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The Most Famous

PAINTERS from Russia

This page contains a list of the greatest Russian Painters. The pantheon dataset contains 1,421 Painters, 74 of which were born in Russia. This makes Russia the birth place of the 8th most number of Painters behind United Kingdom and Belgium.

Top 10

The following people are considered by Pantheon to be the top 10 most legendary Russian Painters of all time. This list of famous Russian Painters is sorted by HPI (Historical Popularity Index), a metric that aggregates information on a biography’s online popularity. Visit the rankings page to view the entire list of Russian Painters.

1. Wassily Kandinsky (1866 - 1944)

With an HPI of 80.56, Wassily Kandinsky is the most famous Russian Painter. His biography has been translated into 81 different languages on wikipedia.

Wassily Wassilyevich Kandinsky (16 December [O.S. 4 December] 1866 – 13 December 1944) was a Russian painter and art theorist. Kandinsky is generally credited as one of the pioneers of abstraction in western art. Born in Moscow, he spent his childhood in Odessa, where he graduated from Odessa Art School. He enrolled at the University of Moscow, studying law and economics. Successful in his profession, he was offered a professorship (chair of Roman Law) at the University of Dorpat (today Tartu, Estonia). Kandinsky began painting studies (life-drawing, sketching and anatomy) at the age of 30. In 1896 Kandinsky settled in Munich, studying first at Anton Ažbe's private school and then at the Academy of Fine Arts. He returned to Moscow in 1914, after the outbreak of World War I. Following the Russian Revolution, Kandinsky "became an insider in the cultural administration of Anatoly Lunacharsky" and helped establish the Museum of the Culture of Painting. However, by then "his spiritual outlook... was foreign to the argumentative materialism of Soviet society", and opportunities beckoned in Germany, to which he returned in 1920. There he taught at the Bauhaus school of art and architecture from 1922 until the Nazis closed it in 1933. He then moved to France, where he lived for the rest of his life, becoming a French citizen in 1939 and producing some of his most prominent art. He died in Neuilly-sur-Seine in 1944, three days before his 78th birthday.

2. Andrei Rublev (1360 - 1428)

With an HPI of 71.12, Andrei Rublev is the 2nd most famous Russian Painter. His biography has been translated into 66 different languages.

Andrei Rublev (Russian: Андрей Рублёв, romanized: Andrey Rublyov, IPA: [ɐnˈdrʲej rʊˈblʲɵf] ; c. 1360 – c. 1430) was a Russian icon painter. He is considered to be one of the greatest medieval Russian painters of Orthodox Christian icons and frescos.

3. Nicholas Roerich (1874 - 1947)

With an HPI of 66.06, Nicholas Roerich is the 3rd most famous Russian Painter. His biography has been translated into 54 different languages.

Nikolai Konstantinovich Rerikh (Russian: Николай Константинович Рерих), better known as Nicholas Roerich (; October 9, 1874 – December 13, 1947), was a Russian painter, writer, archaeologist, theosophist, philosopher, and public figure. In his youth he was influenced by Russian Symbolism, a movement in Russian society centered on the spiritual. He was interested in hypnosis and other spiritual practices and his paintings are said to have hypnotic expression. Born in Saint Petersburg, to a well-to-do Baltic German father and to a Russian mother, Roerich lived in various places in the world until his death in Naggar, India. Trained as an artist and a lawyer, his main interests were literature, philosophy, archaeology, and especially art. Roerich was a dedicated activist for the cause of preserving art and architecture during times of war. He was nominated several times to the longlist for the Nobel Peace Prize. The so-called Roerich Pact (for the protection of cultural objects) was signed into law by the United States and most other nations of the Pan-American Union in April 1935.

4. Ivan Shishkin (1832 - 1898)

With an HPI of 65.58, Ivan Shishkin is the 4th most famous Russian Painter. His biography has been translated into 59 different languages.

Ivan Ivanovich Shishkin (Russian: Иван Иванович Шишкин; 25 January [O.S. 13 January] 1832 – 20 March [O.S. 8 March] 1898) was a Russian landscape painter closely associated with the Peredvizhniki movement.

5. Natalia Goncharova (1881 - 1962)

With an HPI of 65.33, Natalia Goncharova is the 5th most famous Russian Painter. Her biography has been translated into 38 different languages.

Natalia Sergeevna Goncharova (Russian: Ната́лья Серге́евна Гончаро́ва; 3 July 1881 – 17 October 1962) was a Russian avant-garde artist, painter, costume designer, writer, illustrator, and set designer. Goncharova's lifelong partner was fellow Russian avant-garde artist Mikhail Larionov. She was a founding member of both the Jack of Diamonds (1909–1911), Moscow's first radical independent exhibiting group, the more radical Donkey's Tail (1912–1913), and with Larionov invented Rayonism (1912–1914). She was also a member of the German-based art movement Der Blaue Reiter. Born in Russia, she moved to Paris in 1921 and lived there until her death. Her painting vastly influenced the avant-garde in Russia. Her exhibitions held in Moscow and St Petersburg (1913 and 1914) were the first promoting a "new" artist by an independent gallery. When it came to the pre-revolutionary period in Russia, where decorative painting and icons were a secure profession, her modern approach to rendering icons was both transgressive and problematic. She was one of the leading figures in the avant-garde in Russia and carried this influence with her to Paris.

6. Ivan Kramskoi (1837 - 1887)

With an HPI of 63.65, Ivan Kramskoi is the 6th most famous Russian Painter. His biography has been translated into 51 different languages.

Ivan Nikolayevich Kramskoi (Russian: Иван Николаевич Крамской; 8 June [O.S. 27 May] 1837 – 5 April [O.S. 24 March] 1887) was a Russian Realist painter and art critic of Ukrainian origin. He was an intellectual leader of the art movement known as the Wanderers between 1860 and 1880.

7. Viktor Vasnetsov (1848 - 1926)

With an HPI of 62.36, Viktor Vasnetsov is the 7th most famous Russian Painter. His biography has been translated into 54 different languages.

Viktor Mikhaylovich Vasnetsov (Russian: Ви́ктор Миха́йлович Васнецо́в; 15 May (N.S.), 1848 – 23 July 1926) was a Russian artist who specialised in mythological and historical subjects. He is considered a co-founder of Russian folklorist and romantic nationalistic painting, and a key figure in the Russian Revivalist movement.

8. Alexej von Jawlensky (1864 - 1941)

With an HPI of 61.96, Alexej von Jawlensky is the 8th most famous Russian Painter. His biography has been translated into 36 different languages.

Alexej Georgewitsch von Jawlensky (Russian: Алексе́й Гео́ргиевич Явле́нский, romanized: Alekséy Geórgiyevich Yavlénskiy; 13 March 1864 – 15 March 1941), surname also spelt as Yavlensky, was a Russian expressionist painter active in Germany. He was a key member of the New Munich Artist's Association (Neue Künstlervereinigung München), Der Blaue Reiter (The Blue Rider) group and later the Die Blaue Vier (The Blue Four).

Pantheon has 74 people classified as painters born between 1360 and 1979. Of these 74, 4 (5.41%) of them are still alive today. The most famous living painters include Andrei Kolkoutine, Israel Tsvaygenbaum, and Viktor Lyapkalo. The most famous deceased painters include Wassily Kandinsky, Andrei Rublev, and Nicholas Roerich. As of April 2022, 15 new painters have been added to Pantheon including Serge Poliakoff, Teresa Feoderovna Ries, and Tetyana Yablonska.