Elena Genrikhovna Guro had a special view of the world as a single organic whole. For her, every creature of nature, be it a plant, a stone, or an object, had its own life and soul. She believed that nothing should be harmed in order to preserve the fragile beauty and harmony of life.
Guro had a strong influence on Mikhail Vasilyevich Matyushin’s worldview. When it came to art, Elena Guro was particularly interested in the works of Modernists and Expressionists. Modernism provided a special interpretation of nature through the stylization and “philosophical” form. Impressionism taught Elena Guro to have a direct connection with nature and strive for an accurate rendering of what she saw.
Guro was greatly interested in a series of works by Yelena Dmitriyevna Polenova, in which she used floral patterns and stylized images of flowers. Elena Guro wrote about these works,