Pavel Filonov
Russian painter and poet (1883-1941)
Pavel Nikolayevich Filonov (Russian: Па́вел Никола́евич Фило́нов, IPA: [ˈpavʲɪl nʲɪkɐˈlajɪvʲɪtɕ fʲɪˈlonəf] ; January 8, 1883 – December 3, 1941) was a Russian avant-garde painter, art theorist, and poet.
Biography
Filonov was born in Moscow on January 8, 1883 (Gregorian calendar) or December 27, 1882 (Julian calendar). In 1897, he moved to St. Petersburg, where he began taking art lessons. In 1908, he entered St. Petersburg Academy of Arts but was expelled in 1910.
Between 1910 and 1914, Filonov was a member of the art group Soyuz Molodyozhi ("Union of Youth"), founded by artists Elena Guro and Mikhail Matyushin. In 1912, he wrote The Canon and the Law, an article in which he articulated the principles of analytical realism, also known as "anti-Cubism". According to Filonov, while Cubism represents objects using elements of surface geometry, analytical realism seeks to represent objects through the elements of their inner essence or soul. He remained committed to these principles throughout his life.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Pavel Filonov” is russian painter and poet (1883-1941). The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Pavel, Filonov and Russian, not as a finished interpretation.
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The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 30, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q466187. VIAF identifies the subject as 64043652. The Library of Congress control number is n82224063. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1883, 1941, 1882 and 1897.
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This entry incorporates text from “Pavel Filonov” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.