Viktor Mikhaylovich Vasnetsov Paintings and Biography

Viktor Mikhaylovich Vasnetsov was born in on 15 May 1848 in a village under funny name Lopyal. Vasnetsov's father was a priest, and same were his grandfather and great-grandfather. In 1850, Mikhail Vasilyevich took his family to the village of Ryabovo as dictated by his service terms. Viktor Vasnetsov had 5 brothers, one of whom also became famous artist; his name was Apollinaris.

Vasnetsov's talent manifested itself from his very childhood; however, the extremely unfortunate financial situation in the family left no options but sending Victor to the Vyatka Theological School in 1858. Being only 14, Viktor Vasnetsov was the student of the Vyatka Theological Seminary. Children of priests benefited from the free of charge education there.

Without graduating from the seminary, in the year 1867 Vasnetsov moved to Petersburg to enter the Academy of Arts. He had very little money, and Victor put up 2 of his paintings for "auction", these were "The Milkmaid" and "The Reaper". By the time of leaving, he never received any money for them. He received 60 rubles for these two paintings a few months later in St. Petersburg. The young artist only had 10 rubles when arriving in the capital.

Vasnetsov passed the drawing exam brilliantly and was immediately enrolled in the Academy. For about a year he studied at the Drawing School, where he met his teacher, I. Kramskoy.

Vasnetsov commenced his studying at the Academy of Arts in 1868. That was the time when he became friends with Repin, and they even used to share the apartment for some time.

Although Vasnetsov liked the Academy, he did not finish it, and left for Paris in 1876, where he lived for more than a year. And Repin was there on a business trip. They maintained friendly relationship.

After returning to Moscow, Vasnetsov was immediately accepted into the Association of Traveling Art Exhibitions. By this time, his style of drawing was changing significantly, and not only the style, Vasnetsov himself moved to live in Moscow, where he made close acquaintance with Tretyakov and Mamontov. It was in Moscow that Vasnetsov revealed himself. He liked to stay in this city, he felt at ease and made various creative works.

Vasnetso spent more than 10 years designing the Vladimir Cathedral in Kiev, with the help of M. Nesterov. Upon completion of this work, Vasnetsov deserved the title of the great Russian icon painter.

The year 1899 was the peak one of the artist's popularity. At his exhibition, Vasnetsov presented the “Three Bogatyrs” to the public.

After the revolution, Vasnetsov lived no longer in Russia, but in the USSR, and this seriously oppressed him. People destroyed his paintings, disrespected the artist. But until the end of his life, Viktor Mikhaylovich was faithful to his work - he painted. He died on July 23, 1926 in Moscow, without finishing the portrait of his friend and scholar M. Nesterov.