Mark Zhitnitski
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Mark (Meer) Solomonovich Zhitnitski (Mogilev (Belarusian: Mahilyov) in the former Russian Empire, now Belarus - 1993, Tel Aviv) was an Israeli and Belarusian artist and graphic artist, member of the Union of Artists of the USSR until 1971, also member of the Union of Artists of Israel.
Mark Zhitnitski finished four classes of the secular school "Talmud Torah". He came from a poor background. His father was a shoemaker and died at the front in East Prussia during the First World War. Zhitnitski, the eldest of five children practiced various occupations from the age of 12 to support the family financially. After the October Revolution of 1917, a civil war was raging in the former Russian Tsarist Empire. The 15-year-old Zhitnitski, convinced of the ideals of the revolution, joined the Red Army, where he served for five years. In Petrograd, he first completed a military-political course and studied at the “Krunt” artistic studio (Krasnoarmeiskii universitet, Eng. University of the Red Army).
After his demobilization in 1923 he worked as a laborer in Mogilev. His first wife was Serafima Isaakovna Ėitingon (until 1930). With her he moved to Moscow and graduated from the Workers' Faculty of Art (Rabfak - Rabochii fakul’tet).
In 1925 he began studying in the graphics department at the Higher Artistic-Technical Institute (WChUTEIN, Russian ВХУТЕИН, long form: Высший художественно-технический институт) in Moscow. There he was a student of Vladimir Favorskii and Lev Bruni, among others. Zhitnitski participated in student exhibitions with his graphics and sculptures. He finished his studies in 1932.
In 1933 he was appointed editor-in-chief of the Belarusian State Publishing House (Белорусском государственном издательстве), where he illustrated numerous books by Belarusian, Ukrainian and Jewish authors, such as Yanka Mavr, Ales' Yakimovich, Izi Kharik, Yakub Kolas, Moishe Kul'bak, Petro Panch. He participated in many exhibitions with his graphics and paintings and received numerous awards for his illustrations. In the same year he married Nina (Nekhama) Levina from Uzda Stetl and in 1934 their daughter Lara (Larisa) was born.
In 1936 Zhitnitski was arrested along with the director and seven fellow artists of the publishing house on charges of membership of "a counter-revolutionary Trotskiist group." He was sentenced to 10 years in a penal and labor camp.
In 1937, he arrived at the Gulag in Ukhta (Ukhtpechlag, Ukhtinsko-Pechorsky lager') in northwestern Soviet Russia, with prisoners having to walk 760 km of the journey (Kotlas to Ukhta) in winter conditions. As a professional artist, Zhitnitsky got a job in the theater of the city of Ukhta (he replaced the released artist and prisoner I. V. Alekseev), where, among other things, he designed theater sets. He also worked in an artist's workshop.
Zhitnitski shared a room with sculptor Nikolai Aleksandrovich Bruni and helped sculptor Gorshkov with complex molding and casting of Aleksander Pushkin sculpture designed by Nikolai Bruni. In addition, he witnessed Bruni being arrested and sent to Ukhtarka, where he was subsequently shot.
In 1941 Mark Zhitnitski was sent to general labor. He worked in the quarry of a brick factory, as a loader in a gypsum factory, in peat mines, in sawmills, and as a lathe operator in an oil mine. In 1943, he was recalled from the mine and sent to the theater to create the play "The Russian People" by Konstantin Eggert, directed by Konstantin Simonov, a prisoner.
Influenced by reports from the Nazi-occupied territories about the atrocities committed against the Jewish population and worrying about his family, he made a series of drawings. Characteristic of these drawings is the obligatory presence of children. The administrator of the theater kept a folder with the drawings.
Zhitnitski worked as a loader in a plaster factory for seven months. He then returned to the art workshops and worked there until his liberation in September 1946.
After his return to Belarus, he had no right to stay in Minsk and was therefore registered in Pukhovichi. He learned of the death of his wife, his mother, his two sisters and their families in the ghettos of Minsk and Mogilev, and of his brother at the front. Nina Glebko, the wife of the Belarusian poet Peter Glebko, who had taken in Mark's daughter Lara during the war, refused to return her to her father. Zhitnitski married the younger sister of his dead wife Nina, Basia. Shortly after, their son Itzhak was born. Moscow and Minsk artists lobbied the Supreme Soviet for Mark Zhitnitski, after which he was allowed to live in Minsk again. There he worked in the satirical magazine "Vozhyk". He also painted a painting about the Minsk ghetto.
In March 1949 he was arrested again, imprisoned for two months and sentenced in absentia by a special commission of the MGB (Ministry of State Security (Soviet Union)) to life exile in Igarka (Krasnoyarsk region). His wife and son joined him, and they lived there together in a small house on the bank of the Yenisei River.In exile Zhitnitski continued to occupy himself with illustrations, he drew and painted. His paintings "First Settlers" ("Первые поселенцы") and "Ice drift on the Yenisei" ("Ледоход на Енисее") were in the Igarka Museum of Regional Studies (in 1962 they burned down together with the museum). In 1955 he was allowed to return to Belarus, but again he was not allowed to settle in Minsk. In 1956 he was rehabilitated and the case was closed for "lack of evidence". In 1958 his daughter Alla was born. He worked on journals and magazines, as well as illustrations and graphics. He also taught book design in a school of printing.
Zhitnitski created a number of works on Jewish themes. Firstly, he worked on the theme of the Holocaust: graphics about the Minsk Ghetto such as "Pit", "The Last Way", "Jubilee Square", "Longing for Life (Nina)", "The Avengers. Unit 106", etc. On the other hand, he created graphic series based on the works of Jewish writers such as Moishe Kulbak (12 works), Izi Harik (8 works) and Sholom Aleichem (29 works). He also created a cycle about the Gulag (10 works) and the cycle "Khatyn" (12 works). His exhibitions were held in Minsk, Mogilev, Vilnius and Moscow. In 1963, in honor of its sixtieth anniversary, the Artists' Union held an exhibition of his works in Minsk, most of which included Jewish themes. Foreign Jewish newspapers such as "Folksshtime" (Warsaw), "Naye Pres" (Paris) and "Maariv" (Tel Aviv) wrote about the exhibition. He also organized exhibitions in the Minsk Writers' House on the 70th anniversary of Moishe Kulbak and Izi Kharik in 1968. In 1967, his works celebrated the Israeli victory in the Six-Day War.
Since 1957 he wrote memoirs about his life. Published in the Moscow magazine "Sovietish Heymland" was a Yiddish-language autobiographical account called "A Raid on Loew" about the Civil War.
In 1971 Zhitnitski emigrated to Israel with his family. He created several series of drawings, for example, "The Wailing Wall", "Megilat Ruth", 15 illustrations to the works of Bashevis-Singer, 25 graphic sheets about the Gulag. He also collaborated on journals and magazines, published drawings and articles. He had successful exhibitions in Israel and the USA.
Mark Zhitnitski died in 1993 in Tel Aviv.
Personal Exhibitions[edit]
Yad Vashem, Jerusalem 1974 (together with the artist I. Kuzkovski).
Beit Emmanuel, Ramat Gan 1972.
Beit Sokolov, Tel Aviv 1972.
Beit Bnei Brit, Tel Aviv 1975.
Museum of Bat Yam 1985.
Haaretz Museum, Tel Aviv 1978.
Museum of the University of Wisconsin, USA 1987.
Sources
М. Zhitnitski, "Iz glubin pamjati" (From the dephts of memory). Evrejskij Kamerton. 2003, Tel Aviv, Israel
М. Zhitnitski, "‘Nikolai Bruni‘, Khudozhniki v nevole" ("‘Nikolai Bruni‘ Artist in Imprisonment"). Novoe russkoje slovo. USA, 1973
B. Zhitnitskaja. Zhizn‘ prozhitaja nadezhdoj (Das Leben mit Hoffnung gelebt). Ramat-Gan, Israel, 1997.
M. Schneider. „Syn svoego naroda. Interv'ju.“ (Son of his people. Interview). Krug, Tel Aviv, Israel, 1983.
A.Kandrusiewicz. Chelovek apaleni malankami. "Mahilyov Pravda", BSSR 1965.
G. Reles. Künstler Mark Zhitnitski. " My jashhe tut", Minsk 2000.
A. Litin. Istorija mogilevskogo evrejstva. Dokumenty i ljudi. Kniga 2 (History of the Mogilev Jewry. Documents and People. Book 2.)
A. Rubin. Stranicy perezhitogo (Pages of the experienced), 2019 ISBN 978-965-561-166-3
B. Pinkus. Russian and Soviet Jews. Annals of a National Minority. University of Beer-Sheva, 1986.
L. Schroeter, The Last Exodus, 1974. ISBN 0-87663-204-5
The Jewish Mother - City Minsk Vol 2 edited by Prof. S. Even-Shoshan, 1985 (Hebräisch)
Ukhta Khudozhniki (Ukhta Artists)
www.ukhta-lib.ru/resources/pub/rio/pub/Художники%20Ухты%20-%20Период%20ГУЛАГа.pdf
K. Eliashevich, „My v plenu u svoih“ ('We are prisons of our own people“)
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