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Tyrsa, Nikolay (Andreyevich)
(b Aralyk, Armenia [now in Turkey], 10 May 1887; d Vologda, 10 Feb 1942). Russian artist and watercolourist of Armenian birth. He did not receive a systematic art education, although he studied with Léon Bakst at the Academy of Arts in St Petersburg from 1905 to 1910. He regarded Bakst, a clear influence in the many nude studies of the early and mid-1910s, as one of his principal mentors. During this period Tyrsa also studied and copied church frescoes, sharing in the general rediscovery and reappraisal of the national traditions of Russian culture, including icons, church architecture and the decorative arts. After the October Revolution of 1917 he was successful as a commercial designer, poster artist and book and magazine illustrator, especially for children’s literature. Together with the artists Vladimir Konashevich, Vladimir Lebedev (1891–1967) and Yury Vasnetsov, and the writers Korney Chukovsky (1882–1969) and Samuil Marshak (1887–1964), Tyrsa contributed to the virtual renaissance of the children’s book during the 1920s and early 1930s. He also gave much attention to the Russian classics, illustrating Pushkin’s Pikovaya Dama (The Queen of Spades; Leningrad, 1936), Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina (Leningrad, 1939) and Lermontov’s Geroy nashego vremeni (A Hero of Our Time; Leningrad, 1941).
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