VERESHCHAGIN, Vasily Petrovich - b. 1835 Perm, d. 1909 St. Petersburg

Russian painter and graphic artist, part of a family of artists. His first art lessons came from his father while he was attending the public schools. He also worked with his maternal grandfather, a local icon painter named Ivan Babin.

In 1856, he enrolled at the Imperial Academy of Arts and studied with Alexey Markov (1802-1878). He remained there for six years and was awarded a gold medal for his painting of Sophia of Lithuania at the wedding of her son, Vasily the Blind. Later, thanks to a stipend from the Academy, he was able to study in Europe, especially Rome, where he copied the Old Masters, and won a gold medal at the International Exposition in Paris in 1867.

Upon his return to St. Petersburg in 1869, he presented two large paintings with several portraits and watercolours and was appointed a Professor of history and portrait painting at the Academy, a position he held for twenty years. The following year, he created decorations on themes from Russian folk poetry in the palace of Grand Duke Vladimir.

In 1873, he received another gold medal at the Vienna Exposition, and did further decorative work at the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour (1875-1879) and in the Assumption Cathedral of the Kiev Pechersk Lavra. In 1891, he published an album, featuring portraits of notable people and scenes from history, which became very popular.

After his health began to fail, he presented many of his paintings, and some by his late brother Petr, to the Scientific Industrial Museum in Perm, towards the goal of creating a separate art department there.