by Nathan Roi A wonderful example of cubist period art is a painting of the Russian poet Anna Akhmatova, by the avant-garde Jewish artist, Nathan Altman. When I visited Vinnitsa for the first time, few people, including the residents of Vinnitsa, knew that it was the home town of Altman before he left for Paris. From 1902 to 1907, he studied painting and sculpture at the Art College in Odessa and in 1906 had his first exhibition in the town. In 1910 he went to Paris where he studied at the Free Russian Academy, working in the studio of Vladimir Baranoff-Rossine, and was in contact with Marc Chagall, Alexander Archipenko and David Sternberg. In 1910, before the Russian revolution, he became a member of the group Soyuz Molodyozhi (Union of Youth). When speaking to some of the young people … Continue Reading
Russian Donors Forum Presents the First Report on Institutional Philanthropy in Russia
by Maria Chertok The report is the first attempt of its kind to capture a comprehensive picture of foundations in Russia. It combines statistical data, results of quantitative and qualitative research, expert opinions on the environment for foundations and some prognosis of how the foundations sector will develop in the future. The report also names the most significant results of 2010. Why this report was needed? Despite the significant growth of the foundation sector, there was very little reliable data available so it was pretty hard to comprehend the size of the sector, both in terms of number of institutions and funds involved. The Russian legislation and practice takes a very broad view on the idea of foundations when practically any charity can be named a foundation, so it is hard to … Continue Reading
Loving Your Neighbor
by Yoram Dori Va’ahavta lare’echa kamocha (“Love your neighbor as yourself” - Leviticus 19:18) is one of the golden rules in the Bible. It is also one of the basic precepts on which I and thousands of others like me were brought up from childhood. Sometimes I had the feeling that it was another brick in the wall of self-assurance that we are, indeed a chosen people - different from others - somehow better and more ethical. A recent Limmud FSU conference in Odessa taught me that there is sometimes a tangible meaning to the overworked expression. During the course of the conference I was asked to join a “home visit.” At first, I was not too clear about what was implied. What was the connection between Limmud and home visits? Were we going to visit young Odessa Jews in their homes and … Continue Reading
Ver Is Di Mezuzah?
by Yoram Dori Ver is di mezuzah? (“Where is the mezuzah?”) was the question at the heart of our tour of various Jewish sites in Ukraine, preceding the recent Limmud FSU festival in Odessa. After landing in Kiev, our first destination was Berdichev or in the language of Shalom Aleichem, Yehupetz, and we also found ourselves in Katrielevka. Our trip was in a modern mini-van, but the views from the window were of horse-drawn wagons which are still in use and which gave us the feeling that at any minute we would encounter Tuviya the milkman. A central issue in our discussions was - is there still a stetl called Anatevka? The answer, by the way, is no. This and the above, were just some of the many fictitious place names coined by the famous Jewish-Russian-Hebrew-Yiddish writer, Sholem … Continue Reading
Helping Holocaust Survivors in Odessa
by Nathan Roi The Hebrew writer, Shmuel Yosef Agnon, who won Israel’s first Nobel Prize (for literature in 1966) was born in 1888 in the small Ukrainian town of Buczacz in the province of Galicia. He visited the town again after the First World War in 1930, 22 years after he had left Buczacz via Odessa to Jaffa in 1908. His monumental novel, Oreach Nata Lalune - “A Guest for the Night” was published on April 7, 1939, five months before the outbreak of the Second World War. The chairman of the Nobel Prize Committee noted in his award speech that the book showed Agnon at the peak of his genius, and Prof. Dan Laor, head of the department of Hebrew Literature at Tel Aviv University, maintains that the book is the best creation of Hebrew literature in the 20th century. In the opinion of … Continue Reading
Limmud FSU Odessa
by Yoram Dori Every time I participate in a Limmud event for young Russian-speaking adults, it is a new experience. Although Limmud FSU in Odessa, which took place this November, was dedicated to the 20th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between Ukraine and Israel, it did not mean that the entire festival was built around it. Only one session (which I had the pleasure of attending) was dedicated to this topic and the remainder, in the best tradition of Limmud, were as varied as usual. Limmud FSU is not just the usual run-of-the-mill Jewish seminar, where it would be difficult to persuade participants to listen to endless debates about the political games of different organizations. Here at Limmud, the whole event pivots around the young participants, most of them … Continue Reading
Over 600 Participants Celebrate Limmud FSU Odessa
The most recent Limmud FSU Festival for young Russian-speaking Jews took place in Odessa, Ukraine, last week. More than 600 young adults from 14 countries, including Ukraine, Russia, Belarus, Moldova, USA and Israel, participated. Additionally, Limmud FSU successfully collaborated with the European Jewish Union bringing young adults from Germany, France, Belgium, Britain and even Gibraltar, to Odessa. Several well-known lecturers, journalists, actors, musicians and political figures came to Odessa specially to participate in this festival. One highlight was the attendance of Andrei Makarevich, a famous Russian rock-musician, who at the Gala Opening, sang a number of his songs translated into Hebrew. Other prominent speakers included Michael Goldovsky, Head of the Jewish Agency Office in Odessa; … Continue Reading
Jews of Siberia
Filed under In Case You Missed, Life in the FSU Countries, PresenTense Magazine
Jews of Siberia: in the jewish autonomous region by Jason Pressberg The Soviet Union was a terrible place to be a Jew, and Siberia was terrible place to be no matter what your background was. In 1934, Stalin created the “Jewish Autonomous Region” in Siberia. It was his attempt to solve the “Jewish question.” While a small number of Jews had been forced to Siberia under the Czarist government, Stalin took Jewish settlement in Siberia to a new level. Yiddish advertisements encouraging Jewish migration promised a better life for those who went willingly to this new region, where Jews would have autonomy and Yiddish heritage and socialism would predominate. In a historical anomaly, a small number of Jews even migrated from the United States. Until around 150 years ago, Siberia was mostly … Continue Reading
Camps for Volunteerism
Camps for Volunteerism: reshaping the future by Anna Litovskaya While having tea with my groupmate Olga Savchuk at Paideia (The European institute of Jewish Studies in Sweden), we started sharing our backgrounds. I had just graduated from the International Relations department of the Linguistic University, Russia, while Savchuk is an ecology student at the Kyiv Mohyla Academy. Yet we had something in common: the experience of going abroad to volunteer at Jewish camps. I did social work in Spain and Israel, some farming in the Czech Republic and Russia, and volunteered as an interpreter, while she had worked as an educator for Jewish camps every summer. Then we came up with an idea: to create a volunteer Jewish summer camp that would reshape Jewish life in Ukraine. The vision behind the … Continue Reading
Hefzibah and Tel Am Leaders Visit Dnepropetrovsk School
Dnepropetrovsk, Ukraine - The Levi Yitzchak Schneerson Day School in Dnepropetrovsk, which is part of the Ohr Avner Chabad educational network, hosted a visit by the heads of the Israeli “Hefzibah” and “Tel Am” educational programs in the CIS and Baltic countries. Under the “Hefzibah” program, Israeli teachers are invited to Jewish schools outside of Israel to improve the quality of teaching of the Hebrew language, as well as aiding in the formation of students' Jewish identity. The “Tel Am” program is for the in-depth study of Hebrew and Judaism for elementary grade students according to a unique methodology developed in Canada. “Tel Am” offers teacher training, methodological support, provides classes with visual aids, teaching materials, as well as workbooks and other … Continue Reading
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