Nikolai Kalmakov

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Nikolai Konstantinowitsch Kalmakow , Russian Николай Константинович Калмаков , also Nicholas Kalmakoff , (born January 23, 1873 in Nervi , Italy ; † February 2, 1955 in Chelles , France ) was a Russian draftsman , painter and set designer .

Life

As the son of a noble Russian general and an Italian, he initially received home schooling. His first passion for the occult was sparked early on by stories from the Brothers Grimm and ETA Hoffmans . He studied law in St. Petersburg from 1890 to 1895 and, after graduating, painting and anatomy in Italy. His favorite subjects were Greek and Oriental legends , eroticism and asceticism . Stylistically he was close to symbolism and art nouveau . From 1900 he lived alternately in St. Petersburg and Moscow . Although he otherwise preferred isolation, he had loose contact with the artists' association Mir Iskusstwa and the St. Petersburg theater world, where he caused a sensation with elaborate and taboo-breaking costumes and stage designs. He also worked as a book illustrator and manufactured to customer bookplate .

After the Russian Revolution in 1917 he emigrated and lived in Constantinople , Tallinn and from 1924 in Paris . There he worked in 1926 together with his former fellow student and playwright Nikolai Jevreinow in St. Petersburg on a performance of Oscar Wilde's Salomé . The mystic Gurdjieff , who also emigrated, was one of his acquaintances in France .

He died in 1955, impoverished and largely forgotten, in a retirement home in Chelles. He is also buried in this city.

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personal data
SURNAME Kalmakov, Nikolai
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Kalmakow, Nikolai Konstantinowitsch (full name); Kalmakoff, Nicholas; Калмаков, Николай Константинович (Russian)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Russian draftsman, painter and set designer
DATE OF BIRTH January 23, 1873
PLACE OF BIRTH Nervi , Italy
DATE OF DEATH 2nd February 1955
Place of death Chelles , France