Stepan Jaremich

Painter, graphic artist, illustrator, writer on art, collector, curator, restorer, teacher. Born in the family of a ploughman called Pyotr Jaremich in the Ukrainian village of Halaiki (1869). Studied at the school of painting in the Kiev Monastery of the Caves (1882–87) and the Nikolai Murashko School of Drawing in Kiev (1887–94). Helped Mikhail Vrubel to decorate St Vladimir’s Cathedral in Kiev and took lessons from Nikolai Ge at Ivanovsky, where he met Leo Tolstoy (1880s). Lived and worked in the Pechersk district of Kiev, where he studied and published articles on St Andrew’s Church and the Kiev Monastery of the Caves (1890s). Moved to St Petersburg (1900), where he collaborated with such periodicals as the World of Art, Artistic Treasures of Russia and Olden Years (from 1900). Worked for the Community of St Eugenia (from 1902). Member of the World of Art (1902; 1910, founding member). Lived and worked in Paris (1904–08), where he painted the sets after designs by Alexander Golovin for Sergei Diaghilev’s production of Modest Mussorgsky’s musical drama Boris Godunov at the Théâtre National de l’Opéra (1908). Contributed illustrations to Alexander Benois’s Tsarskoe Selo in the Reign of Empress Elizabeth Petrovna (1910). Published monographs on Mikhail Vrubel (1911), Pavel Chistyakov (1928) and Nikolai Ge (1930) and articles on Nicholas Roerich (1914, 1915, 1916), Mstislav Dobuzhinsky (1923) and Valentin Serov (1936). Taught at the School of Drawing of the Society for the Encouragement of the Arts (1913–18), served as keeper (from 1915) and director of the school’s Museum of Modern Art (1917–28). Art advisor to the Provisional Government (1917), board member of the Russian Museum (from 1918) and the Academy of the History of Material Culture (from 1924). Donated his collection of Old Master drawings and library to the Hermitage (1918), where he headed the department of drawings (1918–30) and restoration studio (1930–39). Died in Leningrad (1939). Contributed to exhibitions (from the 1890s). Contributed to the exhibitions of the World of Art (1902, 1903, 1906, 1911–13, 1915, 1924), Union of Russian Artists (1903–09), New Society of Artists (1907, 1908), In the World of Art (1908), Sergei Makovsky Salon (1909), Russian Landscapes (1918–19), First State Free Exhibition of Works of Art (1919), Community of Artists (1922) and Sergei Diaghilev’s Exposition de l’Art russe at the Salon d’Automne in Paris (1906) and Russische Kunst-Ausstellung at the Kunstsalon Schulte in Berlin (1906).