09.10.1984 – 13.12.1947

Nicholas Roerich is known not only as an amazing painter, but also as a stage designer, traveler, archeologist, writer and philosopher. His creative heritage is huge – more than seven thousand paintings scattered all over the world, numerous literary works – books, essays, articles, diaries.Roerich Nicholas Roerich

The artist was born October 9, 1874 in St. Petersburg in the family of the famous notary Konstantin Fedorovich Roerich. After graduation from the gymnasium, Nikolai Roerich entered the law faculty of St. Petersburg University and the Imperial Academy of Arts, where he studied in the studio of the famous artist A.I. Kuindzhi. As a student, the artist becomes a member of the Russian Archaeological Society and participates in numerous excavations on the territory of the Pskov, Novgorod, Tver and other provinces. His love for the Motherland was expressed in deep interest in Russian culture and history. Nicholas Roerich works a lot in the historical genre – the diploma painting “The Gonets”, the paintings “Evening of the Greatness of Kiev”, “The Morning of Kiev’s Greatness”, “Idols”. Already in the artist’s early works one can see his peculiar style – laconism and clarity of composition, purity of color, deep knowledge of historical material.

Nicholas Roerich also designed theatrical productions. During the famous “Russian Seasons” by Sergei Diaghilev in Paris in the design of Nicholas Roerich, there were “Polovtsian Dances” from “Prince Igor” by Borodin, “Pskovite” by Rimsky-Korsakov, ballet “Spring of the Sacred” to the music of Stravinsky.

From 1906 to 1918 years. Nicholas Roerich is the director of the School of the Imperial Society for the Encouragement of Arts, the school organizes a number of workshops: needlework and weaving, icon painting, ceramics and porcelain painting, chasing,

In May 1917, due to lung disease, Roerich and his family moved to Finland, on the shores of Ladoga Lake, but after the revolutionary events, Nicholas Roerich was cut off from the motherland. In 1920, the artist received an offer from the director of the Chicago Institute of Arts to organize a tour of the US cities, and in 1923 the artist’s cherished dream came true – to visit India, and in 1923-1928. N.K. Roerich undertakes an unprecedented scientific and artistic expedition through the Himalayas, Tibet, Altai and Mongolia, and in 1934-1935. – according to Manchuria and China.

Acquaintance with the philosophical thought of the East is reflected in the work of Roerich, and the theme of India increasingly sounds on his canvases and literary works, replacing the colorful images of pagan and early Christian Russia. At the end of the expedition in July 1928, Nicholas Roerich founded the Himalayan Institute of Scientific Research “Urusvati”, which in Sanskrit means “Light of the Morning Star”. In the same place, in the Kulu valley, in the Western Himalayas, Nikolai Konstantinovich and his family find their home. Here, in India, and will be the last period of the artist’s life.