Grigory Ivanovich Gurkin
About museum
Grigory Ivanovich Gurkin was an Altai painter and a figure in the Altai national liberation movement. Gurkin was born in the village of Ulala (now Gorno-Altaysk) into the family of an Altai artisan saddlemaker from the Choros clan. At the age of 13 he completed formal schooling but continued his studies in an icon-painting workshop. Later he became a student of Ivan Shishkin and produced numerous landscapes, genre-ethnographic canvases, and portraits.
During the Soviet period he participated in political events and spent five years in exile in Mongolia and Tuva. In 1937 Gurkin was arrested and executed on charges of nationalism and espionage. His works were banned until his posthumous rehabilitation in 1956.
Date of birth
12 January 1870
Date of death
11 October 1937
Occupation
Artist