I was born and grew up in a small town of Tuimazy in the West Bashkortostan, in the Ural Mountains in Russia.

My mother had worked as a teacher of geography at school for more than forty years. My father was a driver and a mechanic and retired rather late. The fate of my ancestors was typical for the people of that time in Russia: my father’s father was killed in the 30-s because he refused to denounce his belief (he was a minister), his wife had to survive with her five children alone. My mother’s father was killed during the World War II, and his wife, a communist, worked as a school principal for many years.
 

Since early childhood I felt I was very old and experienced. I didn’t like much to play with other children. I loved to watch rather than to participate. I was fond of reading: when I was ten, I had read half of the home many volumes library, including Tolstoy and Saltykov-Tchshedrin. I considered studying at school as inevitable evil.

 

I adored to draw and always did it with passion: I could tear into pieces a pile of paper if something didn’t come out properly. Very early I felt that I can draw better than others. I visited the local art school for two years, but had no more persistence to study more.

I dreamed to become a ballerina, an astronomer, an artist, but became a teacher of English. Teaching at school I felt as if there wasn’t room enough for me. I needed something more.

It was the end of the 80-s – the very height of perestroika in Russia, the time of fighting for freedom of speech. “Surfing” on this wave, I found myself in the local newspaper, where I started to work as a journalist.

It was awfully difficult at the beginning. I clearly realized it wasn’t my vocation at all but I made my mind, having said to myself: I won’t retreat, let journalism teach me to communicate with people, reveal my weak points and strengthen my spirit.

It lasted so for fourteen years. Journalism, in fact, taught me many things, but after a number of years my true essence – introvertive, intuitive – began to prevail.

After some fighting I left my socially active past and started a new life. I came back to painting, having elaborated my own method.

Today I am an artist. I am so much happy that I can do what I want.

And how lucky we are to have Internet with the help of which you can get acquainted with my works too!