Isaak Tartakovski

• Russian (1912 - 2002)
  Signed, dated '77 & inscribed in pencil stretcher verso
  Oil on canvas
  97 x 79 cms


Ukrainian painter. People’s Artist of Ukraine and a Member of the USSR Union of Artists. Isaak Iosifovich Tartakovskiy was born on April 25, 1912 in the town of Volochisk (Khmelnytsky region) in the family of a teacher. In 1919, the artist’s family moved to Kiev. At the age of fifteen, Isaac entered the Art and Industrial School, which he graduated in 1929. His teachers were such outstanding teachers and artists as K. Trokhimenko and K. Yelev. From 1932 to 1937 he studied at the Kiev Institute of Cinematography at the Cinematography Department in the studio of A. Dovzhenko, he graduated with honours. Before the war he worked at the Kiev Film Studio, where, together with M. Umansky, he participated in the creation of the films “Alexander Parkhomenko”, “Big Life” part of the  Memories of the Great Patriotic War. Demobilized after the war, Isaak Tartakovsky entered the Kiev Art Institute. His teachers were A. Shovkunenko, M. Sharonov, K. Yeleva, V. Kostetsky, I. Shtilman, S. Grigoriev, T. Yablonskaya. He took part in art exhibitions from 1949, and since 1951 – in international exhibitions. He finished his studies in 1951, his diploma painting 1“At the Watch of the World” was awarded a distinction. He was a Member of the USSR Union of Artists. In 1976, I.I. Tartakovsky was awarded the title of Honoured Artist of Ukraine, and in 1993 he was awarded the title of People’s Artist of Ukraine. He is the author of numerous thematic pictures, distinguished by imagery and his love for life. Entering the history of Russian painting primarily as a portraitist, the artist painted many fine landscapes and still life’s, especially in the last years of his life.  In the 1990s I.I. Tartakovsky begins working on the theme of the genocide of the Jewish people which is reflected in his paintings from this period. The artist died on June 18, 2002 in Kiev. The works of Isaak Iosifovich Tartakovsky are kept in the National Art Museum of Ukraine, Dnepropetrovsk, Donetsk, Simferopol, Sevastopol Art Museums, Theodosia Art Gallery, etc., in galleries and private collections in Ukraine and abroad.