Vrubel Mikhail Alexandrovich

Mikhail Alexandrovich Vrubel was a painter, author of portraits, landscapes, easel and monumental compositions, theatrical illustrations, and a master of sculpture and decorative arts. From 1864 to 1868, he attended the Drawing School of the Society for the Encouragement of the Arts, and from 1874 to 1879, he attended evening classes at P. P. Chistyakov's life class. From 1880 to 1884, he took watercolor lessons from I. E. Repin. Between 1884 and 1889, he worked in Kyiv on the restoration and creation of murals for the 12th-century St. Cyril's Church and created sketches for the St. Volodymyr's Cathedral. From 1889, he was a member of the Abramtsevo art circle and a designer for S. I. Mamontov's Russian Private Opera. In 1900, he was awarded a gold medal at the Paris World's Fair for his work in applied arts. He was a member of the 'World of Art' (Mir Iskusstva) movement, a founding member of the Union of Russian Artists (SRKh) from 1903, and an academician of painting from 1905.