Mark Chagall: Fiddler on the Canvas



Young Chagall (By Yehuda Pen)

Long before Fiddler hit Broadway, it had an even longer run on the streets of Vitebsk, Russia (now Belarus).  Taking it all in (and giving it all back for the rest of his life) was the young Marc Chagall.

Chagall’s famous painting, The Fiddler, was the inspiration behind the show’s eventual title:  Fiddler on the Roof.  In this 1912 painting, a fiddler looms surrealistically large over the rooftops of Chagall’s homeland.  Wikipedia reports that this fiddler represents “survival, through tradition and joyfulness, in a life of uncertainty and imbalance.” 

Such was the childhood of Moishe Shagal.  His parents were devout Jews in a Russia that persecuted Jews.  In his autobiography, My Life, Chagall wrote:  Day after day, winter and summer, at six o’clock in the morning, my father got up and went off to the synagogue…  On his return, he made ready the samovar, drank some tea and went to work.  Hellish work…

These memories were permanently seared into Chagall’s psyche.  The Hasidic Judaism that was prevalent at the time combined mysticism with everyday spirituality.  Ordinary objects and events were therefore believed

to be infused with God’s miraculous presence.  The extraordinary nature of Chagall’s flying cows, floating

lovers, and rooftop fiddlers seems to reflect this type of worldly/otherworldly juxtaposition.

However, Rabbi Rachel Esserman questions the idea that Chagall was simply “painting in Yiddish.”  She

explains how religiously ambivalent he often seemed to be.  On the one hand, Chagall would describe himself

as “a little Jew of Vitebsk” – on the other hand, he would be featuring Jesus and the crucifixion in some paintings.  His stained-glass windows can be found in both churches and synagogues, and he was ultimately buried in a Catholic cemetery (although he never officially converted).

Perhaps Chagall was somewhat able to transcend this religious ambivalence by painting his way towards an

underlying spiritual unity.  

Resources 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiddler_on_the_Roof

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marc_Chagall

http://www.jewishaz.com/issues/story.mv?070629+chagall

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hasidic_Judaism

Copyright July 7, 2011 by Linda Van Slyke   All Rights Reserved