Across the Former Soviet Union Arts Journal Published in Ukraine Helping Jewish Culture Grow Up

The rebirth of Jewish culture in Ukraine is still in its childhood.

But the Institute of Judaic Studies and its Yegupets journal are doing their part to help it mature.

The Kiev-based institute specializes in organizing and coordinating research in the field of Jewish culture and history in Ukraine, and devotes approximately one-third of its activity to publishing.

With the financial backing of organizations like the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, the institute has been producing the bilingual Russian-Ukrainian Yegupets for the past four years, now publishing it twice a year.

The thick, 400-page journal is a treasure trove of Jewish works from the past and present. The compilation typically includes an offering of essays, prose and poetry — both from Ukraine and abroad — plus a fine arts section.

“The journal is called Yegupets,” or Little Egypt, “because that reflects Ukraine’s position as a place where the Diaspora lives,” said the institute’s director and publisher of Yegupets, Leonid Finberg, making a biblical reference. “The aim is to produce a compilation of works that reflect the cultural activity here.”

Just as the shape of that Jewish population is changing, Yegupets has evolved.

“At first it was not very professional, but now it’s more serious and attracts professional-level texts as well as poem, prose and arts features,” Finberg said. “It’s organized around the center of Jewish intellectual life in Ukraine, but we’re developing our contacts with people, both contributors and readers, in different countries, too.”

Vol. 10 also includes such diverse themes as the first-time Ukrainian translation of Polish psychologist and writer Janusz Korczak’s “Alone With God: Prayers for Those Who Don’t Pray” and a political essay, “Israel and the Arab-Israeli Conflict” in Russian by David Harris, executive director of the American Jewish Committee.

Finberg said Yegupets is comfortable delving into the past in the form of Holocaust memories, but also in exploring new, experimental works — such as Ukrainian Anna Lisovaya’s “Spirit and Letter,” to be included in the soon-to-be released Vol. 11.

“Anna produces some of the best contemporary prose on Jewish topics in Ukraine,” he said.

Finberg said the diversity and weight of the works stems in part from the tradition of Soviet-style newspapers like Novy Mir, which catered to the intellectual set. But the Yegupets format also results from the people who make up its editorial team.

One is Zheni Aronov, the journal’s senior editor. A doctor by training with a specialty in immunology until retiring a decade ago, Aronov continues to pursue his other specialty — medical history — and works out of the Museum of Medicine in Kiev. And he writes.

Aside from editing and contributing to Yegupets, Aronov also published “Stories From Different Years” in 2002 as a collection of his short stories written between 1966 and 2001.

The journal has become well-known enough in the region and in both Israel and the United States that there are no problems soliciting content — which isn’t limited to literature and politics.

Irina Klimova, who serves as editor of the fine arts section, is quick to point out the fine arts coverage offered by Yegupets and the institute.

In addition to the print publication, which includes color photographs of works by artists featured in the journal, Klimova, an artist and designer, also helps stage exhibitions by Jewish artists; some 30 to date at galleries around Kiev. Moreover, the institute’s Web site at www.judaica.kiev.ua also includes a virtual art gallery and information on and links to the region’s Jewish artists.

Klimova said one of the most positive aspects of working with Yegupets is not only the ability to help “resurrect” Jewish culture in Ukraine, but also to rediscover some of those individual Jewish artists who’ve faded from the limelight over the years.

Klimova offered the examples of Kiev native Ina Lesovaya, who had become better known in her adopted city of Moscow than at home, and of Yuli Shanus, who was making a living through commercial art but who hadn’t held an exhibition in more than 20 years.

The institute staged exhibitions in Kiev for both artists.

The circulation of Yegupets is only 2,000. Most copies remain in Ukraine, though many are sent abroad as gifts or to libraries and institutions in Israel and the United States.

Despite the small circulation, “Yegupets represents one of the best publications in the tradition of the Russian ‘fat journals,’ ” said reader Martin Horwitz, director of the Jewish Community Development Fund in Russia and Ukraine.

“It’s got at least two to three quality pieces every issue,” Horwitz continued. “No. 9 had an essay on the Ukrainian avant-garde.” Until that piece came out, he added, it “had been locked away in some sort of vault.”