Mihail Chemiakin Russian (1943 - )

Mihail Chemiakin was born in Moscow spent his early years in East Germany. His father served in the Army there. His family returned to the Soviet Union in 1957 and he studied at the secondary school of art affiliated with the II'ya Repin Institute of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture, in Leningrad. In 1961 he was subjected to forced psychiatric treatment to "cure" him of views that did not conform to Soviet norms.

He later worked at the Hermitage Museum In Leningrad. With his colleagues from the museum he organized an exhibition in 1964. After this exhibition the director of the museum was fired and all the participants forced to resign. In 1967 he co-authored with philosopher Vladimir Ivanov a treatise called "Metaphysical Synthesism", which laid out his artistic principles, and created the "St. Petersburg Group" of artists . In 1971 he was exiled from the Soviet Union for failing to conform to Socialist Realism norms.

He settled in France and he published Appollon-77, an almanac of post-Stalinist art, poetry, and photography. He moved to New York in 1981 and currently lives in France.

Chemiakin works in a broad range of media and subjects, as can be seen in the 2010 two-volume book on his art, Mihail Chemiakin (Azbooka publishers, St. Petersburg) In 2001, commissioned by the City of Moscow, Chemiakin created a monument "Children Are the Victims of Adult Vices", a group of sculptures in a park 2000 feet south of the Kremlin, behind the British Ambassador's residence. Other sculptures by Chemiakin include Peter the Great in St. Petersburg's Peter and Paul Fortress, Peter the Great in London, Monument to Victims of Terrorism in Vladikavkaz (North Ossetia), Vladimir Vysotsky in Samara, Russia.

Since roughly 2001, he has been working as artistic designer on the upcoming Russian animated feature film Hoffmaniada.. In 2001 he directed and designed an entirely new production of The Nutcracker for the Mariinsky Theater, where he also created a second ballet based on the same tale by Hoffman, "The Magic Nut". In 2010 the artist created a new production of "Coppelia" for the Lithuanian National Opera and Ballet Theater.

His work is collected World Wide by private collectors and Museums. Diva Art Group welcomes new Mihail Chemiakin listings.