Boris Efimowitsch Efimov

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Boris Yefimov ( Russian Борис Ефимович Ефимов ; born September 28 . Jul / 11 October 1900 greg. In Kiev ; † 1. October 2008 in Moscow ) was a Russian cartoonist.

Life

Early years

Boris Efimovich Efimov was born under the name Boris Haimovich Friedland ( Борис Хаимович Фридлянд , occasionally also transcribed as Fridljand ) as the second son of a Jewish shoemaker on September 28th July. / October 11th 1900 greg. born in Kiev. A short time later his family moved to Belostok, then Russian , now Polish Białystok , where he grew up with his two years older brother Mikhail . During the First World War , the family fled the Germans and went back to the Ukrainian capital.

Efimov began studying law in Kiev in 1917 . Although endowed with a great talent for drawing, at this point he showed no ambition to earn his living as an artist. The October Revolution and the newly established balance of power thwarted his plans. After only a year he had to end his academic career and instead try to survive the painful period of the civil war unscathed. The rulers changed regularly; Atrocities by the Bolsheviks or the White Army were the order of the day. By drawing caricatures of politicians, Yefimov was able to let his emotions run free. His first professional work was published in 1919 in the Kiev Krasnaya Armiya .

After the Bolsheviks finally had control of the city in 1920, he came to terms with the new regime. This decision was much more difficult for him than for his brother, who was actively involved in the fight against the monarchical order, because Yefimov had worshiped the tsar for a long time. What they both had in common was that they changed their Jewish-sounding family name. Boris was now called Yefim with the surname Yefimov after his father, and Mikhail was called Koltsov .

Career advancement

From 1920 to 1921, Efimov designed posters and brochures in Kiev and Odessa for YugROSTA, a division of the CPSU propaganda organization Agitprop . A year later he moved to Moscow . His brother worked there as an editor at Pravda and offered him to draw caricatures for this newspaper. In this way, both of those who were very close to each other could work together. Jefimow's first work was very well received, so more could follow. Soon he was a sought-after caricaturist and worked regularly for newspapers such as Pravda, Izvestia and Krasnaya Zvezda, as well as for magazines such as Krokodil and Ogonyok, founded by his brother in 1923 . Mainly the respective cartoons dealt with international politics and sharply criticized the Western world. The publications in the newspaper Proschektor from 1924 to 1934 , in which he dealt with local social issues, are an exception . His drawings have been published regularly since 1931.

With Polititscheskije karikaturen (German Political Caricatures ), the first album with Efimov's caricatures was released in Moscow in 1924. The preface was written by Leon Trotsky , whom Yefimov first heard of when he was eighteen. The Izvestia editor-in-chief and publisher Yuri Steklov , however, was not enthusiastic about the fact that right at the beginning of the book an “L. Trotsky. July 20, 1924. ”was emblazoned: He only reluctantly agreed to the preface, which can be explained by Trotsky's incipient loss of power.

Shortly before he went into exile in Alma-Ata , the two met one last time in 1928. Despite this connection to Trotsky, who later became "Public Enemy No. 1" in Soviet propaganda, Yefimov remained unmolested. Trotsky was later portrayed by him as a murderer, traitor, fascist and collaborator with the Third Reich . As one of the country's leading caricaturists, Efimov was also involved in the denigration and distorted portrayal of other "anti-Soviet conspirators". His biting works against Nikolaj Bukharin , Karl Radek and other victims of Stalinism can only partly be explained by his obedience to orders from above. In a certain way they were an expression of the worldview prevailing at the time and also corresponded to Efimov's ideas.

Efimov's brother Mikhail was less fortunate. For inexplicable reasons he had fallen out of favor with Stalin. Boris Yefimov suspects in his memoirs that this happened after Koltsov ignored Stalin's warnings in 1923 and published a newspaper page with photos of Trotsky. Fifteen years later, according to Yefimov, the dictator's vengeance would overtake him. However, this representation simplifies the complex mechanisms of Stalinism, whereby its correctness or falsity cannot be proven. Boris and Michael met for the last time on December 12, 1938. A short time later, Michael was arrested in the Pravda editorial office by the Soviet secret police and executed in February 1940 as an alleged "enemy of the people". Usually the family members of "enemies of the people" were also withdrawn from circulation. An arrest warrant for Yefimov was already in place, but Stalin did not sign it and gave orders to leave him alone. One of the reasons for this leniency was that Stalin obviously liked Efimov's drawings and needed a talented and experienced cartoonist for his propaganda purposes. As early as 1937, through the then editor-in-chief of Pravda, Lew Mechlis , he had sent him the curious wish not to depict Japanese samurai with long teeth protruding from their mouths because this would violate the dignity of the Japanese.

The fact that Yefimov was awarded the Stalin Prize twice (1950, 1951) also testified to Stalin's favor .

After his brother's arrest, his main employer Izvestia dismissed him, but after eighteen months he found a permanent job again with Trud . Efimov continued to be one of the most important propagandists in the Soviet Union . During the Second World War he worked for an army newspaper and made several trips to the front, where his caricatures were distributed en masse in the form of handouts. One of the main points of attack were the National Socialists . Hitler first met Yefimov in the early 1930s when he was about to return from France to the USSR, stopping over in Germany. His first Hitler cartoon was created on the same day.

Jefimov's style was by no means particularly subtle, it offered exactly the clichéd art that one wanted to see in the leadership ranks: Nazis with raptor noses and long fingers, almost oozing with greed; fat, complacent and inactive politicians from other western nations as well as Soviet soldiers who valiantly fought alone against the fascist threat. These aggressive representations made waves on the other side, of course, and Hitler ordered him to be executed as soon as Moscow was taken.

After the Second World War

One of the great tasks that awaited Eefimov after the end of the war was the Nuremberg war crimes trials . Thanks to his trustworthiness, the trip to the West was made possible for him. He sat right in the courtroom and was able to caricature the accused criminals of the Nazi regime.

In 1947, Stalin's adviser Andrei Zhdanov contacted Yefimov and commissioned him with a new caricature that Stalin wanted as a first attack in the Cold War against the United States. The drawing should look like this: General Eisenhower arrives at the North Pole ready to fight with a large army and is asked by a simple American, “What's going on, General? Why the great military presence in this peaceful area? ”, To which he replied,“ Don't you see the Russian threat? ”. The Soviet side, which Yefimov was free to shape, he contrasted with the Americans, armed to the teeth , in the form of a poor and primitive Eskimo family . The next afternoon at three o'clock he received a call from Stalin who told him that he had to be ready at six o'clock. Normally it would have taken him all day, but Yefimov drew for his life, finished the caricature on time and saved himself from becoming the next victim of the Stalinist despotism. This in turn was satisfied and had nothing to add except a few small things.

After Stalin's death in 1953, Efimov's life under the new rulers became easier and more predictable again. He spent a lot of time at conferences, including traveling to China in the 1960s. His artistic skills were still in demand; in 1966 he worked as the lead editor at Agitplakat, an organization that produced propaganda posters. Three years later the book Boris Yefimow appeared in Izvestia , which presented many of his works. He was active for Pravda until 1980. He received recognition from Mikhail Gorbachev , who invited him to the Kremlin as the only president . In 1990, in his cartoon Stalin - the red god , he took a critical look at his former client in public for the first time. Eight years later he published the 318-page autobiography Moi Vek (German My Century ).

In old age his eyesight deteriorated. In 1999 he underwent eye surgery for a cataract , which at least partially restored his vision in his right eye.

Eefimov died three days after his birthday at the age of 108. He was cremated and buried about a month after his death in the Moscow Memorial Cemetery of the New Maiden Convent .

Awards

Publications

Caricatures and illustrations (selection)

Russian

  • Lico vraga ( Лицо врага , "The Face of the Enemy", 1931)
  • Caricaturea na službe oborony SSSR ( Карикатура на службе обороны СССР , "The Caricature in the Service of Defense of the USSR", 1931)
  • Fašizm - vrag narodov ( Фашизм - враг народов , "Fascism - Enemy of the Peoples", 1937)
  • Podžigateli vojny ( Поджигатели войны , "War Incendiary ", 1938)
  • Fašistskie interventy v Ispanii ( Фашистские интервенты в Испании , "Fascist Intervention Troops in Spain", 1938)
  • Mister Dollar ( Мистер Доллар , 1948)
  • Za pročnyj mir, protiv podžigatelej vojny ( За прочный мир, против поджигателей войны , "For a lasting peace, against the arsonists", 1950)

German

Books

  • Osnovy ponimanija caricature ( Основы понимания карикатуры , "General understanding of caricatures", 1961)
  • Sorok let. Zapiski chudožnika-satirika ( Сорок лет. Записки художника-сатирика , "40 years. Notes of a satirical artist", 1961)
  • Rabota, vospominanija, vstreči ( Работа, воспоминания, встречи , "Work, memories, encounters" 1963)
  • Mne chočetsja rasskazat ( Мне хочется рассказать , "I want to tell" 1970)
  • Rasskazy o chudožnikach-satirikach ( Рассказы о художниках-сатириках , "Tales about satirical artists")
  • Rovesnik veka ( Ровесник века , " Peer of the Century", 2001)
  • Desjat desjateletij ( Десять десятилетий , "10 decades", 2000, ISBN 5264004382 )

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Запись о рождении Бориса Фридлянда в метрической книге Киевского раввината за 1900 год ( ЦГИАК Украины. Ф. 1164. Оп. 1. Д. Л. 435об 454.-436. ). (rus)
  2. ↑ A number of sources point to the wrong date of birth. - September 15th jul. / 28 September 1900 greg. .
personal data
SURNAME Efimov, Boris Efimowitsch
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Ефимов, Борис Ефимович (Russian)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Russian cartoonist
DATE OF BIRTH September 28, 1900
PLACE OF BIRTH Kiev , Russian Empire
DATE OF DEATH October 1, 2008
Place of death Moscow , Russia