Judaica Posters collection at the Blavatnik Archive Foundation
Access: https://www.blavatnikarchive.org/collection/judaica-posters
The fully digitized collection includes 74 items: 73 color posters and 1 map, dating 1894-1970. The items are subdivided into four groups: Soviet propaganda posters in Yiddish and Russian (1917-1940); Soviet theater and concert posters in Yiddish and Russian (1924-1970); movie posters from USSR and Mandate Palestine in Russian, Yiddish, French, English, and Hebrew (1926-1932); Yugoslav antisemitic propaganda posters in Serbian (1941-1942).
The largest group—Soviet propaganda posters in Yiddish and Russian—includes 25 items. These posters were published by the Bolshevik party propaganda organs to promote Soviet policies among the Jews such as transforming the Jews into “active builders of socialist society” (https://www.blavatnikarchive.org/item/22962).
6 Soviet theater and concert posters in Yiddish and Russian advertise theatrical performances, concerts, and literary evenings in various USSR cities, starting from Russian-Yiddish comedy show in Poltava in the 1920s (https://www.blavatnikarchive.org/item/22954), to the 1936 Moscow literary evening celebrating the 100th anniversary of classical Yiddish writer Mendele Mocher Sforim (https://www.blavatnikarchive.org/item/22959), and to Yiddish song concert in Moscow in 1970 (https://www.blavatnikarchive.org/item/34423).
13 movie posters from USSR and Mandate Palestine in Russian, Yiddish, French, English, and Hebrew advertise movies, which run at the “Eden” summer movie theater in Tel Aviv, in 1926-1930, including Hollywood pictures and films produced in USSR. There are also posters advertising one of first the Soviet sound movies, “The Return of Nathan Becker,” released in 1932 in both Russian and Yiddish (https://www.blavatnikarchive.org/item/22971).
23 Yugoslav antisemitic propaganda posters in Serbian were a part of a Nazi antisemitic propaganda campaign during the World War II, based on a “theory” of Judeo-Masonic conspiracy to win domination of the world. These posters were exhibited and distributed at the Grand Anti-Masonic Exhibition held from October 22, 1941 to January 19, 1942 in Belgrade, the capital of the Nazi Germany-established Military Administration Authority in occupied Serbia. These posters include the intimidating imagery of the conspirators and their weapons, such as the poster, “His Weapons: Democracy, Masonry, Communism, Capitalism” (https://www.blavatnikarchive.org/item/22977).
The Judaica Posters collection at the BAF opens a window on the twentieth-century most radical ideologies and policies toward the Jews, conceived and implemented by Communist regime in USSR in the 1920s-1930s and Nazi regime in Germany and Germany-occupied Europe in the 1940s. Ideological content of many posters is reinforced by the cutting-edge art created by leading avant-garde artists. Collection materials also reveal various forms of Jewish cultural life, including film, theater, literature, and music, in USSR and Mandate Palestine in the 1920s-1930s.
The Blavatnik Archive Foundation (http://www.blavatnikarchive.org) is a nonprofit foundation dedicated to preserving and disseminating primary resources that contribute to the study of 20th-century Jewish and world history, with a special emphasis on World War I, World War II, Soviet and interwar periods. The Archive was founded in 2005 by American industrialist and philanthropist Len Blavatnik, to reflect his commitment to his family heritage, to explore his interests in historical events and people, and to expand his support for primary source-based scholarship and education. Currently, the Archive’s holdings of over 90,000 items include video oral histories, postcards, photographs, posters, drawings and illustrations, diaries, letters and documents, periodicals, leaflets and books.