Anatolii Kaplan

(1902 - 1980)

7754

Scholem Alejchem

Stempenju

Stempeniu

Dresden: Verlag der Kunst, 1967

730 x 510 mm. 30 lithographs

Edition: 125. Copy nr. 64

Anatoly Kaplan was born the son of a Jewish butcher in the small Byelorussian town of Rogachev. He started drawing at the local art school and after the revolution, only 17 years old, he was appointed a teacher at the same school. In 1921 he was sent to Petrograd/Leningrad to study at the Art Academy  from 1921 to 1926. Between 1927 and 1937 he travelled throughout the USSR. In 1937 he got a commission to design the Jewish department of the Leningrad Ethnographical Museum. He designed his first lithographs between 1937 and 1940 for the series Kasrilovka. From 1953 he took up illustrating the literary works of Sholem Aleichem. The lithographs for the story Stempenju were designed between 1963 and 1967. The series of 30 large lithographs tells the story of the unrequited love of the fiddler Jankele (known as Stempenju) for his Rochele. The images are monumental and have a look of frescos rather than of book illustrations. The contours are fuzzy evoking a dreamy atmosphere. The borders do not show rectangular forms but undulate, an effect acquired by using pieces of ripped paper on the edges of the lithographic stone. The series was quite popular and was shown in a number of exhibitions. Kaplan’s art had quite an influence on the future generation of Leningrad artists. the lithographs were also used as book illustrations.     

References: 

Munich 1967

Suris 1972, pp 186-201

Leipzig 1989, pp. 56-59

Mayer 1990, pp. 158-177

GRM, 2003, pp. 24-25