Pavel Varfolomevich Kusnetsov (1878-1968) was a Russia

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 painter and graphic artist.

He studied at Saratov

Saratov

-Modern Saratov:The Saratov region is highly industrialized, due in part to the rich in natural and industrial resources of the area. The region is also one of the more important and largest cultural and scientific centres in Russia...

 at Bogolyubov

Alexey Bogolyubov

Alexey Petrovich Bogolyubov was a Russian landscape painter.Bogolyubov was born in the Pomeranian village of Novgorod Gubernia. His father was retired colonel Pyotr Gavriilovich Bogolyubov...

 Art School (1891-6), then Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture

Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture

The Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture was one of the largest educational institutions in Russia. The school was formed by the 1865 merger of a private art college, established in Moscow in 1832, and the Palace School of Architecture, established in 1749 by Dmitry Ukhtomsky. By...

 (1897-1904) and for a year in Paris

Paris

Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

 (1905). His early paintings were exhibited by the Mir Iskusstva

Mir iskusstva

Mir iskusstva was a Russian magazine and the artistic movement it inspired and embodied, which was a major influence on the Russians who helped revolutionize European art during the first decade of the 20th century. From 1909, many of the miriskusniki also contributed to the Ballets Russes...

 group, and he was closely associated with the Russian Symbolists

Russian Symbolism

Russian symbolism was an intellectual and artistic movement predominant at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century. It represented the Russian branch of the symbolist movement in European art, and was mostly known for its contributions to Russian poetry.-Russian symbolism in...

. He helped to organize the Crimson Rose exhibition (1904) and was a founder and leader of the Blue Rose

Blue Rose (art group)

Blue Rose was a Symbolist artist association in Moscow from 1906 to 1908. They emphasised color as a 'tonal' medium to construct rhythm in a painting and the elimination of shape and contour. Members included Anatolii Arapov, Petr Bromirsky, V...

 in 1907. He taught at the Stroganov Institute (1917-18; 1945-8) and at the Moscow Institute of Fine Arts (1918-37). He headed the painting section of Narkompros until 1921, but fell out of official favour with the advent of Socialist Realism

Socialist realism

Socialist realism is a style of realistic art which was developed in the Soviet Union and became a dominant style in other communist countries. Socialist realism is a teleologically-oriented style having its purpose the furtherance of the goals of socialism and communism...

.

Kuznetsov's early paintings are typical of the Blue Rose group's poetic explorations of an interior, imaginative world through archetypal symbols. After 1910 he drew increasingly on folk culture, continuing to draw on the rich colours and harmonious rhythms of the Symbolists but simplifying his compositions to depict the everyday life of village communities of Kirghizstan in Central Asia

Central Asia

Central Asia is a core region of the Asian continent from the Caspian Sea in the west, China in the east, Afghanistan in the south, and Russia in the north...

.