Boris Efimov Illustrations
125 Total
DESCRIPTION
Boris Efimovich Efimov (born Fridland; 1900–2008) was a Soviet political caricaturist who, during his 80-year career, promoted Soviet policies and targeted domestic and international enemies of the regime. His cartoons were printed in the leading newspapers and magazines, including “Pravda,” “Izvestiya,” “Krasnaya Zvezda,” and “Krokodil”. During World War II, Efimov’s drawings appeared nearly daily and were popular in the trenches and throughout Russia, illustrating fascist savagery, ridiculing the Nazi leadership, and assuring his audience of Soviet might and ultimate victory. During the Cold War period, Efimov published caricatures about political events around the world, denouncing Western hypocrisy, imperialism, and aggression. A number of illustrations in this collection focus specifically on the topic of nuclear weapons. Drawings range in size from 8 x 11 to 14 x 18 inches.
PROVENANCE
The collection was acquired in 2007 from an anonymous ephemera dealer.
HIGHLIGHTS
Across his long career, Efimov drew caricatures of the nefarious, hidden intentions of Soviet enemies. This caricature depicts the South African apartheid government in cahoots with rapacious Western figures plundering the country of Namibia. Three capitalists—a British man in a bowler hat, an American cowboy figure, and a South African businessman—steal Namibia’s uranium, diamond, and nickel reserves. This caricature first appeared in the satirical magazine "Krokodil" No. 35 with the caption "The racist regime of the South African Republic not only illegally took over Namibia but also created the conditions enabling American, British, and other companies to plunder the natural resources of this country."
Efimov published his first anti-Nazi cartoon in 1923 and consistently warned against the dangers posed by German fascism for the next two decades. This illustration from 1944, which first appeared in the magazine "Ogonek" (Little Flame), references the Red Army offensives of that year, which pushed the Wehrmacht out of Soviet territory. The Red Army, represented by the large, red bayonets, spear a pot of what by that time had become the “usual dish”: Wehrmacht soldiers surrendering and holding a white flag emblazoned with the words “Hitler kaput [Hitler is done].” The black kettle crushes a desk where Hitler, Goebbels, and Goering sit, sending them tumbling.
Efimov often liked to draw a collection of Soviet enemies, lining them up or placing them in a circle and exposing their collective vices. In this 1985 caricature, captioned “To break the vicious circle,” he drew a ring of familiar American types: generals, capitalists, and Uncle Sam. They dance in a vicious circle of militarism and imperialism, clutching weapons and documents labeled “Star Wars,” “politics from a position of strength,” “military orders,” “diktat,” and “global pretensions of the USA.” Viewers would be reassured, however, that Soviet hands have contained this warmongering group. Around these hands are the slogans of the Second World: “for peace,” “for disarmament,” “for the safety of all peoples.”
