Smirnov fon Raukh Aleksey

Smirnov Aleksey Glebovich (von Rauch) was a Soviet artist, icon painter, art theorist, poet, and publicist of the generation of nonconformist Sixtiers, and the founder of magical symbolism.

Aleksey Glebovich was born on July 23, 1937, in Moscow. His father was the graphics professor Gleb Borisovich Smirnov. The two older generations of the family on his father’s side belonged to the non-remembering branch of the catacomb church. His mother was the artist Lyubov Fyodorovna Smirnova, sister of General F. F. Abramov (the Younger). His grandfather was Boris Vasilyevich Smirnov, a Peredvizhnik painter. From 1950 to 1956, Smirnov studied at the Secondary Art School at the Academy of Arts. From 1957 to 1962 he studied graphics at the Surikov Moscow Art Institute in the workshop of Professor Yevgeny Kibrik. In the early 1960s, the artist Vladimir Kovenatsky introduced Smirnov to Yury Mamleev, after which he joined the Yuzhinsky Circle, becoming one of the central figures of that time. Later he left the Yuzhintsy, breaking off contact with them for unknown reasons. He maintained close relations with the department head, artist and teacher Aleksandr Solovyov, and wrote memoirs about him entitled “The Conspiracy of the Maimed.” A. G. Smirnov considered Russian icon painting to be his true school.

In the mid-1970s, A. G. Smirnov left fine art and concentrated on literary work: he created several plays, a novel, cycles of poems, and others. In the USSR, A. G. Smirnov was not published. Since the 1990s, A. G. Smirnov’s works have been published in Russia, Israel, and France.

He was buried at Babushkinskoye Cemetery in Moscow.