VOLKOV Efim Efimovich

March 23, 1844 (St. Petersburg) — February 17, 1920 (Petrograd)

Painter, graphic artist

Efim Volkov was born to a family of a doctor. In 1866 he attended the Drawing School under the Society for the Encouragement of the Arts (OPKh). In 1867–1870 Volkov studied in the Imperial Academy of Arts (IAKh) as a noncredit student. In 1870 Volkov was conferred the title of free (non-class) artist for the painting View of Petersburg’s Outskirts.

Volkov lived in St. Petersburg (Petrograd). He painted landscapes, sometimes genre scenes of everyday life. He also was engaged in drawing and etching. In 1879 Volkov worked in the Crimea together with I. I. Shishkin.  In 1888 the artist accompanied Grand Dukes Sergei Alexandrovich and Paul Alexandrovich of Russia on a trip to Turkey, Syria, Palestine, Egypt and Greece. In 1898 Volkov travelled to the Volga-River, to town of Plyos. In 1890 the artist drew illustrations for the poem My Native Land by Mikhail Lermontov for the collected works of the poet published on P. P. Konchalovsky’s initiative (Moscow, 1891).

Since 1879 Volkov was a member of the Society of Travelling Art Exhibitions (TPKhV), since 1894 — member of the board of the Society; from 1878 till 1918 (with intervals) the artist participated in the exhibitions of the TPKhV. Volkov showed his works at the Academy exhibitions (1870); the exhibitions of the Society for the Encouragement of the Arts (OPKh; 1874–1889, with intervals); the exhibitions of Moscow Society of Art Lovers (1884–1911; with intervals); at the international exhibitions in London (1872), Paris (1878), Chicago (1893), Munich (1895, 1909, 1913), Berlin (1896), Rome (1911); at the All-Russian Exhibition of Industrial Art in Moscow (1882); at the All-Russian Industrial and Agricultural Exhibition in Nizhny Novgorod (1896); and the First State Independent Art Exhibition in Petrograd (1919).

In 1899 Volkov was elected academician. Since 1895 he was a member of the Imperial Academy of Arts (IAKh).

Efim Volkov is one of the most significant Russian painters of the 2nd half of the 19th century, who continued the traditions of lyric landscape. His works are characterized by free dynamic strokes, different pictorial texture, and simple art motifs: overgrown riversides, small rivers, streams and swamps.

Works by Efim Volkov are in many museum collections including the State Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow, the State Russian Museum in St. Petersburg, many regional museums (Smolensk, Irkutsk, Voronezh, Khabarovsk, Omsk, Nizhny Novgorod, Novgorod, Rybinsk, Ufa, Bryansk, Kazan, Ekaterinburg, Kostroma, Nizhny Tagil, and Taganrog).