SHEMYAKIN Mikhail

Genus. May 4, 1943 (Moscow)

painter, graphic artist, sculptor, set designer.

was born in the family of the officer. He spent his childhood in Koenigsberg, where he served his father. In 1957 he moved to Leningrad, he studied at the Art School at the Institute of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture. Repin, where in 1961 was certified. In 1962 in the magazine "Star" was the first exhibition of the artist. In 1960, worked as a scaffold in the State Hermitage, parallel continuing to create. In 1967 in Novosibirsk (Akademgorodok) was opened extensive exposition of works of Bioorganic Chemistry. In the same year he became one of the founders of the group "St Petersburg", in collaboration with the philosopher Vyacheslav Ivanov wrote the theory of "metaphysical sintetizma».

In 1971, after the forced treatment in a psychiatric hospital, stripped of his Soviet citizenship and expelled from the country. He lived in Paris. In 1974, shown at the exhibition watercolor series "Petersburg Carnival", which brought fame in European and American art circles. In 1977 issued anthology "Apollo 77", which became a kind of collective manifesto of non-conformist artists.

In the 1980's turned to sculpture, worked in a small plastic and monumental sculpture. He created a monument to Peter I in the fortress, a monument to victims of political repression in the form of two sphinxes on Robespierre Embankment (opposite the prison "Crosses") in St. Petersburg, sculptural group "Children - victims of adult vices" in the Swamp embankment in Moscow, "Cybele: Goddess of Fertility in New York, a monument of Casanova in Venice.

In 1981 he moved to New York. Elected a member of the New York Academy of Sciences. In 1889 he took U.S. citizenship. Since 1991 lives and works in Klavirake near New York. In 1993 awarded the State Prize of Russia in the field of literature and art, and in 1994 was awarded the French Order of "Knight of Arts and Letters».

Retrospective exhibition of paintings took place in 1989 (Central House of Artists), 1994 (gallery "House Nashokin"), 1995 (State Tretyakov Gallery), in Moscow, as well as in 1995 (State Hermitage Museum and Exhibition Hall "Manege") in St. Petersburg.

in 2001 designed the ballet "The Magic Nut" to music by S. Slonimsky at the Mariinsky Theater, in 2002, costumes and scenery for the ballet were shown in a special exhibition at the Museum of Private Collections of the Pushkin Museum . Pushkin, and in 2005 - at the State Russian Museum.

Shemyakin one of the most famous representatives of the unofficial art 1960 - 1970. The formation of his style, combines the features of symbolism and surrealism, influenced by the works of great masters of the World of Art ", as well as P. Filonov and his disciples.

Works Shemyakin are many museums in Russia and abroad, among them the Metropolitan Museum in New York, Museum of Modern Art in Paris, the State Tretyakov Gallery and the State Russian Museum.