Cartoonist Boris Yefimov has celebrated 125 years since his birth.

It is 125 years since the birth of the famous artist and cartoonist Boris Yefimov. According to his works, one can study the chronicle of political events of the last century. On September 28, relatives and specialists told about the master.

"The artist of the current moment, it is necessary to react urgently. Some kind of event has happened, they are asking you to draw for a newspaper, for magazines, you need to be able to do it. If they just say talent, not talent <...> Well, talent, probably," said Viktor Fradkin, Efimov's grandson.

Yefimov began his career as a young man, and his work attracted the attention of well-known political figures. Thus, the revolutionary and Soviet statesman Leon Trotsky wrote the preface to the collection of his works, in which he noted that "rapid success is fraught with danger," adding that the biggest threat is to stop working.

Yefimov survived the arrest and execution of his older brother Mikhail Koltsov during the years of repression. He admitted that sometimes he had to paint people in obscene images, and to refuse this would not only be dangerous, but disastrous.

"Efimov's phenomenon is, of course, amazing, because to repeat such an enchanting career and such an amazing fate — I don't know who repeated it, Efimov's style is absolutely recognizable," said Tatiana Kireeva, editor of the Izvestia archive.

The artist's style was so recognizable that even an attempt to paint under a pseudonym after his brother's arrest could not hide his identity.

Efimov's friend Vladimir Mochalov shared that the artist often feared arrest when he went out for walks around Moscow at night, and even set up alarms with his wife in case a car came for him. During the war, soldiers wrote to him from the front, and draw this or that, "we'll cut it out and put it in our pocket to raise our spirits." Kireeva clarified that Yefimov's work raised the spirit of the Soviet military, relieved their tension.

"Even commissioned works by political artists — they still reflected the mood of the whole nation," explained Maxim Smagin, director of the Museum of Caricature in Yekaterinburg.

Each episode of Yefimov's life is a story of different eras.

Silence and gold: the art of one of the most expensive Soviet artists was shown in Moscow

The retrospective dedicated to the 100th anniversary of Dmitry Krasnopevtsev's birth became a journey to his workshop.

An exhibition of paintings from the collection of the Russian Museum dedicated to the capital has been operating at VDNH since September 19. The exhibition consists of four sections — "Old Moscow", "New Moscow", "Moscow Capital" and "Muscovites". Walking around the halls, you can trace how the image of the city has changed over the centuries, as well as learn about its famous inhabitants.

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