Shtetl-Scapes

There are individual stories galore in the fascinating exhibition of Russian artist Anatoly Kaplan, now at the Platt Gallery, but there is also a compelling story behind the art itself, making the show unusually layered in its appeal.

It’s the story of an artist at once deeply rooted in his cultural environment and alienated by larger forces. Kaplan (1902-1980) was a passionate chronicler of the world around him, especially in creating slices of shtetl life from his childhood in Rogachev, Belorussia.

The lithographs and drawings convey ideas through his own directly nostalgic prism of memories or by illustrating stories and folk tales by Sholom Aleichem (we find a sympathetic portrait of the author here).

Yet, even as Kaplan drew from experience and worked with a personal style, modernist aesthetics and sociopolitical circumstances swirled about him. He weathered the Bolshevik revolutionary tide, and varying policies made his work alternately acceptable and counteractive.

This selection of work at the Platt comes from a large collection of Edward Goldman, a critic whose commentaries can be heard on KCRW (89.9 FM). Goldman rightly contends that greater attention should be paid to Kaplan, who was finally honored, posthumously, in his native country in 1995 when a retrospective exhibition was held at the State Russian Museum in St. Petersburg.

In this show, illustrations from Aleichem stories such as “The Bewitched Tailor,” “Stempenu” and “Tevye the Milkman” typify the rough charm of Kaplan’s pictorial touch. These are storytelling images, but they’re underscored by a sure artistic sense and nuanced visual effects, whether in the dark, curling contours of musicians amid plumes of smoke in “Wedding Musicians” or the sheets of precipitation pelting a goat in “The Rain.”

Part of the beauty of these images is the aura of cultural pride and forbearance, celebrating the bond of family and heritage at a time we know, historically, to be notoriously repressive to Jewish life.

In “Family New Moon,” figures are happily strewn about a red house, a slice of moon beaming overhead, while twisting figures do dizzy revelry in “Celebration Dance.”

The pencil on paper work called “Grandpa’s Bookcase” has a soft-edged texture, as if depicting a vaguely remembered scene from childhood.

This may be an especially ripe time for a reconsideration of this little-known artist’s work. Looking at this sampling, from this historical vantage point, Kaplan’s work bears some resemblance to Marc Chagall’s paintings--albeit from a simpler, less surreal perspective.

It also gains in fashionable currency through its folk art-like directness of expression, a quality more valued in today’s art world than that of decades earlier.

In pieces like “Shtetl Landscape With Woman and a Cow” and “In the Bedroom,” a tranquil work from a half-waking perception of a fondly regarded room, the softening power of memory conquers the tyranny of real-world demons. Life delivers its punishing blows and dismissive sneers, but every so often art wins.

BE THERE

“Vanishing Vision: The Secret World of Anatoly Kaplan, Works From the Edward Goldman Collection,” through Sunday at the Platt Gallery, University of Judaism, 15600 Mulholland Drive in Los Angeles. Gallery hours; 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Sunday-Thursday; 10 a.m.-2 p.m., Friday; (310) 476-9777, Ext. 203.