Olha Rapai-Markish<\/b> (1929\u20132012) was an artist and ceramic sculptor.<\/span><\/p>\n Olha Rapai was born in Kharkiv in 1929 to a family of the writer Peretz Markish\u00a0 and the translator Zinaida Yoffe. Her father was sentenced to death in the concocted \u201cJewish Anti-Fascist Committee case\u201d in 1952. Olha Rapai was also targeted by Stalinist repressions. Right after her father\u2019s execution, she was arrested, imprisoned and then exiled to the village of Dolgii Most in Krasnoyarsk Krai. In 1954, Olha Rapai was exonerated. She graduated from Kyiv Art Institute in 1956 and worked at Kyiv Experimental Ceramic Art Factory.\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n During her life, the artist created more than 5,000 sculptures, panels, reliefs, and vases. Olha Rapai is well known primarily for her works of monumental decorative architecture in Kyiv. Especially remarkable is her relief composition decorating the House of Trade (1967), the interiors of the Republican Children\u2019s Library (1980), of the Bohomolets Institute of Physiology (1982), of Mykola Kholodnyi Botanic Institute (1984), of the House of Art Collectives on Taras Shevchenko Boulevard (1987), and of the Vzuttia (Shoewear) Store in Podil (1989). A significant place in her artistic legacy belongs to sculptural works, which form biblical, mythological, theatrical, circus, and folklore cycles.\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n The artist spent her final years\u00a0 in Israel. She died in 2012 and was buried in Tel Aviv.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n The Center for Studies in History and Culture of East European Jewry holds unique materials from Olha Rapai\u2019s personal archive: letters, photos, documents, preparatory materials (overall more than 3,000 units of storage) as well as sculptural works, panels, and sketches (some of them need restoration).\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Olha Rapai\u2019s works are distinct for their particular magic appeal. They attract viewers from the first sight, immersing them into an incredible world, which is bright and joyful, often naively fancy, or sometimes contemplative and philosophical. Unfortunately, a part of Rapai\u2019s artistic legacy is lost. However, there is a great possibility that it has been preserved at least in slides, photo negatives, or photographs such as those present in the Center\u2019s collection. Some photos and slides are signed by the sculptor, yet quite a lot of images require a thorough study to identify the objects depicted on them and create a detailed illustrated catalogue of Olha Rapai\u2019s works. The first step in this direction has already been taken in 2007, when Dukh i Litera Publishing House issued the album <\/span>Olha Rapai-Markish: Life and Art<\/span><\/i>.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Art historians and biographers of the artist would be also interested in the collection of printed materials about her works, catalogues, posters, visitors\u2019 books from exhibitions, personal documents as well as papers related to Olha Rapai\u2019s arrest, exile, revision, and cancellation of her case due to the absence of corpus delicti.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Literary scholars and historians of Stalinist repressions may be interested in the materials related to the artist\u2019s father, the Yiddish writer Peretz Markish. Particularly noteworthy are Olha Rapai\u2019s letter to the Security Minister of the Russian Federation Viktor Barannykov requesting permission to get familiar with her father\u2019s criminal record, and handwritten materials form Peretz Markish\u2019s case from the former KGB archive.<\/span><\/p>\n The Center holds Olha Rapai\u2019s photo archive (albums with the photographs of the artist and her family). Quite a lot of images require the identification of persons in them.<\/span><\/p>\n Researchers are suggested to pay special attention to Olha Rapai\u2019s correspondence (more than 220 letters of 1968\u20132010). Among them are letters the artist wrote to her daughter Kateryna Rapai and a letter to the members of Ukrainian Parliament.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Among Olha Rapai\u2019s permanent correspondents were mostly her relatives: Kateryna Rapai (daughter), Shimon Markish (brother) and Ester Markish (stepmother). The archive also has multiple letters and postcards from her friends, acquaintances, institutions, and organizations (Israeli Embassy, National Union of Artists of Ukraine, etc.). The letter collection contains valuable biographic information about the artist and completes a picture of cultural and artistic life in Kyiv in the 1970\u20132000s.<\/span><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Inventory of the archive Olha Rapai-Markish (1929\u20132012) was an artist and ceramic sculptor. Olha Rapai was born in Kharkiv in 1929 to a family of the writer Peretz Markish\u00a0 and the translator Zinaida Yoffe. Her father was sentenced to death in the concocted \u201cJewish Anti-Fascist Committee case\u201d in 1952. Olha Rapai was also targeted by […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"parent":17940,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-18040","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t![\"\"](\"http:\/\/judaicacenter.kyiv.ua\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/12\/Zavitok.png\")
<\/p>\n