This ticket by Tatiana Kuptsova, Samara, Russia

By Paul Berger April 14, 2010

Radik Shvarts’ idea was simple enough: design your ideal plane ticket to Jerusalem and mail it to Shvarts care of a PO Box in Brooklyn.

A highlight of the 120 tickets he has received from around the world over the past year form the basis of a new exhibition, Ticket to Jerusalem, which opened last night at the JCC in Manhattan.

Not all of the 84 tickets on display are by Russian-speaking artists. But there’s a distinctly post-Soviet feel. The results range from the whimsical Chagall-esque image of a man flying towards Jerusalem, by the painter and theater designer Yevgenia Nayberg, to a hint of the Russian avant-garde in the form of the Russian word for ticket printed backwards by the Russian painter Vagrich Bakhchanyan who died at the end of last year.

Forwarding the News

Thoughtful, balanced reporting from the Forward and around the web, bringing you updated news and analysis each day.

Terms(Required)

I agree to the Forward's Terms of Service and Privacy Policy

Email(Required)

Shvarts, a graphic designer who was born in Ukraine, says the idea for his mail-art project was born after he became more interested in Jewish history. “Modern man is supposed to be cosmopolitan and not attached to national roots,” Shvarts told me, as about 60 Russian-speaking New Yorkers, mainly in their twenties and thirties, chatted and sipped red wine while examining the artworks nearby.

By introducing this subject I hope to bring people closer to this idea that you can do something that can be a form of Jewish activism that can be fun and different at the same time.

Shvarts is still accepting entries for his project. Once he has about 250 tickets he intends to gather them together in a book.

The Ticket to Jerusalem exhibition runs through June.

The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.

Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.

Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.

This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism you rely on. Make a gift today!

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

$90 $180

$360

Other amount