EPSTEIN (Mark Isaevitch). KIPNIS (Itzik). Di farshterte khasene. Kinder pyese in eyn act. [Le Mariage perturbé. Play for children in one act]. [Cooperative Publishing]. Kultur-Lige. [Red Army Street, 43]. Kiev. 1924. In-12 (17.5 x 12.9 cm). 18, (1) pp. strong paper covers, the first illustrated in black with typographical compositions in Yiddish and a cubist painting depicting a bear accompanied by a goat in a shaded circle. First edition. A rare, spectacularly illustrated children's account of the flowering of Yiddish culture in Kiev in the 1920s. Cover and three original plates by sculptor, painter and theater designer Mark Isaevitch Epstein (1899-1949). Alongside Chagall, Lissitzky and Altman, he played a pioneering role in the Kutur-Lige organization in Kiev, founded in 1918 to promote Yiddish culture and language. A central figure in Ukrainian art, he illustrated most of the works published by the organization. A student in Alexandra Exter's studio, he was a founding member of the Ukrainian Artists' Union (OSMU) in 1927. Epstein illustrates the short play by writer Itzik Kipnis (1896-1974). A children's author, he was arrested in 1948 and exiled to Siberia, returning to Ukraine only after Stalin's death. His works are still in print. This is the story of the bear's wedding. "Prepare tables, bottles and fish, we're going to drink wine and honey until dawn. But insects (flies, bees, ladybugs...) arrive to steal the honey and disrupt the party. The family flees, falls: it's a mess. "Never had a bear wedding gone so wrong! A magnificent cubist illustration, playing on the different depths of black obtained by juxtaposing dots and uneven secant planes. The "reconstruction" of the plates in no way alters the touching figurative aspect. Unrestored, with a pale mauve shelf-stamp of 1948 on the second cover: Stalin's anti-Semitic purges also liquidated Jewish culture and art in libraries. Hence the extreme rarity of this work today. Minimal trace of folding on the first cover and small bottom corner missing (4 mm). Future anterior. The avant-garde and the Yiddish book (1914-1939). Musée d'art et d'histoire du Judaïsme. Paris. 2009, 95. Keywords: judaica, jew, jewish, hebrew, rabbis, jewish, torah, hebrew, hebraica, judaism, synagogue, zionism, pessah, pessach, haggada, haggadah, hagada, hagadah, passover, menora, menorah, hannuka, hannuca, hannucca, hanouccah, torah, juden, israélite, Israël, antisemitism, antisémitisme, dreyfus, meguila, sepharade, sefarad, ketouba