Andrey Avinoff
Encyclopedia
Andrey Avinoff sometimes referred to as Andrej Nikolajewitsch Avinoff or Andrei Avinoff, was a Russia
n entomologist and painter who became Director of the Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh
.
He was especially interested in Lepidoptera
among many other interests. He was the brother of the famous portrait painter Elizabeth Shoumatoff
who most famously was painting Frankin Delano Roosevelt when he died, and was a highly skilled artist himself who usually painted images of flora or fauna, or paintings with deep meanings with themes of religious or apocalyptic nature.
court as an "adviser to the Tzar," left Russia after the Revolution
. In 1924, he was hired as an assistant curator of entomology at The Carnegie Museum; he was promoted to director of the Museum in 1926 which he remained through 1946. He was also a trustee of the American Museum
.
One of his most famous series of paintings depict The Fall of Atlantis, a poem by George V. Golokhvastoff, published in limited edition in 1938 http://www.unseenrealms.com/vorder.html. The Birth of Atlantis, illustrated in his series of paintings, exemplifies the Art Deco style popular in the 1930s. The image is of a young male figure rising out of the sea, symbolic of the legendary island said by Plato to have later disappeared beneath the waves during an earthquake. Avinoff, a naturalist, was also known for his paintings of flowers, and 350 of his works illustrate Wildflowers of Western Pennsylvania and the Upper Ohio Basin.
Born in Ukraine
, Avinoff's early interest was in entomological fauna. His work as a Russian diplomat led him to immigrate to the United States in 1917 following the Communist Revolution. Whilst resident in the United States, Avinoff made six trips to Jamaica
which he described as "a dreamland of tropical splendor" between 1926 and 1940, five of them with Nicholas Shoumatoff, the son of his sister Elizabeth Shoumatoff
whose father had died in his arms at the age of 12 from a drowning at Jones Beach, New York, and who Avinoff largely served as a father figure for. Shoumatoff would eventually become a well-traveled engineer who may have been responsible for the development of up to 50% of the world's paper mills, and eventually became a president of the New York Entomological Society, traveled to Jamaica several times himself, and became an expert in mountainous alpine climates and mountain ranges including the Swiss Alps
and the Himalayas
. The two caught more than fourteen thousand bots (butterflies and moths in Jamaican patois), doubling the number of known species on the island to more than a thousand, including the Shoumatoff Hairstreak, a rare butterfly that they had discovered together (see picture below).
His associates at the Carnegie Museum included William P. Comstock and E. Irving Huntington, Cyril F. dos Passos and Vladimir Nabokov
.
Avinoff's collection of Rhopalocera from the Pamir Mountains
and Central Asia is in the Zoological Museum in St. Petersburg. This collection of some eighty thousand specimens was appropriated by the Soviet
government. Following World War II, the Mellon
family planned to retrieve the collection, but this was refused. Through trading and purchase Avinoff managed to build up a near duplicate collection, most of which was donated to the Carnegie Museum. Much of his work still exists at the Carnegie Museum and several specimen of the Shoumatoff's Hairstreak still exist at the Museum of Natural History
in New York.
Avinoff generally lived a secluded but socially correct lifesyle in the upper class of Pittsburgh, which was a popular and thriving metropolis at the time, with a strong elitist social society. He never had children and he was homosexual.
He was also close friends with the biologist and sex researcher Alfred Kinsey
, and a number of his collections are available and stored at the Kinsey Institute in Indiana
.
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
n entomologist and painter who became Director of the Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh is the second-largest city in the US Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the county seat of Allegheny County. Regionally, it anchors the largest urban area of Appalachia and the Ohio River Valley, and nationally, it is the 22nd-largest urban area in the United States...
.
He was especially interested in Lepidoptera
Lepidoptera
Lepidoptera is a large order of insects that includes moths and butterflies . It is one of the most widespread and widely recognizable insect orders in the world, encompassing moths and the three superfamilies of butterflies, skipper butterflies, and moth-butterflies...
among many other interests. He was the brother of the famous portrait painter Elizabeth Shoumatoff
Elizabeth Shoumatoff
Elizabeth Shoumatoff was an American painter who was best known for painting the Unfinished Portrait of Franklin D. Roosevelt....
who most famously was painting Frankin Delano Roosevelt when he died, and was a highly skilled artist himself who usually painted images of flora or fauna, or paintings with deep meanings with themes of religious or apocalyptic nature.
Biography
Avinoff, who was from a wealthy family while in Russia with ties to nobility, and who served a diplomatic role in the Tsar'sNicholas II of Russia
Nicholas II was the last Emperor of Russia, Grand Prince of Finland, and titular King of Poland. His official short title was Nicholas II, Emperor and Autocrat of All the Russias and he is known as Saint Nicholas the Passion-Bearer by the Russian Orthodox Church.Nicholas II ruled from 1894 until...
court as an "adviser to the Tzar," left Russia after the Revolution
Russian Revolution of 1917
The Russian Revolution is the collective term for a series of revolutions in Russia in 1917, which destroyed the Tsarist autocracy and led to the creation of the Soviet Union. The Tsar was deposed and replaced by a provisional government in the first revolution of February 1917...
. In 1924, he was hired as an assistant curator of entomology at The Carnegie Museum; he was promoted to director of the Museum in 1926 which he remained through 1946. He was also a trustee of the American Museum
American Museum
The American Museum in Britain is based at Claverton Manor, near Bath, England, in a house, designed by Jeffry Wyatville and built in the 1820s on the site of a manor bought by Ralph Allen in 1758...
.
One of his most famous series of paintings depict The Fall of Atlantis, a poem by George V. Golokhvastoff, published in limited edition in 1938 http://www.unseenrealms.com/vorder.html. The Birth of Atlantis, illustrated in his series of paintings, exemplifies the Art Deco style popular in the 1930s. The image is of a young male figure rising out of the sea, symbolic of the legendary island said by Plato to have later disappeared beneath the waves during an earthquake. Avinoff, a naturalist, was also known for his paintings of flowers, and 350 of his works illustrate Wildflowers of Western Pennsylvania and the Upper Ohio Basin.
Born in Ukraine
Ukraine
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km², making it the second largest contiguous country on the European continent, after Russia...
, Avinoff's early interest was in entomological fauna. His work as a Russian diplomat led him to immigrate to the United States in 1917 following the Communist Revolution. Whilst resident in the United States, Avinoff made six trips to Jamaica
Jamaica
Jamaica is an island nation of the Greater Antilles, in length, up to in width and 10,990 square kilometres in area. It is situated in the Caribbean Sea, about south of Cuba, and west of Hispaniola, the island harbouring the nation-states Haiti and the Dominican Republic...
which he described as "a dreamland of tropical splendor" between 1926 and 1940, five of them with Nicholas Shoumatoff, the son of his sister Elizabeth Shoumatoff
Elizabeth Shoumatoff
Elizabeth Shoumatoff was an American painter who was best known for painting the Unfinished Portrait of Franklin D. Roosevelt....
whose father had died in his arms at the age of 12 from a drowning at Jones Beach, New York, and who Avinoff largely served as a father figure for. Shoumatoff would eventually become a well-traveled engineer who may have been responsible for the development of up to 50% of the world's paper mills, and eventually became a president of the New York Entomological Society, traveled to Jamaica several times himself, and became an expert in mountainous alpine climates and mountain ranges including the Swiss Alps
Swiss Alps
The Swiss Alps are the portion of the Alps mountain range that lies within Switzerland. Because of their central position within the entire Alpine range, they are also known as the Central Alps....
and the Himalayas
Himalayas
The Himalaya Range or Himalaya Mountains Sanskrit: Devanagari: हिमालय, literally "abode of snow"), usually called the Himalayas or Himalaya for short, is a mountain range in Asia, separating the Indian subcontinent from the Tibetan Plateau...
. The two caught more than fourteen thousand bots (butterflies and moths in Jamaican patois), doubling the number of known species on the island to more than a thousand, including the Shoumatoff Hairstreak, a rare butterfly that they had discovered together (see picture below).
His associates at the Carnegie Museum included William P. Comstock and E. Irving Huntington, Cyril F. dos Passos and Vladimir Nabokov
Vladimir Nabokov
Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov was a multilingual Russian novelist and short story writer. Nabokov wrote his first nine novels in Russian, then rose to international prominence as a master English prose stylist...
.
Avinoff's collection of Rhopalocera from the Pamir Mountains
Pamir Mountains
The Pamir Mountains are a mountain range in Central Asia formed by the junction or knot of the Himalayas, Tian Shan, Karakoram, Kunlun, and Hindu Kush ranges. They are among the world’s highest mountains and since Victorian times they have been known as the "Roof of the World" a probable...
and Central Asia is in the Zoological Museum in St. Petersburg. This collection of some eighty thousand specimens was appropriated by the Soviet
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
government. Following World War II, the Mellon
Paul Mellon
Paul Mellon KBE was an American philanthropist, thoroughbred racehorse owner/breeder. He is one of only five people ever designated an "Exemplar of Racing" by the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame...
family planned to retrieve the collection, but this was refused. Through trading and purchase Avinoff managed to build up a near duplicate collection, most of which was donated to the Carnegie Museum. Much of his work still exists at the Carnegie Museum and several specimen of the Shoumatoff's Hairstreak still exist at the Museum of Natural History
Museum of Natural History
A museum of natural history is a museum with exhibits about natural history, including such topics as animals, plants, ecosystems, geology, paleontology, and climatology. Some museums feature natural-history collections in addition to other collections, such as ones related to history, art and...
in New York.
Avinoff generally lived a secluded but socially correct lifesyle in the upper class of Pittsburgh, which was a popular and thriving metropolis at the time, with a strong elitist social society. He never had children and he was homosexual.
He was also close friends with the biologist and sex researcher Alfred Kinsey
Alfred Kinsey
Alfred Charles Kinsey was an American biologist and professor of entomology and zoology, who in 1947 founded the Institute for Sex Research at Indiana University, now known as the Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender, and Reproduction, as well as producing the Kinsey Reports and the Kinsey...
, and a number of his collections are available and stored at the Kinsey Institute in Indiana
Indiana
Indiana is a US state, admitted to the United States as the 19th on December 11, 1816. It is located in the Midwestern United States and Great Lakes Region. With 6,483,802 residents, the state is ranked 15th in population and 16th in population density. Indiana is ranked 38th in land area and is...
.
Publications
Partial list- 1946, with N. Shoumatoff, "An Annotated List of the Butterflies of Jamaica." Ann. Carnegie Museum, vol. 2O: pp. 263–295, pi. I
- 1950, An Analysis of Color and Pattern in Butterflies of the Asiatic genus Karanasa. 10 p. 2 plates.
- 1951, with Swedner, "The KaranasaKaranasaKaranasa is an Old World genus of Satyrinae .-External links:* *...
butterflies, a study in evolution". Ann. Carnegie Mus., 32:1-250. (Also Monograph of the Satyrids of Central Asia)
External links
- The Andrey Avinoff foundation
- Prints of Andrey Avinoff paintings for sale
- Andrey Avinoff widely discussed by his great nephew, the author Alex ShoumatoffAlex ShoumatoffAlex Shoumatoff , is an American writer known for his literary journalism, nature and environmental writing, and books and magazine pieces about political and environmental situations and world affairs...
from excerpts from his book on his family, Russian Blood - Please use the search function to find information. - The Kinsey Institute