvin lived there for several years.
Her studio/home was a three-story building in Manhattan that was once a horse stable. A prolific ceramist, her Manhattan studio was overflowing with artwork. There she also housed a bantam rooster, guinea hens, doves, a rabbit, dogs, and a cat. Her works depict many of these animals, and an exhibit of her work, "A Domestic Bestiary," was at the Perimeter Gallery in Chicago in February, 1998. She taught at Parsons School of Design; Greenwich House Pottery; Music and Art High School for Gifted Children; Y.M.H.A.; all in NYC, and at Ecole des Beaux Arts; Stanley William Hayter Graphic Art Studio; Atelier 17; and, Academie de la Grande Chaumiere all in Paris, France.