Kostandi, Kyriak

Kostandi, Kyriak, b 3 October 1852 in Dofinivka, Odesa county, Kherson gubernia, d 31 October 1921 in Odesa. Realist painter and art scholar. After graduating from the Odesa Drawing School (see Odesa Art School) (1874) and the Saint Petersburg Academy of Arts (1882), he returned to Odesa, where he painted and taught at the drawing school. In 1897 he joined the Peredvizhniki and began to take part in their exhibitions. Having helped found the Society of South Russian Artists, he served from 1902 to 1920 as its president. In 1907 he was elected full member of the Saint Petersburg Academy of Arts. From 1917 he served as director of the Odesa City Museum. Kostandi was opposed to every formalist trend. Adhering to a strictly realist style, he devoted himself to genre painting, but did some landscape painting and portrait painting as well. His works include At a Friend's Sickbed (1884), Geese (1888), Early Spring (1892), Little Bright Cloud (1906), and Little Blue Cloud (1908). After his death, his style and ideas became leading principles for a group of his followers gathered in the Kostandi Society of Artists. Vasyl Afanasiev wrote a critical biography of Kostandi in 1955.