Photo (left): The cover of Israel Tsvaygenbaum’s book, My Secret Memory: The Memoir of the Artist features the artwork for his painting, Angel Of Roses.

Photo (right): “Prayers at the Tree of Life” Painting by Israel Tsvaygenbaum.

 

By MARILYN SHAPIRO

Israel Tsvaygenbaum, an Albany-based artist, views what happened in Israel on Oct. 7 as a painful reminder of his own family history. His father was 29 when he fled Poland in 1939 to escape the Nazis. The remaining family members were murdered in Auschwitz-Birkenau. “I have always reflected in my paintings the theme of the Holocaust and, in general, human tragedy, the loss of people close to us,” said the Russian-American artist, whose work is considered part of the “magic realism art movement.”

ISRAEL TSVAYGENBAUM

Life Influences

The events of Tsvaygenbaum’s life are chronicled in his 2023 memoir, My Secret Memory: The Memoir of the Artist, where he describes the process of how the ideas for creating his paintings were born. The book outlines key events in his childhood that shaped his paintings later in life, including frank and often graphic descriptions of violence and sexual encounters. These dramatic events and the tragedies of his own family members, particularly the loneliness and sadness experienced by his father as a result of the Holocaust, are the main themes. “I pour my soul into my painting,” Tsvaygenbaum said in the YouTube eponymous video. Most importantly, his art represents universal themes of kindness, peace, and shared humanity.

The artist finds comfort and purpose in his artwork. In our interview, he cited three of his works that are partially the result of living though the Second World War and its lead-up. In The Holocaust, blood red angels on a darker red background are joined by two white doves. The Tree of Weeping depicts draped hooded figures with their arms outstretched in supplication. Prayers at the Tree of Life portrays an Orthodox Jewish man praying to a tree made of bright branches. “At some point in our lives our prayers turn to a Tree of Life where each branch represents the prayers of a generation,” he said, “We all have our Tree of Life that hears our prayers.”

Inspirations

Immediately following the Oct.7, 2023, Hamas massacre, Tsvaygenbaum began work on his current painting, The Broken Jar. It features a fractured vase holding red roses on a background of yellow sunflowers. “Their yellow color represents the anxiety that the Israeli people are now experiencing while waiting for their kidnapped loved ones,” he said. “The hearts of the Israelis are now broken like the jar in my painting, but their souls, like those roses, have preserved their integrity, unity and harmony.”

Tsvaygenbaum was born in 1961 in Derbent, Dagestan, Russia, the youngest child of a Polish Holocaust survivor and a “Mountain Jew” a mother who was a descendent of Persian Jews from Iran. As a result, the Tsvaygenbaum children were raised in a Jewish household, a mixture of Ashkenazi and Sephardic traditions and customs. Although often struggling financially, the family kept a kosher home and observed Shabbat and all religious holidays. His father, respected for his erudition and prior religious education, served as a “spiritual bridge” to fellow survivors who had settled in Derbent.

Adding to the young Israel Tsvaygenbaum‘s cultural experiences were his interactions with both Christian and Muslim neighbors. “The memory of these people prompted me to create some of my paintings,” he said. “They were sources of my inspiration.”

Tsvaygenbaum’s artistic bent and talents began at an early age. By eight years old, he was asking his parents to purchase painting supplies so he could capture important moments on canvas. After earning both undergraduate and graduate fine art degrees from Russian art institutions he reports that from 1983 to 1985, he pursued an acting career, which inspired him to paint pictures of fellow thespians. In 1986, Tsvaygenbaum organized an artist’s group called, “Coloring,” an association of artists based in Derbent.

Tsvaygenbaum’s art was well-received throughout Russia, he reports. He added that his paintings are displayed in both museums and private collections.

Success Here

In 1994, he held two solo shows in Moscow. They were to be his last shows in his home country. The escalating conflict between Russian and Chechnya, which bordered Dagestan, made it too dangerous for Tsvaygenbaum and his family to remain in the war-torn area. Later that year, he, his wife Katerina, their three daughters, ranging in age from 14 months to nine years; his mother and his maternal grandmother immigrated to the Capital District to be close to his brother, a Saratoga Springs resident. The family settled in Albany, as he felt the bigger city would provide more opportunities to build a new life.

“Time has showed that I was right,” he remarked. He reports that he has enjoyed a successful career. Many of his extensive oeuvre have been exhibited in Russia and the United States and are part of private collections in nine countries, including Austria, Bulgaria, France, Israel, Netherlands, Russia, the United Kingdom and the U.S. Tsvaygenbaum’s two graphical works (ink on paper) The Sarcasm of Fate and The Grief of People are in the Museum of Imitative Arts, Derbent, Dagestan, Russia. 

In 2001, Tsvaygenbaum began collaboration with Judy Trupin, a choreographer and poet, who created dance compositions based on nine of Tsvaygenbaum’s paintings.

The “Worlds in Our Eyes” dances, created to elicit memories of Jewish life in Eastern Europe and Russia while touching on universal themes, have been performed in several cities in New York State. Tsvaygenbaum dedicated the performances to the people of his home city, Derbent.

Tsvaygenbaum and his wife Katerina have been members of Temple Israel in Albany since 1994. Their family’s life has been closely intertwined with both secular modern life and religion. “The Jewish religion helped me keep both my cultural identity and uniqueness and not get lost in a big bouquet of different ethnicities,” he writes in My Secret Memory. “[It] has helped us to preserve the beauty of our traditions that we inherited more than three thousand years ago.”

The artist reports that he is especially grateful and proud that his love for Judaism has been carried on by his children and grandchildren. “I always wanted to pass the baton that I got from my parents,” he said in My Secret Memory. “I am happy to realize I made it.” He and Katerina’s three daughters, all graduates of Albany High School now with professional careers, have instilled Jewish values and traditions into their own families.  Six out of eight of his grandchildren attend Jewish schools.

“Everything in this world is interconnected,” Tsvaygenbaum wrote in My Secret Memory. He hopes what he has created from his patience and his passion for the conceived idea, and his dedication to work will make the world a kinder place.

He added that just like the roses in his current painting, The Broken Jar, he hopes that his life and legacy will reflect integrity, unity and harmony.

Marilyn Shapiro, formerly of Clifton Park, is now a resident of Kissimmee, Fla. Keep Calm and Bake Challah: How I Survived the Pandemic, Politics, Pratfalls, and Other of Life’s Problems is the newest addition to her line-up of books. It joins Tikkun Olam, There Goes My Heart and Fradel’s Story, a compilation of stories by her mother