Rapoport, Alek (Aleksandr Vladimirovich)
Encyclopedia
Alek Rapoport was a Russian Nonconformist
artist
, art theorist and teacher.
(Ukraine SSR). During Stalin
's "purges" both his parents were arrested. His father was shot and his mother spent ten years in a Siberia
n labor camp
. Rapoport lived with his aunt. At the beginning of World War II, he was evacuated to the city of Ufa
(the Bashkir Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic
). A time of extreme loneliness, cold, hunger and deprivation, this period also marked the beginning of Rapoport's drawing studies.
After the war, Rapoport lived in Chernovtsy
(Western Ukraine), a city with a certain European flair. At the local House of Folk Arts, he found his first art teacher, E.Sagaidachny (1886–1961), a former member of the nonconformist artist groups Union of the Youth (Soyuz Molodyozhi
) and Donkey's Tail
, popular during the 1910s-1920s. His other art teacher was I.Beklemisheva (1903–1988). Impressed by Rapoport's talent, she later (1950) organized his move to Leningrad
, where he entered the famous V.Serov School of Art (the former School of the Imperial Society for the Promotion of Arts, OPKh, later the Tavricheskaya Art School
).
His association with this school lasted eight years, first as a student, and then, from 1965 to 1968, as a teacher. With "Socialist realism
" the only official style during this time, most of the art school's faculty had to conceal any prior involvement in non-conformist art movements. Ya.K.Shablovsky, V.M.Sudakov, A.A.Gromov introduced their students to Constructivism
only through clandestine means.
The school emphasized fundamental drawing skills and an appreciation for Italian Renaissance
art. Additionally, Rapoport continued to educate himself, spending hours at the Hermitage Museum
, copying paintings of the Old Master
s, and studying art at public libraries. Rapoport's generation expressed an increasing interest in contemporary art. Expositions of French Impressionists
came to Leningrad, followed by other exhibitions of modern art from various European countries. This new freedom proved a powerful source of ideas.
His last year in school was interrupted by the military draft. He was stationed in Birobidzhan
(the Jewish Autonomous Oblast
), where he continued to draw and paint during his free time, making a series of sketches vividly depicting scenes of a soldier's everyday life and creating the oil painting The Taking of a Hill for a Khabarovsk
museum. After his military service, Rapoport returned to the Serov School of Art. His diploma work Laying the Wreaths on the Field of Mars
(1958), was denounced as "formalist," a stigma which followed him from then on.
Over the next four years (1959–1963) Rapoport studied stage design at the Leningrad Institute of Theater, Music and Cinema under the supervision of the famous artist and stage director N.P.Akimov
. Akimov taught a unique course based on theories of Russian Suprematism
and Constructivism, while encouraging his graduate students to apply their knowledge to every field of art design. Despite differences in personal artistic taste with Akimov, who was drawn to Vermeer and Dali
, Rapoport was influenced by Akimov's personalilty and liberalism, as well as the logical style of his art.
In 1963, Rapoport graduated from the institute. His highly acclaimed MFA work involved the stage and costume design for I.Babel
's play Sunset
. In preparation, he traveled to the southwest regions of the Soviet Union
, where he accumulated many objects of Judaic
iconography
from former ghettos, disappearing synagogue
s and old cemeteries. He wandered Odessa
in search of Babel's characters and the atmosphere of his books.
Rapoport considered himself a practitioner of Russian Constructivism with roots in ancient Mediterranean
and Byzantine
art forms. He was strongly influenced by Tartu
's school of structural semiotics and by its founder, Yuri Lotman
. Concurrently, Rapoport pursued a deep study of Byzantine art and icon
s. His final studies while in Russia
concentrated on the works of the Russian Orthodox
priest Father Pavel Florensky
and the art historian Lev Zhegin.
After graduation, Rapoport's life was full of a variety of activities, but his most important goal was to try to combine official art with his own creative ideas. The greatest opportunities for this came through work for the theater in the town of Volkhov, as well as at Houses of Culture. He made sketches for sets and costumes for various plays such as Brecht
's The Good Woman from Szechuan
and Fear and Misery of the Third Reich
, Pushkin's The Queen of Spades, Brandon Thomas
's Charley's Aunt
and V.Ivanov
's Armored Train 14-69.
At this time, Rapoport also worked as an artist's assistant at "Lenfilm
" and as a book designer and illustrator for various publishing houses. However, his greatest satisfaction came from teaching specialty courses in composition, design and human anatomy at the Serov Art School. He organized a new liberal course in technical aesthetics, introducing his students to Lotman's theory of semiotics, the Modulor
of Le Corbusier
, the Bauhaus
school, Russian Constructivism, Russian icons and contemporary Western art. As a result of his "radicalism," Rapoport was fired for "ideological conspiracy."
Thereafter, Rapoport channeled all his energy into his own creative work. His main projects centered on Biblical
themes, Anti-Semitism
and subjects of everyday life. He sought to cultivate himself as Jewish
artist. This became particularly noticeable after the Six-Day War
, when the Israel
i victory led intellectuals, including the Jewish intelligentsia, to feel a heightened interest in Jewish culture and its Biblical roots. Rapoport's works of this period include Three Figures, a series of images of Talmud
ic Scholars, and works dealing with anti-Semitism.
In 1970s Rapoport joined the non-conformist movement, which opposed the dogmas of "Socialist realism" in art, along with Soviet censorship. The movement sought to preserve the traditions of Russian iconography and the Constructivist/Suprematist style of the 1910s. Despite the authorities' persecutions of nonconformist artists (including arrests, forced evictions, terminations of employment, and various forms of routine hassling), they united in a group, "TEV – Fellowship of Experimental Exhibitions." TEV's exhibitions proved tremendously successful.
In the same period, Rapoport became one of the initiators of another anti-establishment group, ALEF (Union of Leningrad's Jewish Artists). In the United States this group was known as "Twelve from the Soviet Underground." Rapoport's involvement with this group increased tension with the authorities and attracted KGB
scrutiny, including "friendly conversations," surveillance, detentions and house arrests. It became increasingly dangerous for him to live and work in the USSR. In October 1976, Rapoport with his wife and son were forced to leave Russia.
Following the usual path among Russian immigrants of that time, the family traveled through Austria
and Italy
, then moved to the U.S. They lived in Italy half a year. Despite missing Russia, Rapoport savored his exposure to Italian culture and art, which had intrigued him since childhood. The entire environment strongly inspired his mind and creative work.
In Italy, Rapoport exhibited at the Venice Biennale
, "La Nuova Arte Sovietica-Una prospettiva non ufficiale" (1977), participated in television programs about nonconformist art in the Soviet Union, and created lithographic works continuing his theme of Jewish characters from Babel's play Sunset.
In 1977, Rapoport's family was granted U.S. immigration status and settled in San Francisco. With assistance from the Bay Area Council of Soviet Jews (BACSJ), Rapoport traveled to many American cities as a representative of the "ALEF" group, known in U.S. as "12 from the Soviet Underground," accompanying exhibitions of these artists and lecturing.
Rapoport grew up in the anti-religious Soviet environment. An encounter with the New Testament
at age 16 led his first creation of religious artwork. Beginning in the 1960s, images of the Biblical prophets emerged as a recurring theme in Rapoport's art. His inspiration came from various sources: the stories of the Old and New Testaments, the art of Russian (Byzantine) icons as well as the humanistic art of Renaissance, and Russian religious philosophers such as S.Bulgakov
, N.Berdyayev, V.Solovyov
. Among this latter group, Rapoport had a special regard for Father Pavel Florensky. Rapoport dedicated his painting Short Life of Euphrosynos the Cook (1978) to the memory of Florensky, who perished in a Gulag
in 1944.
For almost nine years, Rapoport was employed as a draftsman-designer of stage equipment, while continuing his own creative work. Initially overwhelmed by a sense of freedom in his new life, he soon came to feel that these liberties restricted more than they permitted, with freedom limited to the narrow views of artists who followed the demands of the market. He experienced difficulty fitting into the American contemporary art mainstream, which he considered frivolous, career-oriented and devoid of any spirituality or artistic merit.
For Rapoport, the 1980s were a time full of creativity and significant life events. He participated in numerous exhibitions in San Francisco and other American cities, sold his paintings in auctions in Europe and the U.S., illustrated Erotic Tales of Old Russia by A.Afanasyev
(Scythian Books, Oakland, CA), and traveled to European countries. A visit to Spain
made a profound impression on him, confirming a sense of personal connection, even blood ties, with the art and culture of the country of El Greco
. Rapoport began a new series of paintings inspired by his experiences in Spain.
In 1984, a significant event in Rapoport's life occurred in his meeting with San Francisco gallery owner Michael Dunev, who became his friend and representative, organizing all his exhibitions until the artist's death.
Rapoport tried to make a connection to bridge the gap between his art and the American viewers, a goal perhaps reflected in his new series of paintings, Images of San Francisco. While in Russia, Rapoport had concentrated on interior and spiritual subjects; in San Francisco, he broadened his art with new sources. He valued the city's international flavor, theatrical and dramatical image, phantasmal ocean-accented light and geographical structure, capturing these qualities with his characteristic forced spherical perspectives and expressionistic coloration, evoking a sense of a spontaneous theater of everyday life. Images of San Francisco came to constitute a second major body of subjects in Rapoport's art.
At the same time, the idea of "brotherhood" and artists "guild" had always attracted Rapoport, and he particularly missed this sense of fellowship while in the U.S. Accordingly, in 1992, he organized the group "SPSF"(Saint Petersburg
-San Francisco). SPSF consisted of two artists and two photographers, all St. Petersburg natives who had wound up in San Francisco. The four saw themselves as heirs of the great St. Petersburg cultural tradition, while also having absorbed the new San Francisco environment. Their exhibitions were enthusiastically received by Russians and Americans.
In 1987, Rapoport was finally able devote himself completely to his creative work. While his subject matter did not change, his works increased in emotional impact and his technical skills became fully developed.
Toward the end of the 1980s and beginning of the 1990s, Rapoport completed his most ambitious works on the theme of the Old Testament
prophets: Samson Destroying the House of the Philistines (1989), Lamentation and Mourning and Woe (1990), the four paintings Angel and Prophets (1990–1991) and Three Deeds of Moses (1992).
In 1992, the artist's friends in St. Petersburg organized the first exhibition of his
works there since his departure into exile, with works patiently gathered from collectors and art museums. This exhibition, held in the City Museum of St. Petersburg and accompanied by headlines such as "A St. Petersburg artist returns to his town," was followed by much larger ones in 1993 (St. Petersburg and Moscow
), organized in collaboration with Michael Dunev Gallery under the name California Branches – Russian Roots. The exhibitions, with an invitation featuring Rapoport's painting Self-portrait as a Mask of Mordecai (1985), marked the artist's first visit to Russia since his departure in 1976.
Rapoport had always protested loudly and openly. In Russia, he protested against the rigidity of the system of teaching, against the communist ideology and censorship in art, against the suppression of religious art. He took a leading part in the creation of the dissident art groups TEV and ALEF. For this he was persecuted by the authorities and forced to emigrate.
Then, in the U.S., Rapoport protested against commercialism in art, against the dominance of ideas of market over ideas of spirit, against the crushing of religious art by public indifference, against the loss of Judeo-Christian values. "In search of these values, I turn again and again to the Old Masters from the Mediterranean region, where at the very outset of Western Civilization, the art of Pictorial Image was born, art in which both the Divine Spirit and the Human Being served as the measure for all things." This was the subject of Rapoport's "loud and bitter cry."
The last five years of Rapoport's life (1993–1997) were spent in voluntary seclusion. He did not endure emigration easily. "What a pathetic life, everything repeats itself," he said, quoting from the letters of Albrecht Dürer
, another artist who saw himself as born in the wrong place and time.
During these years, Rapoport concentrated on his own creative world. In his own words, he worked not for the sake of art, but because art gave him the means to express himself. He sought to reach the very core and heart of the image, an urge complemented by his ever-present inner desire to attain the ideal.
In 1995, he began an association with CIVA (Christians in Visual Arts), participating in the group's exhibitions and conferences. He produced more expressionistic paintings on religious themes, while continuing his ongoing series Images of San Francisco. His works became increasingly spiritual and magically expressive. The art critic V.Baranovsky (Moscow-San Francisco) noted, "One can not leave unnoticed the strange power of these paintings, which remind us of the incandescent coals of Old Russian icons."
By 1996, the artist almost never left his studio, completing Anastasis 1, based on the apocryphal fourth-century Gospel of Nicodemus
. The painting was his final and most personal religious work.
On February 4, 1997, Alek Rapoport died suddenly and unexpectedly in his studio while working on his new painting Trinity.
Soviet Nonconformist Art
The term Soviet Nonconformist Art refers to art produced in the former Soviet Union from 1953-1986 outside of the rubric of Socialist Realism...
artist
Artist
An artist is a person engaged in one or more of any of a broad spectrum of activities related to creating art, practicing the arts and/or demonstrating an art. The common usage in both everyday speech and academic discourse is a practitioner in the visual arts only...
, art theorist and teacher.
Biography and creative work
Alek Rapoport spent his childhood in KievKiev
Kiev or Kyiv is the capital and the largest city of Ukraine, located in the north central part of the country on the Dnieper River. The population as of the 2001 census was 2,611,300. However, higher numbers have been cited in the press....
(Ukraine SSR). During Stalin
Joseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...
's "purges" both his parents were arrested. His father was shot and his mother spent ten years in a Siberia
Siberia
Siberia is an extensive region constituting almost all of Northern Asia. Comprising the central and eastern portion of the Russian Federation, it was part of the Soviet Union from its beginning, as its predecessor states, the Tsardom of Russia and the Russian Empire, conquered it during the 16th...
n labor camp
Labor camp
A labor camp is a simplified detention facility where inmates are forced to engage in penal labor. Labor camps have many common aspects with slavery and with prisons...
. Rapoport lived with his aunt. At the beginning of World War II, he was evacuated to the city of Ufa
Ufa
-Demographics:Nationally, dominated by Russian , Bashkirs and Tatars . In addition, numerous are Ukrainians , Chuvash , Mari , Belarusians , Mordovians , Armenian , Germans , Jews , Azeris .-Government and administration:Local...
(the Bashkir Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic
Bashkir Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic
The Bashkir Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic was an Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic in the former Soviet Union. Currently it is known as Bashkortostan....
). A time of extreme loneliness, cold, hunger and deprivation, this period also marked the beginning of Rapoport's drawing studies.
After the war, Rapoport lived in Chernovtsy
Chernivtsi
Chernivtsi is the administrative center of Chernivtsi Oblast in southwestern Ukraine. The city is situated on the upper course of the River Prut, a tributary of the Danube, in the northern part of the historic region of Bukovina, which is currently divided between Romania and Ukraine...
(Western Ukraine), a city with a certain European flair. At the local House of Folk Arts, he found his first art teacher, E.Sagaidachny (1886–1961), a former member of the nonconformist artist groups Union of the Youth (Soyuz Molodyozhi
Soyuz Molodyozhi
Soyuz Molodyozhi was an artistic group and an art magazine of Russian avant-garde organized in 1910.There were more than 30 members of the group and most of other Russian avant-garde participated in their exhibitions....
) and Donkey's Tail
Donkey's Tail
Donkey's Tail was a Russian artistic group created from the most radical members of the Jack of Diamonds group. The group included such painters as: Mikhail Larionov , Natalia Gontcharova, Kazimir Malevich, Marc Chagall, and Alexander Shevchenko. The group was influenced by the Cubo-Futurism...
, popular during the 1910s-1920s. His other art teacher was I.Beklemisheva (1903–1988). Impressed by Rapoport's talent, she later (1950) organized his move to Leningrad
Leningrad
Leningrad is the former name of Saint Petersburg, Russia.Leningrad may also refer to:- Places :* Leningrad Oblast, a federal subject of Russia, around Saint Petersburg* Leningrad, Tajikistan, capital of Muminobod district in Khatlon Province...
, where he entered the famous V.Serov School of Art (the former School of the Imperial Society for the Promotion of Arts, OPKh, later the Tavricheskaya Art School
Tavricheskaya Art School
Tavricheskaya Art School Tavricheskaya Art School is a secondary art school of the Leningrad. From 1919 to 1961, was located in the building at Tavricheskaya street, 35. This has the informal name of art school, which firmly established him...
).
"My development as a painter was a slow process," Rapoport recalled. "Neither the long and dark winters of Leningrad, nor the oppressive years of the 1950's contributed much to my sense of color. That sense of color came much later, after visiting the exhibitions of CezannePaul CézannePaul Cézanne was a French artist and Post-Impressionist painter whose work laid the foundations of the transition from the 19th century conception of artistic endeavour to a new and radically different world of art in the 20th century. Cézanne can be said to form the bridge between late 19th...
, RouaultGeorges RouaultGeorges Henri Rouault[p] was a French Fauvist and Expressionist painter, and printmaker in lithography and etching.-Childhood and education:Rouault was born in Paris into a poor family...
, and KonchalovskyPyotr KonchalovskyPyotr Konchalovsky , was a Russian painter, a member of Jack of Diamonds group.-Life and career:...
. Copying Cezanne's works contributed most to it. I copied works by Cezanne with great care; it gave me an understanding of color structure combined with an analytical drawing system. The result was impressive; it was the best way for me to study art."
His association with this school lasted eight years, first as a student, and then, from 1965 to 1968, as a teacher. With "Socialist realism
Socialist realism
Socialist realism is a style of realistic art which was developed in the Soviet Union and became a dominant style in other communist countries. Socialist realism is a teleologically-oriented style having its purpose the furtherance of the goals of socialism and communism...
" the only official style during this time, most of the art school's faculty had to conceal any prior involvement in non-conformist art movements. Ya.K.Shablovsky, V.M.Sudakov, A.A.Gromov introduced their students to Constructivism
Constructivism (art)
Constructivism was an artistic and architectural philosophy that originated in Russia beginning in 1919, which was a rejection of the idea of autonomous art. The movement was in favour of art as a practice for social purposes. Constructivism had a great effect on modern art movements of the 20th...
only through clandestine means.
The school emphasized fundamental drawing skills and an appreciation for Italian Renaissance
Renaissance
The Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Italy in the Late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe. The term is also used more loosely to refer to the historical era, but since the changes of the Renaissance were not...
art. Additionally, Rapoport continued to educate himself, spending hours at the Hermitage Museum
Hermitage Museum
The State Hermitage is a museum of art and culture in Saint Petersburg, Russia. One of the largest and oldest museums of the world, it was founded in 1764 by Catherine the Great and has been opened to the public since 1852. Its collections, of which only a small part is on permanent display,...
, copying paintings of the Old Master
Old Master
"Old Master" is a term for a European painter of skill who worked before about 1800, or a painting by such an artist. An "old master print" is an original print made by an artist in the same period...
s, and studying art at public libraries. Rapoport's generation expressed an increasing interest in contemporary art. Expositions of French Impressionists
Impressionism
Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement that originated with a group of Paris-based artists whose independent exhibitions brought them to prominence during the 1870s and 1880s...
came to Leningrad, followed by other exhibitions of modern art from various European countries. This new freedom proved a powerful source of ideas.
His last year in school was interrupted by the military draft. He was stationed in Birobidzhan
Birobidzhan
Birobidzhan is a town and the administrative center of the Jewish Autonomous Oblast, Russia. It is located on the Trans-Siberian railway, close to the border with the People's Republic of China....
(the Jewish Autonomous Oblast
Jewish Autonomous Oblast
The Jewish Autonomous Oblast is a federal subject of Russia situated in the Russian Far East, bordering Khabarovsk Krai and Amur Oblast of Russia and Heilongjiang province of China. Its administrative center is the town of Birobidzhan....
), where he continued to draw and paint during his free time, making a series of sketches vividly depicting scenes of a soldier's everyday life and creating the oil painting The Taking of a Hill for a Khabarovsk
Khabarovsk
Khabarovsk is the largest city and the administrative center of Khabarovsk Krai, Russia. It is located some from the Chinese border. It is the second largest city in the Russian Far East, after Vladivostok. The city became the administrative center of the Far Eastern Federal District of Russia...
museum. After his military service, Rapoport returned to the Serov School of Art. His diploma work Laying the Wreaths on the Field of Mars
Field of Mars (Saint Petersburg)
The Field of Mars or Marsovo Polye is a large park named after the Mars - Roman god of war situated in the center of Saint-Petersburg, with an area of about 9 hectares. Bordering the Field of Mars to the north are the Marble Palace, Suvorova Square and Betskoi’s and Saltykov’s houses. To the west...
(1958), was denounced as "formalist," a stigma which followed him from then on.
Over the next four years (1959–1963) Rapoport studied stage design at the Leningrad Institute of Theater, Music and Cinema under the supervision of the famous artist and stage director N.P.Akimov
Nikolay Akimov
Nikolay Pavlovich Akimov was an experimental theatre director and scenic designer noted for his work with the Leningrad Comedy Theatre. His most notorious production was the cynical version of Hamlet , with Ophelia as a drunken prostitute and the king's ghost as a clever mystification arranged by...
. Akimov taught a unique course based on theories of Russian Suprematism
Suprematism
Suprematism was an art movement focused on fundamental geometric forms which formed in Russia in 1915-1916. It was not until later that suprematism received conventional museum preparations...
and Constructivism, while encouraging his graduate students to apply their knowledge to every field of art design. Despite differences in personal artistic taste with Akimov, who was drawn to Vermeer and Dali
Salvador Dalí
Salvador Domènec Felip Jacint Dalí i Domènech, Marquis de Púbol , commonly known as Salvador Dalí , was a prominent Spanish Catalan surrealist painter born in Figueres,Spain....
, Rapoport was influenced by Akimov's personalilty and liberalism, as well as the logical style of his art.
In 1963, Rapoport graduated from the institute. His highly acclaimed MFA work involved the stage and costume design for I.Babel
Isaac Babel
Isaak Emmanuilovich Babel was a Russian language journalist, playwright, literary translator, and short story writer. He is best known as the author of Red Cavalry, Story of My Dovecote, and Tales of Odessa, all of which are considered masterpieces of Russian literature...
's play Sunset
Sunset (play)
The play Sunset was written by Isaac Babel in 1926 and based on his short story collection The Odessa Tales.-Plot:The play is sent in Moldavanka, Odessa's Jewish Quarter in 1913...
. In preparation, he traveled to the southwest regions of the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
, where he accumulated many objects of Judaic
Judaism
Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...
iconography
Iconography
Iconography is the branch of art history which studies the identification, description, and the interpretation of the content of images. The word iconography literally means "image writing", and comes from the Greek "image" and "to write". A secondary meaning is the painting of icons in the...
from former ghettos, disappearing synagogue
Synagogue
A synagogue is a Jewish house of prayer. This use of the Greek term synagogue originates in the Septuagint where it sometimes translates the Hebrew word for assembly, kahal...
s and old cemeteries. He wandered Odessa
Odessa
Odessa or Odesa is the administrative center of the Odessa Oblast located in southern Ukraine. The city is a major seaport located on the northwest shore of the Black Sea and the fourth largest city in Ukraine with a population of 1,029,000 .The predecessor of Odessa, a small Tatar settlement,...
in search of Babel's characters and the atmosphere of his books.
Rapoport considered himself a practitioner of Russian Constructivism with roots in ancient Mediterranean
History of the Mediterranean region
The history of the Mediterranean region is the history of the interaction of the cultures and people of the lands surrounding the Mediterranean Sea —the central superhighway of transport, trade and cultural exchange between diverse peoples...
and Byzantine
Byzantine art
Byzantine art is the term commonly used to describe the artistic products of the Byzantine Empire from about the 5th century until the Fall of Constantinople in 1453....
art forms. He was strongly influenced by Tartu
Tartu
Tartu is the second largest city of Estonia. In contrast to Estonia's political and financial capital Tallinn, Tartu is often considered the intellectual and cultural hub, especially since it is home to Estonia's oldest and most renowned university. Situated 186 km southeast of Tallinn, the...
's school of structural semiotics and by its founder, Yuri Lotman
Yuri Lotman
Yuri Mikhailovich Lotman – a prominent Soviet literary scholar, semiotician, and cultural historian. Member of the Estonian Academy of Sciences...
. Concurrently, Rapoport pursued a deep study of Byzantine art and icon
Icon
An icon is a religious work of art, most commonly a painting, from Eastern Christianity and in certain Eastern Catholic churches...
s. His final studies while in Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
concentrated on the works of the Russian Orthodox
Russian Orthodox Church
The Russian Orthodox Church or, alternatively, the Moscow Patriarchate The ROC is often said to be the largest of the Eastern Orthodox churches in the world; including all the autocephalous churches under its umbrella, its adherents number over 150 million worldwide—about half of the 300 million...
priest Father Pavel Florensky
Pavel Florensky
Pavel Alexandrovich Florensky was a Russian Orthodox theologian, philosopher, mathematician, electrical engineer, inventor and Neomartyr sometimes compared by his followers to Leonardo da Vinci.-Early life:Pavel Aleksandrovich Florensky was born on January 21, 1882, into the family of a railroad...
and the art historian Lev Zhegin.
After graduation, Rapoport's life was full of a variety of activities, but his most important goal was to try to combine official art with his own creative ideas. The greatest opportunities for this came through work for the theater in the town of Volkhov, as well as at Houses of Culture. He made sketches for sets and costumes for various plays such as Brecht
Bertolt Brecht
Bertolt Brecht was a German poet, playwright, and theatre director.An influential theatre practitioner of the 20th century, Brecht made equally significant contributions to dramaturgy and theatrical production, the latter particularly through the seismic impact of the tours undertaken by the...
's The Good Woman from Szechuan
The Good Person of Szechwan
The Good Person of Szechwan is a play written by the German theatre practitioner Bertolt Brecht, in collaboration with Margarete Steffin and Ruth Berlau. The play was begun in 1938 but not completed until 1943, while the author was in exile in the United States...
and Fear and Misery of the Third Reich
Fear and Misery of the Third Reich
Fear and Misery of the Third Reich, , also known as The Private Life of the Master Race, is one of Bertolt Brecht's most famous plays and the first of his openly anti-Nazi works. It was first performed in 1938...
, Pushkin's The Queen of Spades, Brandon Thomas
Brandon Thomas
Walter Brandon Thomas was an English actor, playwright and song writer, best known as the author of the farce Charley's Aunt....
's Charley's Aunt
Charley's Aunt
Charley's Aunt is a farce in three acts written by Brandon Thomas. It broke all historic records for plays of any kind, with an original London run of 1,466 performances....
and V.Ivanov
Vsevolod Ivanov
Vsevolod Vyacheslavovich Ivanov was a notable Soviet writer praised for the colourful adventure tales set in the Asiatic part of Russia during the Civil War.-Biography:...
's Armored Train 14-69.
At this time, Rapoport also worked as an artist's assistant at "Lenfilm
Lenfilm
Kinostudiya "Lenfilm" is a production unit of the Russian film industry, with its own film studio, located in Saint Petersburg, Russia, formerly Leningrad, R.S.F.S.R. Today OAO "Kinostudiya Lenfilm" is a corporation with its stakes shared between private owners, and several private film studios,...
" and as a book designer and illustrator for various publishing houses. However, his greatest satisfaction came from teaching specialty courses in composition, design and human anatomy at the Serov Art School. He organized a new liberal course in technical aesthetics, introducing his students to Lotman's theory of semiotics, the Modulor
Modulor
The Modulor is an anthropometric scale of proportions devised by the Swiss-born French architect Le Corbusier .It was developed as a visual bridge between two incompatible scales, the Imperial system and the Metric system...
of Le Corbusier
Le Corbusier
Charles-Édouard Jeanneret, better known as Le Corbusier , was a Swiss-born French architect, designer, urbanist, writer and painter, famous for being one of the pioneers of what now is called modern architecture. He was born in Switzerland and became a French citizen in 1930...
, the Bauhaus
Bauhaus
', commonly known simply as Bauhaus, was a school in Germany that combined crafts and the fine arts, and was famous for the approach to design that it publicized and taught. It operated from 1919 to 1933. At that time the German term stood for "School of Building".The Bauhaus school was founded by...
school, Russian Constructivism, Russian icons and contemporary Western art. As a result of his "radicalism," Rapoport was fired for "ideological conspiracy."
Thereafter, Rapoport channeled all his energy into his own creative work. His main projects centered on Biblical
Bible
The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
themes, Anti-Semitism
Anti-Semitism
Antisemitism is suspicion of, hatred toward, or discrimination against Jews for reasons connected to their Jewish heritage. According to a 2005 U.S...
and subjects of everyday life. He sought to cultivate himself as Jewish
Jews
The Jews , also known as the Jewish people, are a nation and ethnoreligious group originating in the Israelites or Hebrews of the Ancient Near East. The Jewish ethnicity, nationality, and religion are strongly interrelated, as Judaism is the traditional faith of the Jewish nation...
artist. This became particularly noticeable after the Six-Day War
Six-Day War
The Six-Day War , also known as the June War, 1967 Arab-Israeli War, or Third Arab-Israeli War, was fought between June 5 and 10, 1967, by Israel and the neighboring states of Egypt , Jordan, and Syria...
, when the Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
i victory led intellectuals, including the Jewish intelligentsia, to feel a heightened interest in Jewish culture and its Biblical roots. Rapoport's works of this period include Three Figures, a series of images of Talmud
Talmud
The Talmud is a central text of mainstream Judaism. It takes the form of a record of rabbinic discussions pertaining to Jewish law, ethics, philosophy, customs and history....
ic Scholars, and works dealing with anti-Semitism.
In 1970s Rapoport joined the non-conformist movement, which opposed the dogmas of "Socialist realism" in art, along with Soviet censorship. The movement sought to preserve the traditions of Russian iconography and the Constructivist/Suprematist style of the 1910s. Despite the authorities' persecutions of nonconformist artists (including arrests, forced evictions, terminations of employment, and various forms of routine hassling), they united in a group, "TEV – Fellowship of Experimental Exhibitions." TEV's exhibitions proved tremendously successful.
Rapoport recalled: "I consider the non-conformist artists movement to be very important for Soviet art. It was not only a fight for independence and democratization of the art itself, but also the fight against oppression and totalitarianism of Soviet authorities. The art of those 'neglected' artists in itself was a starting point of social criticism. This was real non-conformism in art, and it did not appear out of the blue. It sparks were always smoldering [as it made] its way from underground. The first non-conformist artists were P.FilonovPavel FilonovPavel Nikolayevich Filonov was a Russian avant-garde painter, art theorist, and poet.-Biography:Filonov was born in Moscow on January 8, 1883 or December 27, 1882 . In 1897, he moved to St. Petersburg where he took art lessons...
, V.TatlinVladimir TatlinVladimir Yevgrafovich Tatlin was a Russian and Soviet painter and architect. With Kazimir Malevich he was one of the two most important figures in the Russian avant-garde art movement of the 1920s, and he later became the most important artist in the Constructivist movement...
, R.FalkRobert FalkRobert Rafailovich Falk was a Russian painter.-Biography:Falk was born in Moscow in 1886. In 1903 to 1904 he studied art in the studios of Konstantin Yuon and Ilya Mashkov, in 1905 to 1909 he studied at the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture with Konstantin Korovin and Valentin...
, M.LarionovMikhail LarionovMikhail Fyodorovich Larionov was an avant-garde Russian painter.-Life and work:...
, and N.GoncharovaNatalia GoncharovaNatalia Sergeevna Goncharova was a Russian avant-garde artist , painter, costume designer, writer, illustrator, and set designer. Her great-aunt was Natalia Pushkina, wife of the poet Alexander Pushkin.-Life and work:...
. Then came our generation. The Soviet authorities always tried to suppress and extinguish our creative work, to diminish its importance or to ignore its very existence. But despite this, the art became recognized and valued."
In the same period, Rapoport became one of the initiators of another anti-establishment group, ALEF (Union of Leningrad's Jewish Artists). In the United States this group was known as "Twelve from the Soviet Underground." Rapoport's involvement with this group increased tension with the authorities and attracted KGB
KGB
The KGB was the commonly used acronym for the . It was the national security agency of the Soviet Union from 1954 until 1991, and was the premier internal security, intelligence, and secret police organization during that time.The State Security Agency of the Republic of Belarus currently uses the...
scrutiny, including "friendly conversations," surveillance, detentions and house arrests. It became increasingly dangerous for him to live and work in the USSR. In October 1976, Rapoport with his wife and son were forced to leave Russia.
Following the usual path among Russian immigrants of that time, the family traveled through Austria
Austria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
and Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
, then moved to the U.S. They lived in Italy half a year. Despite missing Russia, Rapoport savored his exposure to Italian culture and art, which had intrigued him since childhood. The entire environment strongly inspired his mind and creative work.
"Everything derived from Mediterranean culture: from Byzantine Art, through TintorettoTintorettoTintoretto , real name Jacopo Comin, was a Venetian painter and a notable exponent of the Renaissance school. For his phenomenal energy in painting he was termed Il Furioso...
and Cezanne and right down to Russian artists, everything was concocted here," wrote Rapoport. "The Mediterranean region was the cradle where most of our religions, churches, cities, lifestyles and art were born. The construction of the European city with its lighting began the system of building with perspective in mind. This would be an embodiment of the monotheistic idea of God."
In Italy, Rapoport exhibited at the Venice Biennale
Venice Biennale
The Venice Biennale is a major contemporary art exhibition that takes place once every two years in Venice, Italy. The Venice Film Festival is part of it. So too is the Venice Biennale of Architecture, which is held in even years...
, "La Nuova Arte Sovietica-Una prospettiva non ufficiale" (1977), participated in television programs about nonconformist art in the Soviet Union, and created lithographic works continuing his theme of Jewish characters from Babel's play Sunset.
In 1977, Rapoport's family was granted U.S. immigration status and settled in San Francisco. With assistance from the Bay Area Council of Soviet Jews (BACSJ), Rapoport traveled to many American cities as a representative of the "ALEF" group, known in U.S. as "12 from the Soviet Underground," accompanying exhibitions of these artists and lecturing.
Rapoport grew up in the anti-religious Soviet environment. An encounter with the New Testament
New Testament
The New Testament is the second major division of the Christian biblical canon, the first such division being the much longer Old Testament....
at age 16 led his first creation of religious artwork. Beginning in the 1960s, images of the Biblical prophets emerged as a recurring theme in Rapoport's art. His inspiration came from various sources: the stories of the Old and New Testaments, the art of Russian (Byzantine) icons as well as the humanistic art of Renaissance, and Russian religious philosophers such as S.Bulgakov
Sergei Bulgakov
Fr. Sergei Nikolaevich Bulgakov was a Russian Orthodox Christian theologian, philosopher and economist. Until 1922 he worked in Russia; afterwards in Paris.-Early life:...
, N.Berdyayev, V.Solovyov
Vladimir Solovyov (philosopher)
Vladimir Sergeyevich Solovyov was a Russian philosopher, poet, pamphleteer, literary critic, who played a significant role in the development of Russian philosophy and poetry at the end of the 19th century...
. Among this latter group, Rapoport had a special regard for Father Pavel Florensky. Rapoport dedicated his painting Short Life of Euphrosynos the Cook (1978) to the memory of Florensky, who perished in a Gulag
Gulag
The Gulag was the government agency that administered the main Soviet forced labor camp systems. While the camps housed a wide range of convicts, from petty criminals to political prisoners, large numbers were convicted by simplified procedures, such as NKVD troikas and other instruments of...
in 1944.
For almost nine years, Rapoport was employed as a draftsman-designer of stage equipment, while continuing his own creative work. Initially overwhelmed by a sense of freedom in his new life, he soon came to feel that these liberties restricted more than they permitted, with freedom limited to the narrow views of artists who followed the demands of the market. He experienced difficulty fitting into the American contemporary art mainstream, which he considered frivolous, career-oriented and devoid of any spirituality or artistic merit.
For Rapoport, the 1980s were a time full of creativity and significant life events. He participated in numerous exhibitions in San Francisco and other American cities, sold his paintings in auctions in Europe and the U.S., illustrated Erotic Tales of Old Russia by A.Afanasyev
Alexander Afanasyev
Alexander Nikolayevich Afanasyev was a Russian folklorist who recorded and published over 600 Russian folktales and fairytales, by far the largest folktale collection by any one man in the world...
(Scythian Books, Oakland, CA), and traveled to European countries. A visit to Spain
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
made a profound impression on him, confirming a sense of personal connection, even blood ties, with the art and culture of the country of El Greco
El Greco
El Greco was a painter, sculptor and architect of the Spanish Renaissance. "El Greco" was a nickname, a reference to his ethnic Greek origin, and the artist normally signed his paintings with his full birth name in Greek letters, Δομήνικος Θεοτοκόπουλος .El Greco was born on Crete, which was at...
. Rapoport began a new series of paintings inspired by his experiences in Spain.
In 1984, a significant event in Rapoport's life occurred in his meeting with San Francisco gallery owner Michael Dunev, who became his friend and representative, organizing all his exhibitions until the artist's death.
Rapoport tried to make a connection to bridge the gap between his art and the American viewers, a goal perhaps reflected in his new series of paintings, Images of San Francisco. While in Russia, Rapoport had concentrated on interior and spiritual subjects; in San Francisco, he broadened his art with new sources. He valued the city's international flavor, theatrical and dramatical image, phantasmal ocean-accented light and geographical structure, capturing these qualities with his characteristic forced spherical perspectives and expressionistic coloration, evoking a sense of a spontaneous theater of everyday life. Images of San Francisco came to constitute a second major body of subjects in Rapoport's art.
At the same time, the idea of "brotherhood" and artists "guild" had always attracted Rapoport, and he particularly missed this sense of fellowship while in the U.S. Accordingly, in 1992, he organized the group "SPSF"(Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg is a city and a federal subject of Russia located on the Neva River at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea...
-San Francisco). SPSF consisted of two artists and two photographers, all St. Petersburg natives who had wound up in San Francisco. The four saw themselves as heirs of the great St. Petersburg cultural tradition, while also having absorbed the new San Francisco environment. Their exhibitions were enthusiastically received by Russians and Americans.
In 1987, Rapoport was finally able devote himself completely to his creative work. While his subject matter did not change, his works increased in emotional impact and his technical skills became fully developed.
Toward the end of the 1980s and beginning of the 1990s, Rapoport completed his most ambitious works on the theme of the Old Testament
Old Testament
The Old Testament, of which Christians hold different views, is a Christian term for the religious writings of ancient Israel held sacred and inspired by Christians which overlaps with the 24-book canon of the Masoretic Text of Judaism...
prophets: Samson Destroying the House of the Philistines (1989), Lamentation and Mourning and Woe (1990), the four paintings Angel and Prophets (1990–1991) and Three Deeds of Moses (1992).
In 1992, the artist's friends in St. Petersburg organized the first exhibition of his
works there since his departure into exile, with works patiently gathered from collectors and art museums. This exhibition, held in the City Museum of St. Petersburg and accompanied by headlines such as "A St. Petersburg artist returns to his town," was followed by much larger ones in 1993 (St. Petersburg and Moscow
Moscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...
), organized in collaboration with Michael Dunev Gallery under the name California Branches – Russian Roots. The exhibitions, with an invitation featuring Rapoport's painting Self-portrait as a Mask of Mordecai (1985), marked the artist's first visit to Russia since his departure in 1976.
When Mordecai perceived all that was done, / Mordecai rent his clothes, / And put on sackcloth with ashes, / And went out into the midst of the City, / And cried with a loud and bitter cry. (Book of EstherBook of EstherThe Book of Esther is a book in the Ketuvim , the third section of the Jewish Tanakh and is part of the Christian Old Testament. The Book of Esther or the Megillah is the basis for the Jewish celebration of Purim...
4:1)
Rapoport had always protested loudly and openly. In Russia, he protested against the rigidity of the system of teaching, against the communist ideology and censorship in art, against the suppression of religious art. He took a leading part in the creation of the dissident art groups TEV and ALEF. For this he was persecuted by the authorities and forced to emigrate.
Then, in the U.S., Rapoport protested against commercialism in art, against the dominance of ideas of market over ideas of spirit, against the crushing of religious art by public indifference, against the loss of Judeo-Christian values. "In search of these values, I turn again and again to the Old Masters from the Mediterranean region, where at the very outset of Western Civilization, the art of Pictorial Image was born, art in which both the Divine Spirit and the Human Being served as the measure for all things." This was the subject of Rapoport's "loud and bitter cry."
The last five years of Rapoport's life (1993–1997) were spent in voluntary seclusion. He did not endure emigration easily. "What a pathetic life, everything repeats itself," he said, quoting from the letters of Albrecht Dürer
Albrecht Dürer
Albrecht Dürer was a German painter, printmaker, engraver, mathematician, and theorist from Nuremberg. His prints established his reputation across Europe when he was still in his twenties, and he has been conventionally regarded as the greatest artist of the Northern Renaissance ever since...
, another artist who saw himself as born in the wrong place and time.
During these years, Rapoport concentrated on his own creative world. In his own words, he worked not for the sake of art, but because art gave him the means to express himself. He sought to reach the very core and heart of the image, an urge complemented by his ever-present inner desire to attain the ideal.
In 1995, he began an association with CIVA (Christians in Visual Arts), participating in the group's exhibitions and conferences. He produced more expressionistic paintings on religious themes, while continuing his ongoing series Images of San Francisco. His works became increasingly spiritual and magically expressive. The art critic V.Baranovsky (Moscow-San Francisco) noted, "One can not leave unnoticed the strange power of these paintings, which remind us of the incandescent coals of Old Russian icons."
By 1996, the artist almost never left his studio, completing Anastasis 1, based on the apocryphal fourth-century Gospel of Nicodemus
Acts of Pilate
The Acts of Pilate , also called the Gospel of Pilate, is a book of New Testament apocrypha. The dates of its accreted sections are uncertain, but scholars agree in assigning the resulting work to the middle of the fourth century...
. The painting was his final and most personal religious work.
On February 4, 1997, Alek Rapoport died suddenly and unexpectedly in his studio while working on his new painting Trinity.
"A quiet genius of a troubled world … He was of our day and age, yes, but he is as much of antiquity as a tragic mask (Self Portrait as a Mask of Mordecai), he is a contemporary and interlocutor of Rembrandt (Self-Portrait), ChagallMarc ChagallMarc Chagall Art critic Robert Hughes referred to Chagall as "the quintessential Jewish artist of the twentieth century."According to art historian Michael J...
(Evening Meal), Goya (The Talmudists), and RublevAndrei RublevAndrei Rublev is considered to be the greatest medieval Russian painter of Orthodox icons and frescoes.-Biography:...
(From the Life of St.Nicholas); his canvases could well serve as illustrations to RabelaisFrançois RabelaisFrançois Rabelais was a major French Renaissance writer, doctor, Renaissance humanist, monk and Greek scholar. He has historically been regarded as a writer of fantasy, satire, the grotesque, bawdy jokes and songs...
and EcclesiastesEcclesiastesThe Book of Ecclesiastes, called , is a book of the Hebrew Bible. The English name derives from the Greek translation of the Hebrew title.The main speaker in the book, identified by the name or title Qoheleth , introduces himself as "son of David, king in Jerusalem." The work consists of personal...
. He is of both the cradle and the grave of Euro-Judaic culture at whose naïve and lovely outskirts are Russia and America, low-lying St. Petersburg and hilly San Francisco. He is, too, where we haven't yet gone, where other, still-unknown generations will say in wonder 'He is ours.' Why didn't we learn from him the secret of the hidden wisdom of a clear conscience and faith? And now we will look into his work for answers to questions we did not ask the sage while he was alive."
Main personal exhibits
- 1980 — Gallerie "Trifalco," Rome, Italy
- 1981 — Images of San Francisco, Eduard Nakhamkin Gallery, New York, NY.
- 1984 — Images of San Francisco, University of the Pacific Gallery, Stockton, CA.
- 1986 — Images of San Francisco, Michael Dunev Gallery, San Francisco, CA.
- 1988 — Ecumenical Works, Michael Dunev Gallery, San Francisco, CA.
- 1992 — Russia-USA, The Museum of the City of St. Petersburg, St. Petersburg, Russia.
- 1993 — California Branches-Russian Roots, Manege Exhibition Hall, St. Petersburg, Russia; National Exhibition Hall, Moscow, Russia.
- 1996 — Ecumenical Paintings, SOMAR Gallery, San Francisco, CA.
- 1997 — The Last Paintings: A Memorial Exhibition, Michael Dunev Gallery, San Francisco, CA; The Early Drawings. A Memorial Exhibition. George Krevsky Fine Art, San Francisco, CA; Sacred Inspiration: Icons by Alek Rapoport, The Marian Library, IMRI, Dayton University, Dayton, OH.
- 1998 — Angel and Prophet, Center for Art and Religion, Washington, DC.
- 2004 — Images of San Francisco, Diaghilev Art Center, St. Petersburg, Russia.
- 2007 — Alek Rapoport: A Memorial Exhibition, Belcher Studios Gallery, San Francisco, CA.
Main collections
- Russian MuseumRussian MuseumThe State Russian Museum is the largest depository of Russian fine art in St Petersburg....
, St. Petersburg, Russia - Tretyakov GalleryTretyakov GalleryThe State Tretyakov Gallery is an art gallery in Moscow, Russia, the foremost depository of Russian fine art in the world.The gallery's history starts in 1856 when the Moscow merchant Pavel Mikhailovich Tretyakov acquired works by Russian artists of his day with the aim of creating a collection,...
, Moscow, Russia - Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia
- Ellis Island Museum, NJ
- Personal collection of John Paul II, Vatican CityVatican CityVatican City , or Vatican City State, in Italian officially Stato della Città del Vaticano , which translates literally as State of the City of the Vatican, is a landlocked sovereign city-state whose territory consists of a walled enclave within the city of Rome, Italy. It has an area of...
, Italy - International Marian Research Institute, Dayton University, Dayton, OH.
- Judah L. Magnes Museum, Berkeley, CA.
- Zimmerli Museum, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ
- Legion of Honor Museum, San Francisco, CA.
- Duke University Museum of Art, Duke University, Durham, NC.
- Oakland Museum of California, Oakland, CA.
- Museum of Nonconformist Art, St. Petersburg, Russia
- Moscow Museum of Modern ArtMoscow Museum of Modern ArtThe Moscow Museum of Modern Art is a museum of modern and contemporary art located in Moscow, Russia. It was opened to public in December 1999. The project of the Museum was initiated and executed by Zurab Tsereteli, president of the Russian Academy of Arts....
, Москва, Россия - Diaghilev Art Center, St. Petersburg, Russia
Selected English-language theoretical and polemical works
- From Gulag to Glasnost: Nonconformist Art from the Soviet Union. The N&N Dodge Collection. Thames and Hudson, New York, 1995
- Rapoport, Alek. Tradition and Innovation in the Fine Arts. Canadian-American Slavic Studies. Publisher BRILL, Volume 45, Number 2, 2011, P. 183-206 ISSN 0090-8290
- 12 from the Soviet Underground. Catalogue, Berkeley, CA, 1976
- Creativity Under Duress: From Gulag To Glasnost. Catalogue, Louisville, KY, 1989
- Soltes, Ori Z. III. Art, Politics, Literature and Religion, Art and the Holocaust. B’nai B’rith Klutznick National Museum, Washington DC. P. 6-8
- Scharlach, B. California Dreamin’. Hadassah, Volume 68, Number 4, December 1986. С. 50
- Kerner, Irina. Angel and Prophet from the Streets of San Francisco. Apraksin Blues No. 11, 2003, Seaside, CA, USA.
- Lopata, Vasily. In Memory of One Who Carried Light. Apraksin Blues No. 11, 2003, Seaside, CA, USA.
- The Outsider (interview with Irina Rapoport). Apraksin Blues No. 11, 2003, Seaside, CA, USA.
- Bernstein, Boris. Rapoportian Space. Canadian American Slavic Studies. Publisher Charles Schlacks, vol.41, No 2, Summer, 2007, California, USA, P. 205-216.
- Manteith, James. Civilized Garden. Apraksin Blues No. 14, 2007.
- Alek Rapoport. An Artist’s Journey. Album, Michael Dunev Gallery, San Francisco, 1998. ISBN 0-9661190-0-2
- Dunev, Michael. Art of Conscience: The Paintings of Alek Rapoport. ARTS, Eleven one, 1999, New Brighton, MN, USA, C.36-37
- Jane, R. Russian Artists at OPTS Art. Asian Art News, vol.5, No1, January–February, 1995, San Francisco, CA
- Alek Rapoport. St.Petersburg — San Francisco. Catalogue, APOLLON, St. Petersburg, 1993
Religious subjects
- Bible Review (BR) magazine: June 2001, volume XVII, number 3, P. 38, April 1999, volume XV, number 2, P. 48, October 1996, volume XII, number 5, P. 10
- The Learning Bible, Contemporary English Version. American Bible Society, 2000, New York. ISBN 1-58516-025-3. P. 1083, 1467
- Dunne Cl. Carl Jung: Wounded Healer of the Soul. Parabola Books, NY, 2000. C.173. ISBN 0-930407-49-0
- National Catholic Reporter magazine, December 24, 1999, P. 28 (with participation in the exhibit "Jesus 2000," The Gallery, Schimmel Center for the Arts, Pace University, NY
- Christianity and the Arts magazine: Images of Christ, Spring 1999, Vol.6, No 2, P. 25
- Modern Liturgy magazine: September 1985, Vol.12, No.6, p. 43, September 1984, Vol.11, No.6, P. 43
- CIVA – Christians in the Visual Arts: “Things to Think On” exhibit catalog, May 4–25, 1997, New Brighton, PA, C. 7. CIVA 1997-1998 Directory, p. 91; CIVA 1995-1996 Directory, P. 80
- "Art and Religion: The Many Faces of Faith" exhibit, Balch Institute for Ethnic Studies, Villanova University Art Gallery, PA, July – August 22, 1997, catalog, P. 45, С.107-108 (Kay Z.Myers, poem dedicated to AR's painting “Judeo-Christian Apostles Simon-Peter & Saul-Paul”
- EKPHRASIS exhibit, Visual Arts Gallery, Adirondack College, Queensbury, NY, March 12 – April 16, 2009, catalog, P. 50, C.51 (Kathleen McCoy, poem dedicated to the exhibited painting The Angel Opens the Prophet's Eyes and Mouth)
- Cornerstone magazine, Volume 29, Issue 120, cover illustration
- Old Voices – New Faces. (Soviet) Jewish Artists from the 1920’s-1990’s. B’nai B’rith Klutznick National Jewish Museum, Washington DC, 1992, cover illustration
- The B’nai B’rith International Jewish Monthly magazine, April 1992, P. 41
- Jewish Themes: Northern California Artists. Judah L. Magnes Museum, Berkeley, January 25 – April 26, 1987. Exhibit catalog. P. 30