Nicolai Fechin (pronounced "fay-shin") was born in 1881 in the town of Kazan, Russia. His father was highly skilled in woodworking and whom Fechin received early instruction in drawing and sculpting. In 1895, at the age of 13, Fechin enrolled in the Art School of Kazan, a branch of the Imperial Academy of Arts in St. Petersburg. Operated by graduates of the Academy, the school promoted individual development within an academic framework of Russian literature, art history, and architecture.
After graduating from the Kazan school in 1900, Fechin entered the Imperial Academy of Arts. There he studied under the tutelage of painter Ilya Repin, whose highly popular works emphasized the realistic values of northern European masters such as Rembrandt. After 1904, he began to concentrate increasingly on portraiture. Fechin also began to experiment with using the palette knife to apply color to large areas of the painting surface and to emphasize gesture and movement. |
Fechin graduated from the academy in St. Petersburg in 1908 and was awarded the Prix de Rome scholarship that enabled him to travel outside Russia to visit museums and art galleries in Austria, Germany, Italy, and France. Returning to Kazan from Paris in the late fall of 1909, he accepted a full-time position as an instructor at the local art school. In 1910 he won a gold medal for painting at the annual International Exhibition in Munich and was invited to show in the International Exhibition held at the Carnegie Institute in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, that same year. Here his work came to the attention of New York art patron W.S. Stimmel, through whom Fechin began selling paintings in the United States.
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In 1922 Stimmel initiated the process that eventually enabled the Fechins to immigrate to the United States. After many delays, caused for the most part by governmental red tape, the Fechins arrived in New York City on August 1, 1923. At forty-two years of age, having left everything he had ever known, Fechin faced the uncertain prospect of creating a new life in a new country.
With the help of friends and patrons such as Stimmel and financier John Burnham, who at |