Litvak Jewish art gets first global show after almost a century

Scenes from Jerusalem and 1920s Paris are among the rare works showcasing Lithuania's Jewish artists from the last century that are going on show as a collection abroad for the first time, Reuters reports.

Lithuania, whose borders before World War 1 included parts of modern Ukraine, Belarus, Poland, Russia and Latvia, was a major heartland of European Jewry, famed for its talmudical academies and bookish Jews known as Litvaks.

Looking to leave their traditional surroundings and soak up the creative atmosphere, many Litvak artists, including world-renowned painter Marc Chagall, converged on Paris at that time.