Rachel Kogan was born in 1912 in Evpatoriya (Ukraine) to Jewish
parents.
She spent her childhood in Odessa, and studied at the Trade-Union Art School.
In 1930 she entered the Odessa Art Institute and studied there for one year
In 1931 the Kogan family moved to Leningrad and Rachel was transferred to the All –Russian Academy of Arts (the former St. Petersburg Imperial Arts Academy) to study painting.
Her professors included Kordovsky, Shuchaev and Radlov. She received professional advice and support from Osmarkin and Petrov-Vodkin.
In 1937 Rachel graduated from the Academy.
In 1938 she was accepted to the Leningrad Department of the Artist's Union of the USSR and took part in all- Russian and Leningrad exhibitions.
1941-1944: During the war and the siege on Leningrad, Kogan was
evacuated with her children to Siberia. She worked as an artist and
decorated sets of children's plays as well as painted and created
many compositions.
In 1944 Kogan returned back to Leningrad and signed many contracts with the Artist Union as well as the Art Fund of the USSR.
Her works survived the siege and the Nazi bombings, as they were stored in the basements of the Academy.
1949-1972: Kogan taught painting and was a Professor of Drawing at the Leningrad Institute of Monumental and Decorative Art which was named after Muchina.
For much of her life she devoted herself to painting. Her works are in many USSR company collections and institutions all over Russia, such as the Sergei Kirov steel factory.
In 1973 Kogan immigrated to Israel.
Her works have been exhibited at:
1. The National, Republic and Leningrad exhibitions of the USSR Union of Artists (1938, 73, 75, 76 &78).
2. The Tel-Aviv Museum of Art (Russian Avant-Garde Revaluation 11.1988)
3. The Jerusalem Museum of ART (Propaganda and Vision- Soviet and Israeli Art 1930-1955 in 1997)
4. The Stadtische Kunsthalle Dusseldorf which introduced the international exhibition of European Art in the 30's (The "European conflict in the memory of the early Avant-Garde"10-12 1987).
5. The Bochum Museum (Avant-Garde Art in 1988)
6. Her works are part of many private collections all over the globe, including the Supreme Court of Israel (portraits of the formers presidents of the Supreme Court).
7. Israeli Museums (The Tel-Aviv Museum of Art, the Jerusalem Museum of Art)
About The Artist Biography
Rachel Kogan, a daughter of a Russian Revolution, was born in 1912 .
She lived in a very sensational period politically and artistically. This period of time represented a transformation from Avant- Garde to Socialist Realism.
The 1920's were known as a period of hunger, the 30's a period of fear and Stalinist Terror, the 40's a period of war and the 50's a period of somber.
Rachel Kogan had the privilege to sense and record all of these important changes of Russian history and portray in her work.
Fortunately, her works survived the siege and the Nazi bombings on Leningrad, as they were stored in the basements of the Academy.
Rachel Kogan was not only a daughter of the Revolution, but also a victim of that Revolution.
At the age of six she witnessed the pogroms of the Revolution in her native Ukraine. The emotional battering that Kogan was exposed to was so severe that through adolescence and early adult life she was unable to leave her room.
Although she overcame her fears, these memories remained embedded in her mind.
Kogan graduated from the Leningrad Academy of Art before World War II, when the academy was still considered one of the finest in Europe.
Rachel Kogan, a Russian Jewish artist, is a kind of legend in the Russian art world.
She began her work at the end of the Russian Avant-Gardes epoch and continued on to Socialist Realism. Rachel's focus switched to Modern Realism when she moved to Israel.
She was a phenomenon as a Jewish female artist; one of the only in this period. In Russia, Stalin's terror against Russian Jews was on the rise. Jewish women that recorded socialist achievements in factories were extremely unusual. Kogan didn’t even need the government's encouragement to go to the Sergei Kirov steel factories. She loved the atmosphere and was glad to set up her easel beside the workmen.
She was a student of masters such as Kardovsky and Shukhayev. Once Rachel had been convinced of the universal necessity for serious academics, she began receiving advice and support from Osmerkin and Petrov-Vodkin.
Guided in her artistic and pedagogical activities by Realistic tradition, Kogan's portraits, landscapes and numerous drawings bear the marks of professionalism and high graphic culture. The best of them present a solid argument in favor of the vast potential of the Realistic Method.
Her landscapes and views of Leningrad, Siberia and Pereslavl, are full of lyricism and clear emotions. Every portrait has a sharp characteristic and her still-life engage with the beauty of their colors and shapes.
It is evident that the rules and ideas of Soviet art contributed to establishing the artist's views, yet her art cannot be conveniently and rigidly framed within official realism.
Rachel Kogan possessed a stable and whole personality that rejects any hint of dualism in opinions, actions, and art. This wholeness seems to have been built in her youth.
The start of her creative life coincided with the end of the Russian Avant-Garde epoch. Her drawings bear witness to the fact that she was able to grapple with a wide spectrum of Russian international art - from Cubism to Suprematism. This ability did not wane over the years. It actually became a part of her creative method.
Kogan's art reflects the naked truth of life. We may agree or disagree with the artist's opinions, but her firm position deserves our respect.
Kogan's work is amazingly different from most Israeli artists, but seems to oppose only the modern art of Israel. Essentially, her works are a necessary component of the universal structure of the fine arts culture. They develop in a multitude of ways - not archaic but modern, yet based on solid classical traditions and professional studies.
Based on article of:
Grigory Ostrovsky
Doctor of history of the fine Arts,
Professor of Hebrew University in Jerusalem