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Boris Mikhailovich Kustodiev (Борис
Кустодиев, March 7 1878 - May 28 1927)
was Russian art deco painter.

==Biography==

Boris Mikhailovich Kustodiev was born in Astrakhan
on March 7, 1878 into the family of a professor of
philosophy, history of literature, and logic at
the local theological seminary. His father died
young, and all financial and material burdens lay
on his mother's shoulders. The Kustodiev family
rented a small wing in a rich merchant's house. It
was here that the boy's first impressions were
formed of the way of life of the provincial
merchant class. The artist later wrote, 'The whole
tenor of the rich and plentiful merchant way of
life was there right under my nose ... It was like
something out of an Ostrovsky play.' The artist
retained these childhood observations for years,
recreating them later in oils and water-colours.

Between 1893 and 1896, Boris studied in
theological seminary and took private art lessons
in Astrakhan from Pavel Vlasov, a pupil of Vasily
Perov. Subsequently, from 1896 to 1903, he
attended Ilya Repin’s studio at the Imperial
Academy of Arts in Saint Petersburg. Concurrently
he took classes in sculpture under Dmitry
Stelletsky and in etching under Vasily Mathé. He
first exhibited in 1896.

'I have great hopes for Kustodiev,' wrote Repin.
'He is a talented artist and a thoughtful and
serious man with a deep love of art; he is making
a careful study of nature ...' When Repin was
commissioned to paint a large-scale canvas to
commemorate the 100th anniversary of the State
Council, he invited Kustodiev to be his assistant.
The work was extremely complex and involved a
great deal of hard work. Together with his
teacher, the young artist made portrait studies
tor the painting, and then executed the right-hand
side of the final work. At this time too,
Kustodiev made a series of portraits of
contemporaries whom he felt to be his spiritual
comrades. These included the artist Ivan Bilibin
(1901, Russian Museum), Moldovtsev (1901,
Krasnodar Regional Art Museum) and the engraver
Mathé (1902, Russian Museum). Working on these
portraits considerably helped the artist, forcing
him to make a close study of his model and to
penetrate the complex world of the human soul.

In 1903 he married Julia Proshinskaja (1880-1942).


He visited  France and Spain on a grant from the
Imperial Academy of Arts in 1904. In 1904, he
attended the private studio of René Ménard in
Paris. In 1904, he traveled to Spain, in 1907 to
Italy, and in 1909 visited Austria, France, and
Germany, and again Italy. During these years he
painted many portraits and genre pieces. However,
no matter where Kustodiev happened to be—in
sunny Seville or in the park at Versailles—he
felt the irresistible pull of his
motherland. After five months in France he
returned to Russia. Joyfully he wrote to his
friend Mathé that he was back once more 'in our
blessed Russian land'.

The Russian Revolution of 1905, which shook the
foundations of society, evoked a vivid response in
the artist's soul. He contributed to the satirical
journals Zhupel (Bugbear) and Adskaya Pochta
(Hell’s Mail). At that time, he first met the
World of Art (Russian: Mir Iskusstva) artists, a
group of innovative Russian artists. He joined
their association in 1910 and subsequently took
part in all their exhibitions. 

In 1905 Kustodiev first turned to book
illustrating, a genre in which he worked
throughout his entire life. He illustrated many
works of classical Russian literature, including
Gogol's Dead Soul, The Carriage and The Overcoat,
Lermontov's The Lay of Tsar Ivan Vassilyevich, His
Young Oprichnik and the Stouthearted Merchant
Kalashnikov and Lev Tolstoy's How the Devil Stole
the Peasants Hunk of Bread and The Candle.

In 1909, he was elected into Imperial Academy of
Arts.
He continued to work intensively, but a grave
illness — tuberculosis of the spine — required
urgent attention. On the advice of his doctors he
went to Switzerland, where he spent a year
undergoing treatment in a private clinic.  He
pined for his distant homeland, and Russian themes
continued to provide the basic material for the
works he painted during that year. In 1912 he
painted Merchant Women (Kiev. 

In 1916 he became paraplegic. Now my whole world
is my room, he wrote. His ability to remain joyful
and lively despite his paralysis is amazing. His
colorful paintings and joyful genre pieces do not
reveal his physical suffering, and on the contrary
give the impression of a carefree and cheerful
life. His Pancake Tuesday/Maslenitsa. 1916,
Fontanka 1916 are all painted from his memories.
He meticulously restores his own childhood in the
busy city on the Volga banks.

In the first years after the Russian Revolution of
1917 the artist worked with great inspiration in
various fields. Contemporary themes became the
basis for his work, being embodied in drawings for
calendars and book covers, and in illustrations
and sketches of street decorations. His covers for
the journals The Red Cornfield and Red Panorama
attracted attention because of their vividness and
the sharpness of their subject matter. Kustodiev
also worked in lithography, illustrating works by
Nikolai Alekseevich Nekrasov|Nekrasov. His
illustrations for Nikolai Leskov|Leskov's stories
The Darner and Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk
District (story)|Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk District
were landmarks in the history of Russian book
designing, so well did they correspond to the
literary images.

The artist was also interested in designing stage
scenery. He first started work in the theatre in
1911, when he designed the sets for Alexandr
Ostrovsky|Ostrovskv's An Ardent Heart. Such was
his success that further orders came pouring in;
in 1913 he designed the sets and costumes for The
Death of Pazukhin at the Moscow Art Theatre. His
talent in this sphere was especially apparent in
his work for Ostrovsky's plays; It's a Family
Affair, A Stroke of Luck, Wolves and Sheep and The
Storm. The milieu of Ostrovsky's
plays—provincial life and the world of the
merchant class —was close to Kustodiev's own
genre paintings, and he worked easily and quickly
on the stage sets. 

In 1923, Kustodiev joined the Association of
Artists of Revolutionary Russia. He continued to
paint, make engravings, illustrate books and
design for the theater up until his death on May
28, 1927, in Leningrad.


==Sources==
*http://www.abcgallery.com/K/kustodiyev/kustodiyev
bio.html Olgs's gallery
*http://www.russianavantgard.com/master_03_artists
_world_of_art/boris_kustodiev-Master%203.html
Russian Avantgard
*http://artroots.com/ra/bio/kustodiev/boriskustodi
evbio.htm Art Roots
*http://www.hrono.ru/statii/o_kustodi.html (in
Russian)
*http://www.radmuseumart.ru/pages/index.asp?id_pag
es=431&id_header=6
*http://nauka.relis.ru/15/0401/15401033.htm
*http://vmeste-gazeta.narod.ru/12_2.html