Alexander Nikolayevich Benois was born on May 3, 1870 in St. Petersburg and was the ninth child in the family of architectural academician Nikolay Leontievich Benois. He studied at the prestigious private gymnasium of Karl Ivanovich May, at the same time attending the Academy of Arts as a non-matriculated student. Alexander Nikolayevich received his higher education at St. Petersburg University, where he studied law. He was engaged in fine art mostly on his own and under the guidance of his older brother Albert, a watercolorist and architect.
In 1893, Alexander Nikolayevich proved himself to be a talented landscape painter when he created watercolor views of the surroundings of St. Petersburg. At the end of 1896, together with friends, he visited France for the first time. Impressed by what he saw in Paris and its suburbs, he made a series of paintings with the Park of Versailles.
The historical theme prevailed in the artist’s works, the subjects of his paintings were devoted to France during the time of Louis XIV and St. Petersburg of the 18th–19th centuries. In 1894, Alexander Benois wrote a chapter on Russian artists for the German collection “The History of Painting of the 19th Сentury.” He was immediately appreciated as a talented art critic who was able to turn over established ideas about the development of Russian art.
Alexander Nikolayevich Benois became one of the organizers and ideologists of the art association “World of Art” and the editor of the magazine of the same name. He had a unique gift for turning his illustrations into works of art. Alexander Benois devoted a lot of his attention to scenic design. Throughout Benois’s life, the theater was his strongest hobby, the artist loved it and knew it very deeply. His numerous sketches of scenery and costumes demonstrate an exceptional ability to recreate a wide variety of eras, national characteristics and moods.
The 1914 sketch “A Feast
in Time of Plague” was carefully thought out by the artist. Alexander
Nikolayevich depicted a scene on the street of a medieval city: a skinny dog
listens to a conversation between a plump citizen and an elderly dandy, a guard
in armor froze in an unusual position at the city gates. The predominance of
reddish-black tones in the color scheme gave the work a dramatic sound.
