Tselkov, Oleg
Oleg Tselkov was born in Moscow in 1934. He decided to be an artist at the age of 15 and studied at the Moscow Secondary Art School from 1949 to 1953. He spent one year at the Minsk Art Institute and another year at the Repin Institute for Painting, Sculpture and Architecture in Leningrad. Tselkov finally graduated from the Russian State Institute of Performing Arts in Leningrad where his teacher was Nikolay Akimov (1901-1968), a pupil of Mstislav Dobuzhinsky (1875-1957), in 1958.
Oleg participated in the exhibitions of young artists from 1956 and moved back to Moscow to join the circle of unofficial artists in 1961. He had personal shows at the I. V. Kurchatov Institute of Atomic Energy in 1965 and the Central House of Architects in Moscow in 1970.
In the 1970s Tselkov became one of the most celebrated non-conformist artists known for his bright colours and bold shapes. His studio was visited by many celebrities including Arthur Miller (1915-2005), Renato Guttuso (1911-1987) and David Alfaro Siqueiros (1896-1974). Oleg’s paintings were shown at many exhibitions abroad. However his works were deemed unacceptable by the Soviet authorities and Tselkov emigrated to France settling at a farm, 200 miles to the east from Paris, in 1977.
From the 1980s Tselkov lived and worked in France. He had numerous exhibitions in the USA, the UK and Europe. His first monograph was published in Italy in 1988, another one in France and New York in 1992 and the third one in Moscow in 2002. His 2 major personal shows took place at the State Russian Museum in Saint Petersburg and the State Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow in 2004.
His works are present at the Zimmerli Art Museum in New Jersey, the Hunterian Art Gallery in Glasgow, the Ulster Museum in Belfast, the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, the Yokohama Museum in Japan, the Pushkin Fine Art Museum and the State Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow, the New Museum and the State Russian Museum in Saint Petersburg, other public and many distinguished private collections in Russia and abroad.
