Trained in St Petersburg, he spent much of his career in Paris, where he designed stage sets and costumes for the Ballets Russes. But there was more to his art.
art nouveau
Highly original visual stories, of the Soldier of Marathon, Saint Francis of Assisi and the Wolf of Agubbio, plus illustrations for ‘Notre Dame de Paris’.
Some of his more popular Symbolist paintings from the 1890s, a portrait of a humanitarian journalist, and more.
As well as designing stage sets and costumes for opera, he painted bogatyrs from East Slavic legends, and Azrael, the Angel of Death.
Known now as one of the great Russian Symbolists, in life he was independent, and painted in very modern style from legends and literary sources.
In the first article about the Symbolist painting of Giovanni Segantini (1858–1899), I showed a selection of his […]
As he moved away from Nabi style, he made a few narrative works, and painted idyllic realist landscapes.
He introduced the Nabis’ argot, gave them all names, and remained true to their style for longer than most.
He turned more to figurative painting in his final years, inspired by Hodler. Superb stained glass design for an Art Nouveau church in Vienna’s psychiatric hospital, and a dress for Klimt’s partner.
He returned to painting in 1907, when he started making landscapes inspired by those first of Klimt, then of Hodler.
