Descripción

Grandmaster of Avant-Garde The Chess Art of Galina Satonina (1905–2000) was the leading chess painter of the Soviet era. A multiple-time Kazan and Tatarstan ladies chess champion, she saw life as a game of chess, and her paintings speak the language of Caissa. She painted world champions and other famous players, ranging from early stars Philidor, Morphy and Anderssen, all the way through to Fischer, Karpov and Kasparov.

Grandmaster of Avant-Garde

Several of her paintings depict the chess pieces themselves and emotions felt during play, as well as different aspects of the game such as time-trouble and checkmate.

Satonina’s works were exhibited at Soviet-era world championship matches. They were widely written about in the Soviet and international chess press, including Shakhmaty v SSSR, 64 and Ceskoslovensky Sach.

The Chess Art of Galina Satonina

This full-color coffee-table book, based on original paintings from museum and private collections, was compiled by Dr. Vladimir Kudryavtsev, who has published many tomes on national and regional visual art of the Soviet and pre-Soviet periods. It additionally contains other works from Satonina’s career as well as her unique life story.

Grandmaster of Avant-Garde

Satonina was born on 14th December 1905 in Kazan. At the age of 7, she was sent to a girls grammar school; its founder and head teacher, V. I. Ryakhina, sought out alumni of Kazan, St. Petersburg and Moscow universities as teachers. The talented pedagogues cultivated a high cultural level among the pupils of this pre-revolutionary school. The Ryakhina School, one of four similar schools in Kazan at the time, distinguished its pupils by their gray uniform. Satonina remained loyal to that color for her entire life, combining its silvery shades and rich tones in her artist’s clothes and carefully chosen accessories.

Ryakhina’s private school was located in the house of merchant L. V. Kekin, who built it based on a design by architect G. B. Rush from his own bricks, the best in the Kazan region.The project, upon the whim of the customer, was created in a mixed style, organically blending eclectics and modernism with elements of Gothic and Mauritanian architecture.The restored mansion, still hiding the mysterious secrets of its owner, became a unique landmark in Kazan and still attracts the attention of contemporaries.

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