Siona Tagger was born on August 17, 1900, in Jaffa, to a Sephardic family whose ancestors had emigrated from Spain to the Netherlands, Germany, and Bulgaria before settling in Palestine. She attended the Yehili School for Girls and the Levinski Seminary, then studied art with Isaac Frenkel and Joseph Constantinovsky at Gymnasia Herzliya in Tel Aviv. Despite her parents' opposition, she continued her training at the Bezalel Academy of Fine Arts in Jerusalem before moving to Paris to further her artistic studies.
In the 1930s and 1940s, Tagger continued her career despite personal difficulties, including her marriage to Michel-Mordechai Katz and their divorce. She also served in the ATS (Auxiliary Territorial Service) and the Haganah during World War II.
Her work is characterized by watercolor and oil paintings depicting daily life in Eretz Yisrael, and she later added stained glass creations. Her style evolved from Orientalist influences to more contemporary depictions of Israel's pioneers and public figures, while remaining faithful to her Sephardic roots through portraits of women in her family and circle, such as that of her sister Shoshana.
In 1977, Siona Tagger was honored as a Yakir of Tel Aviv-Yafo for her contribution to the arts, and a street was named after her. She died on June 19, 1988, leaving a central artistic legacy in the history of Israeli art.
