Native Hut, Brazil

Boris Grigoriev prints bring the bold line and sharp wit of a Russian Silver Age painter into your home. Grigoriev drew Paris cafés and circuses, painted the peasants of his Russia series, and became one of the most sought-after portrait painters of his day, first in Petrograd and then in exile. Our collection of fine art prints includes his portraits and models, peasant figures, still lifes of flowers, and landscapes from France, Morocco and Brazil.

About Boris Grigoriev

Boris Dmitrievich Grigoriev was born in 1886 and grew up in Rybinsk on the Volga, where his father managed a bank branch; his mother was Swedish. From 1903 to 1907 he studied at the Stroganov School in Moscow, and then attended the Imperial Academy of Arts in Saint Petersburg, where his teachers included Dmitry Kardovsky and Alexander Kiselyov. From 1909 he showed with the Union of Impressionists, a young group close to the Futurists, and from 1911 his drawings appeared in the magazines Satirikon and Novy Satirikon.

In 1913 he spent four months in Paris and studied at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière. Paris made him a brilliant draughtsman, and his drawings of its bohemian life, later published as the album Intimité, brought him fame when they were shown with the World of Art group. Back in Saint Petersburg he moved among artists and writers such as Sergey Sudeikin, Velimir Khlebnikov and Anna Akhmatova, and painted many of them. From 1916 to 1918 he worked on Raseja (Russia), a cycle of paintings and drawings of village life that the critic Alexandre Benois praised highly.

In 1919 Grigoriev crossed the Gulf of Finland by boat with his family, settling first in Berlin and from 1921 in Paris. He spent long periods in the United States and travelled in Latin America, painted portraits of leading Russians in exile, and illustrated Gorky's Childhood and Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov. In 1927 he bought land at Cagnes-sur-Mer in Provence and built a villa there. He died at home in Cagnes on 7 February 1939.

Style and Subjects

Line is everything in Grigoriev's work. His figures are drawn with a supple, elegant contour, then stretched and sharpened until they hover between portrait and caricature. In the Raseja pictures, peasants, children and old people are exaggerated yet painfully truthful, which shocked his first viewers. His portraits often show the role a sitter plays more than the private person, with a sly rather than cruel humour.

He felt close to Cézanne, Van Gogh and the Fauves, and after he left Russia his subjects widened: Breton bell-ringers, Provençal bays, Moroccan streets and the forests and huts of Brazil. The collection follows that range, from Woman Reading and The Model to flower still lifes and South American landscapes.

Famous Works

• Portrait of Vsevolod Meyerhold (1916), Russian Museum, Saint Petersburg. The theatre director twisted into a theatrical pose, a fine example of his playful grotesque.
• Raseja (Russia) cycle (1916–1918). Paintings and drawings of Russian peasants and village life, published as an album in 1918.
• Intimité (1916–1918). A large cycle of drawings of Paris cafés, circuses and night life.
• Woman Reading (1922), Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. A quiet figure study from his first years in exile.
• Portrait of Maxim Gorky (1926), Gorky Museum, Moscow. The writer shown as a puppeteer working the characters of his play The Lower Depths; Grigoriev called it his best portrait.
• The Model (c. 1926), Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. A studio figure painted in Paris in the mid-1920s.

Decorating with Grigoriev Prints

Grigoriev's portraits have strong personalities, so give them a wall of their own. Woman Reading suits a library, reading corner or bedroom, and Lady in Top Hat adds a stylish note to a dressing room, hallway or living room with dark or jewel-toned walls.

For lighter rooms, the flower and kitchen still lifes, such as Geraniums or Sunflowers, work in a kitchen or dining room. The travel landscapes, like The Blue Bay, Brazil and the Provençal coast views, bring warm light to a sunroom, guest room or study.

FAQ

What art movement was Boris Grigoriev part of?

Grigoriev was a painter of the Russian Silver Age. He showed with the Union of Impressionists from 1909 and joined the World of Art group in 1913, and he kept a figurative style rather than turning to abstraction.

What is Boris Grigoriev's most famous work?

His best-known works are the Raseja (Russia) cycle of peasant pictures from 1916–1918 and his portraits, especially Vsevolod Meyerhold (1916) in the Russian Museum and Maxim Gorky (1926), which he considered his best.

Where can I see Grigoriev's paintings?

The Russian Museum in Saint Petersburg and the Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow held major exhibitions of his work in 2011. The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the Fogg Museum at Harvard also hold his paintings.

Why did Grigoriev leave Russia?

In 1919, after the revolution, he secretly crossed the Gulf of Finland by boat with his family. He lived in Berlin, then Paris, spent time in the United States and Latin America, and settled at Cagnes-sur-Mer in Provence.

Related Artists

• Sergey Sudeikin: painter and friend from the Saint Petersburg bohemian scene, whom Grigoriev portrayed
• Abram Arkhipov: one of Grigoriev's teachers
• Paul Cézanne: a strong influence on his work in Paris
• Vincent van Gogh: one of the modern painters Grigoriev felt closest to
• Nicholas Roerich: World of Art painter among the many cultural figures Grigoriev portrayed