Konstantin Juon

Painter, draughtsman, engraver, theatrical designer, teacher, writer. Younger brother of the composer Paul Juon (1872–1940). Born in Moscow (1875) to Swiss-Russian insurance official Theodor Friedrich Juon (1842–1912) and his Scottish-German wife Emilie Brigitta Gottwalt (1845–after 1925). Studied under Abram Arkhipov, Konstantin Savitsky, Nikolai Kasatkin and Konstantin Korovin at the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture (1892–98) and in Valentin Serov’s studio (1898–1900). Travelled down the River Volga (late 1890s) and paid visits to Paris (1896–late 1900s), where he trained in private schools and studied Impressionist townscapes. Built a house and studio in the village of Ligachovo near Moscow (1900) and married a local peasant woman called Claudia Nikitina (1908). Worked in Sergiev Posad (1903, 1911, 1918–21) and Tver Province (1905–06, 1916–17). Founding member of the Union of Russian Artists (1903, committee member from 1904), life member of the Salon d’Automne (1906), member of the Association of Artists of Revolutionary Russia (1925). Taught at the Konstantin Juon and Ivan Dudin School of Painting and Drawing in Moscow (1900–17), Moscow Studio for Raising the Qualifications of Artists (1926–29), Ilya Repin Institute of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture in Leningrad (1934–35, 1938–39) and the Vasily Surikov Institute of Art in Moscow (1952–55). Engraved the Creation of the World cycle (1908–12). Designed the sets and costumes for productions of Modest Mussorgsky’s musical drama Boris Godunov at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris (1913), Maxim Gorky’s play Yegor Bulychov and Others at the Moscow Art Theatre (1934) and Modest Mussorgsky’s opera Khovanshchina at the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow (1940), won first prize for his curtain design for the Bolshoi Theatre (1920). Worked for the Academy of Artistic Sciences (1921–30). Published the Sergiev Posad album of lithographs (1922) and Autobiography (1926). Sketched Vladimir Lenin lying in state in the Pillar Hall of the House of the Unions (1924). Designed mosaics for the Constitution Hall of the planned Palace of the Soviets (1940). Principal designer of the Maly Theatre in Moscow (1943–48), director of the Scientific Research Institute of the Theory and History of Art of the Academy of Arts of the USSR (1948–50), first secretary of the Union of Artists (1957–58). Died in Moscow and buried at the Novodevichy Cemetery (1958). Contributed to exhibitions (from 1893). Contributed to the exhibitions of the Moscow Society of Lovers of the Arts (1897–1901, 1910), Moscow Fellowship of Artists (1898–1902, 1912), Society of Travelling Art Exhibitions (1900), 36 Artists (1902), World of Art (1903, 1906), Union of Russian Artists (1903–23), Sergei Makovsky Salon (1909), Association of Artists of Revolutionary Russia (1925–29), international exhibitions in Düsseldorf (1904), Venice (1907), Munich (1909), Brussels (1910), Rome (1911), Leipzig (1914), Malmö (1914) and Pittsburgh (1925), exhibitions of Russian art in Paris (1906), Berlin (1906, 1922), Prague (1912) and New York (1924), one-man shows at the Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow (1926, 1945, 1955), Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts in Moscow (1931) and the Academy of Arts of the USSR in Moscow (1950) and retrospectives at the Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow (1962, 1976) and the Russian Museum in Leningrad (1976). Winner of the Stalin Prize (1943), People’s Artist of the RSFSR (1945), full member of the Academy of Arts of the USSR (1947), People’s Artist of the USSR (1950).