Memories of a Peaceful Time

Born in Rostov-on-Don, a provincial town in southern Russia, to a family of Russian-speaking Jews, the photojournalist Emmanuel Evzerichin was raised with a traditional Jewish education. In the 1920s, Evzerichin joined the Communist Youth League. A chance meeting with the codirector of the Photo Union, who was visiting from Moscow, led to an offer of work, and eventually Evzerichin was employed by the Telegraph Agency of the Soviet Union for most of his career. The anticosmopolitan campaign of the 1940s threw the Soviet Jewish photography community into disarray; before, 50 percent of Soviet photographers were Jews, after, only Evzerichin and one other were still employed. Conditions worsened, however, and Evzerichin turned to teaching photography, which is how he lived out his career.