Icons of War – Yevgeny Khaldei | Soviet Photographer | World War II

Yevgeny Khaldei was one of the most prominent Soviet photojournalists of World War II, and played an important role in molding memories of this war. Khaldei’s “visiting card” was “The Raising of the Soviet Flag Over the Reichstag Building” May 2, 1945 – a photograph which commemorates the capture of Berlin and the end of the Third Reich. This picture, which Khaldei staged meticulously, is one of the renowned historic photographs of the 20th century.

The life of Khaldei, born into a Jewish family, was bound up with the changes which occurred in the Soviet Union before, during and particularly after the war – when he became the victim of anti-Jewish purges.

Exhibition sections:

• 1917 – 1940 From Yuzovka to Moscow / the Young Photographer
• 1941 – 1945 From Moscow to Berlin / Photographer of the “Great Patriotic War”
• 1945 – 1946 / From Berlin to Potsdam and Nuremberg
• 1947 – 1990 – Back to Moscow / Antisemitism / A Propaganda Photographer
• 1991 – 1997 – Epilogue / International Fame

The exhibition was opened in 1999, marking the 60th anniversary of the outbreak of World War II.