Chanoch Hendel Lieberman

From earliest childhood, Hendel Lieberman showed signs of rare artistic talent. An art professor who saw some of his early pictures forecast a great future for the boy: "He'll be the pride of the Jewish people," he declared.

Hendel's widowed mother, however, looked askance at young Hendel's artistic ambitions, fearing they would distract him from Torah study and the Chasidic way of life. To be a chasid and an artist seemed a contradition.

To ensure his Chasidic education, Hendel's mother sent him to the famous yeshiva in the town of Lubavitch. The six years Hendel studied in Lubavitch left an indelible impression upon him, imbuing him with an all-pervasive love for the Chasidic way of life.

With the outbreak of World War I, Hendel left Lubavitch to work in Moscow. Though studying Torah part time, by 1920 he had earned enough to begin art courses. Hendel married and had two daughters. He supported his family through jobs in the art field, while continuing his art courses and part-time Torah studies.

While studying art, Hendel was noticed by the distinguished Russian sculptor, Innocento Zhukov, disciple of the famous French artist Rodin. Zhukov submitted one of Hendel's paintings to a nationwide, government-sponsored art competition. Out of 500 entries, Hendel's painting won first prize. He was awarded a six-year scholarship to the Moscow Academy of Art, which he completed with honors in 3 years.

World War II reached Russia in 1941. Hendel was drafted into the Red Army and was twice wounded and hospitalized. Meanwhile his wife and daughters went to stay with her parents in Retchitza, White Russia. In 1942, on reaching Retchitza, the Nazis shot the forty Jews there, including Hendel's family.

After the war, Hendel recorded his profound grief at the loss of his family in a painting that immortalized the Holocaust. To his painting he added the words: "There lies my own portion, too." Hendel found solace in his artwork and in total dedication to the Chasidic way of life.

In the fall of 1946 hundreds of Lubavitcher families left Russia. Hendel changed his family name from Futerfas to Lieberman for passport purposes and accompanied his mother, sisters, sister-in-law, and their children to Western Europe and a new life.

But his personal tragedies gave Hendel no respite. He would fall into moods of dejection, feeling he had no place for himself. During the winter of 1951, Hendel wrote about his feelings to the Rebbe, shlita.

The Rebbe answered Hendel in a long letter encouraging him to utilize his remarkable talents in the service of Torah and mitzvot as illuminated by Chabad philosophy. The letter breathed new life into Hendel. He soon went to New York to meet the Rebbe.

A new canvas unfolded for Hendel. Settling in Crown Heights, he enjoyed the Chasidic way of life of Brooklyn's Lubavitcher community. At the same time, the prosperous economic conditions enabled him to devote himself to art as a profitable occupation. His unique style was in demand both among art enthusiasts who appreciated his expertise and among Jews seeking reminders of their heritage.

The epitome of infectious joy and optimism, Hendel became popular, even revered, among the younger generation of Chabad chasidim, especially the young people returning to traditional Judaism. They loved him for his warmth and understanding, his slightly eccentric ways, his ability to bridge the gulf between two worlds so long considered contradictory. In his later years, he became known as "The Conductor" at the Rebbe's gatherings. Between the Rebbe's talks, the chasidim sing traditional melodies and Hendel would conduct. With an imaginary baton in his hand, he would stand near the Rebbe and guide the thousands of voices.

New York's art community also fully accepted Hendel. Widely respected among artists, he belonged to the artist-society of the Museum of Modern Art, and his paintings hang today at New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art, London's Tate Gallery and art museums in Paris. Hendel traveled widely to exhibit his art. "When they see my paintings," Hendel once remarked, "they can really feel what it means to be a Jew." After one exhibition, the local rabbi told him his paintings had done more in ten days to arouse the community's interest in Judaism than ten years of the rabbi's own work. Hendel came to regard this aspect of his work as a sacred vocation. If he could thus arouse such interest in Torah, he would leave behind him an accomplishment of eternal value.

Few individuals are blessed to become true trailblazers. But by the time Hendel Lieberman passed away, in 1976, he had become a legend in his lifetime--the "Father of Chasidic Art."

Reprinted from The Yiddishe Heim.

Lchaim #190

By Joshua Dubrovsky

Chenoch Lieberman was born April 12, 1900 in Polotsk, Russia. His parents, Menachem Mendel Futerfas and Mariashe Bodana, came from a long line of Chassidim. As with so many other Eastern European Jewish families, harsh circumstances soon forced the family, with three children, to move, first to Dvinsk, now part of Latvia, and then to Kharkov in the Ukraine.

Menachem Mendel's artistic impulse -- he sketched and played the violin -- was transmitted to his son Chenoch at an early age. But Chenoch was soon orphaned; his father died when Chenoch was only seven years old. Nevertheless, his father's love of music would appear repeatedly in the paintings of the later, mature artist.

Young Chenoch was a compulsive sketcher and every surface was fair game for his drawings. He later recalled: "I would draw and sketch on books and discourses. I felt a 'soul-need' to draw. I was caught up, mainly, in drawing portraits and landscapes." The walls of his house were soon turned into murals, and even the young boy's prayer books were not safe from the lad's busy pen.

At the age of twelve, Chenoch was sent to the Yeshiva in Lubavitch in White Russia, where he studied at the home of Rabbi Shmuel Gronem Esterman, a noted thinker and teacher in the community.

By 1920, Chenoch was studying art in Moscow and learning the business skills he would need for his family's textile business. Chenoch soon started a family of his own: in 1925 he married Bryna Friedman, and four years later he was the father of two daughters.

A turning point occurred in 1927. Lieberman had been bedridden for several months with an ulcer when he was visited by Innocento Zhukov. Zhukov, a well-known sculptor and disciple of the great Rodin, had seen Lieberman's work and wanted to submit one of his paintings to a national art competition. He had his eye on a small Lieberman painting depicting ice skaters on a rink.

Lieberman's painting won first prize and a six-year scholarship for Lieberman to the acclaimed Moscow Academy of Art. Perhaps more importantly, this was the first confirmation for Lieberman that he was a serious artist. He devoted himself to his studies with renewed enthusiasm, surging through his course requirements at the Academy in half the usual time.

The final requisite for his diploma necessitated spending time in the field, and Lieberman decided to travel to Birobidjan, Siberia, 6,000 miles east of Moscow. A year earlier, in 1928, under Stalin's edict, the remote area had become the official "new homeland" for Soviet Jews who would now have their own territory -- as did such other ethnic groups in the Soviet Union as the Armenians, the Uzbeks, the Azarbaijanis and the Kazakhs.

Bordered on the South by Mongolia and on the North by the Burreya and Khingh mountains, the wilderness of Birobidjan presented its own unique, pristine beauty. It was in this harsh but colorful environment that Chenoch, not yet thirty, began the chronicle of his people, the Jews of Eastern Europe.

Artist at the Table by Checnoch Lieberman. Color pencil, 1972.

In 1939, when he was nearly forty years old, Lieberman was forced to leave his family and join the Red Army's defense against the advancing Nazis. Twice he was wounded in combat, the second time in 1943, in the decisive battle of Stalingrad.

Chenoch Lieberman came home to horror. His entire family - his wife and his daughters, Bluma and Leah - had gone to live with his in-laws in the town of Brayan. There, unprotected from the German onslaught, they had been rounded up by the Nazis, forced to dig their own graves and murdered.

Devastated, Lieberman didn't know where to turn. His own life now in mortal danger, he, along with many others of the Lubavitcher community, sought refuge in Samarkand, the ancient city in Soviet Asia.

Immediately after the war, the Soviet Union issued a prohibition against any Soviet nationals leaving the country. As a means to escape this prison, Chenoch dropped his family name, Futerfas, and adopted the more Polish sounding name, Lieberman. This name would help allow him to "return" to Poland, posing as a displaced Pole.

Together with his mother, sisters, younger brother Mendel and Mendel's wife, Chenoch Lieberman made his way to the border. Though the rest of the party made it safely across, Mendel was caught and imprisoned by Stalin's secret police for helping Russians escape the country. He spent the next fifteen years in Soviet work camps.

Poland was a temporary and unpleasant stop for the family; the trek continued westward. Chenoch made his way to Paris and became part of its growing Lubavitcher community, while his family went on to England. The spiritual leader of Lubavitch, Rabbi Joseph Isaac Schneerson, had settled in New York, and Chenoch Lieberman, his life shattered, sought the Rebbe's counsel about the one thing which still had meaning for him: reconciling his art with his religion. The Rebbe understood precisely Lieberman's needs and potential: Lieberman was an artist, and must recreate the world as he saw it. The artist is driven to imbue the world with his own unique sensitivity and perspective - this was Chenoch Lieberman's calling. The Rebbe explained that for the true Chassid, all aspects of life must be brought together in a larger harmony. The means of serving and understanding G-d are varied, and they include the way of the artist. Any conflict Lieberman felt between his artistic inclinations and his Chassidic wav of life was thus resolved, and he became consumed by painting. Lieberman reached down into his own deep spiritual resources and turned to his work with a renewed vision and enthusiasm. Paris was the ideal city to nourish his artistic inspiration, and Lieberman's painting flourished.

Rabbi Joseph Isaac Schneersohn. Detail from "Histalkus" by Chenoch Lieberman. Oil on Canvas, 1950's,

While Lieberman was in London, the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Joseph Isaac Schneerson, passed away. In his mourning, Lieberman sketched "The Histalkus" (The Passing), one of his most powerful pencil drawings. The picture portrays a desolate wilderness with bare, twisted trees, and, as far as the eye can see, black-hatted Chassidim sitting on the ground, their hands held to their heads in grief. In the sky looms the face of the previous Rebbe, and behind him, the shadowy faces of deceased spiritual leaders welcoming the new soul into heaven.

But the burden of history and personal tragedies continued to weigh heavily on Lieberman. He questioned again whether painting was a proper vocation for him, but once again he turned to his spiritual guide, the Lubavitcher Rebbe.

The new Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, son in-law of Joseph Isaac Schneerson, also urged Lieberman not to abandon his talent, but to use it in the service of G-d and humanity. In a letter to Lieberman, Rabbi Schneerson captured the essential calling of the artist. Click here to read the letter.

Lieberman did not remain in London for long. He soon moved to the United States and the growing Chassidic community of Crown Heights in Brooklyn, centered around the Lubavitcher Rebbe.

Chenoch Lieberman derived great comfort from the religious understanding that Chassidism provided. Now living in physical proximity to the Rebbe, he flourished even more. Here he was, an artist occupying an honored position behind the Rebbe at prayers, celebrations and lectures. Chenoch soon became an important figure in the life of Lubavitch Brooklyn.

"The Rebbe" by Checnoch Lieberman. Oil on canvas, 1960's

"Let me tell you a story," Chenoch recalled, explaining his unusual career. "One day, many years ago, I came to Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, the Lubavitcher Rebbe.

"How is your art coming along?" he asked. "I want to hold an exhibition," I answered.

"Yes, yes, of course," said the Rebbe. "You should. Each person on this earth is allotted a task. You have a talent... use it. Use it to encourage Jews to return to their Judaism. True, in the old days, painting was not considered an acceptable way to achieve this aim. Today it is. It is your way" And so it was.

Painting with a renewed intensity, Lieberman exhibited in galleries and Chassidic communities around the world, from New York to Australia.

Lieberman's Chassidic life became increasingly intertwined with his artistic life. He once asked his nephew: "Do you want to know what an artist is? I'll tell you. You know I sit behind the Rebbe at the "fabrengen" (Chassidic gatherings centering on scholarly talks by the Rebbe, punctuated by heartfelt communal singing). By the time the Rebbe has begun his second talk, I have entirely forgotten what he just spoke about in the first talk But I remember a pattern of light and shade underneath the Rebbe's chair for forty years."

Chenoch Lieberman fused his Chassidism and painting into a continuous intense life activity. His attachment to Lubavitch permeated his life. An unrelenting joie de vivre sustained and anchored a life beset with terrible personal tragedy and dislocation and Lieberman continued sketching even from his deathbed, sending some very personal, poignant pieces as a present to his Rebbe. After a prolonged stomach ailment, he passed away on March 15, 1976.

http://www.chabad.org/therebbe/article_cdo/aid/395099/jewish/The-Ch...