Tamara Zubkova was born into an artistic family. Her father, Ivan Zubkov, was one of the founders of the Artel of Ancient Painting, an Honored Artist of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic and a laureate of Ilya Repin State Prize.

She significantly contributed to the development of Palekh miniature. Her works were mainly inspired by songs. Tamara Zubkova chose both folk compositions and bard songs composed in the USSR. Like many Palekh artists, she could sing well and at the same time depicted song plots on the surface of black lacquer boxes with great delicacy.

The painting on the chest ‘There is no better blossom’ presents various lyrics by prominent Soviet poet Mikhail Isakovsky. The artist placed fragments from his songs in the lower part of the chest, making them part of the ornamental composition.

On the front panel, she depicted the plot of the song after which the chest was named:

The miniature on the right is inspired by the poem “By the Well”:

The box is distinguished by a special warmth, heartiness and a smooth rhythm of the composition, which echoes the melodies themselves.

This is not the only work which Tamara Zubkova dedicated to Mikhail Isakovsky’s songs. For example, the museum also houses a cigarette case with a painting based on the song ‘You Can Never Tell’.

Tamara Zubkova proved herself in many creative domains. She took part in designing the book ‘Traditional Russian Tales’ by Alexander Afanasyev, worked on the stage design for the ballet ‘The Tale of the Dead Princess’ and opera ‘Kashchey the Deathless’ for the Maly Opera Theatre in Leningrad. In addition, she contributed to the restoration of the Lacquer cabinet in the Monplaisir Palace in Peterhof in 1956.

The artist also worked on the design of one of the most beautiful pavilions of the All-Union Agricultural Exhibition — the Central Industrial Zones Pavilion of the Russian SFSR. Based on her sketch, masters decorated it with a delicate relief pattern.

Tamara Zubkova’s work in the field of animation is no less impressive: together with other masters of Palekh miniature, Nikolay Golikov and Boris Kukuliev, she created sketches for the animated movie “Dobrynya Nikitich”.