By Aryeh Levin, COLlive reporter
On Sunday, May 13, 1990, Alex Gorokhov arrived at 770 Eastern Parkway with his Soviet manufactured camera and didn’t really know what to expect.
Having settled with his parents in Crown Heights just a year earlier, he heard residents talking with excitement about “the parade that the Rebbe will attend.”
“While I had become much closer to Yiddishkeit in that period,” he told COLlive this week, “I still didn’t know the significance of the Rebbe.”
Equipped with his Kiev-Arsenal camera, Alex positioned himself right across the red-decorated stage that was prepared for the Rebbe at Lubavitch World Headquarters.
It had only been a few months since he had a Bris with the help of the F.R.E.E. organization and Rabbi Meir Okunov, who was his neighbor on Union Street.
The Torah-and-Mitzvos-themed grandiose floats and artistic displays that passed by as part of the parade captured his imagination.
“The only parades I saw and attended beforehand were the military ones in Minsk. Those were all about weapons, power, missiles, rockets and soldiers,” Alex says.
“Here I was watching something all pure. About doing good, life, Judaism and Kosher. I felt like a fish in water.”
That didn’t stop him from photographing U.S. Army Reserve Chaplain (Colonel) Jacob Goldstein who brought a tank and other gear to the parade.
But his focus was the Rebbe, surrounded by regal decor, with the emcee Rabbi JJ Hecht standing beside him.
The Chassidus classes by Rabbis Zalman Shagalow OBM, Moshe Chaim Levin and Berel Haskelevich had already had some effect on him.
“I wanted to photograph the Rebbe, but I only had a 15 mm lense that could only photograph a wide angle. So I asked a newspaper photographer – I think he was from the New York Post – to lend me one of his lenses that he was using with his Nikon.
“He laughed at me. ‘These will never fit on your old camera,’ he said. I didn’t give up and tried it on. It worked and I was able to zoom up to the Rebbe and get beautiful pictures.”
A day later Alex developed the photos from the film and handed them out to some friends. “They practically grabbed them,” he laughs.
Alex then lost the photos. “I had no idea where I put them or the negatives,” he says.
Three years ago he and his wife hosted a fundraiser auction in their Flatbush home for Rabbi Zalman Liberow‘s Chabad House.
“We were talking about photos of the Rebbe when I suddenly remembered about those photos I took on Lag B’Omer – that last parade with the Rebbe,” Alex recalls.
“I ran upstairs, planning to go through some old untouched boxes. The first one I opened had the negatives on the top.
“In honor of The Great Parade this year on Lag B’Omer, I decided to give COLlive.com those special photos I took of the Rebbe.”
Today, Alex Gorokhov heads Glatt & Art Photography and captures Crown Heights and Jewish weddings with his partner, award-winning photographer Radmila Ladizhinsky.
He will be photographing the Great Parade on Sunday, May 2, 2010, for COLlive.com. Until then, visit GlattPhotography.com.
Great story. Nice px. Webside- fantastic
wow
better than the pictures is the fact that he simply gifted them to the world vs commercializing them.
nice move.
be blessed with much business.
amazing pictures
COL u made my day. These pix are fantastic, amaizing.
Alex. I visited You site. Great job. Agroise Shekoach.
Moshiach now!!!
Dmitry U are real jewish Hero and champ. You did’t lose last fight – You won it.
Great pictures, Alex is an incredible photographer. He has captured great moments in style. Thank you Sasha
Dima S
Beautiful Pictures! I remember those days like it was yesterday.. makes me want to cry.
Thank you for sharing them. May you be blessed!
this year the rebbe will come out
thank you for sharing them!
Great pics of the Rebbe.
Alex You website is fantastic !!!
Photos all great and music too. I hope we’l see REBBE on this Year Lag BA’Omer
May we be reunited with the Rebbe with the coming of Moshiach now!
Amazing photos – although I wish he used a tripod. Either way – may the rebbe return – as 20 years ago, better than ever before.
Thanks Alex. great pics
No words, just WOW !!!
Million thanks. No Billions!!!
Those pictures are really special!!!
nice pics
So many people have tzetlach, horaos and letters from the rebbe and they keep it to themselves. I’m not talking about private answers but information that can help so many yidden today. How can people take the freedom to hold back the light from the world?
Amazing Amazing……..
i think it is really nice!
Thanks so much for sharing this!
May we merit to see the Rebbe at the great parade again!
r’ yisroel koziminsky shyichya. to 2 his name is moshe teleshvsky
wow these are very amazing pictures i’ve never seen them before
Amazing pictures, really captures the spirit of the parade.
What an auspicious time to bring them out in the open. May we merit the Yehi Ratzon of the local cantor Brudoshevitz, I think that’s his name, I am from out of town Buffalo
amazing pics!!
what a special time to bring them out!
may we merit that this year we have the presence of the
Rebbe with us begashmius!!
Amen Kein Yehi Ratzon!