Soviet sculptor Zair Azgur 1908-1995
The bust of Rabindranath Tagore. Work by Soviet sculptor Zair Azgur (1908-1995). Granite, 1956, the hall of the National Art Museum of Belarus
Soviet sculptor Zair Azgur
Academician of the USSR Academy of Arts (1958), Corresponding Member (1947), Hero of Socialist Labor (1978), People’s Artist of the USSR (1973), Azgur was the winner of two Stalin Prize of the second degree (1946, 1948), and member of the Communist Party since 1943. His works are in the collections of the National Art Museum, the Museum of the Great Patriotic War, Memorial Museum – workshop of Zair Isaakovich Azgur (Minsk, Belarus), the State Tretyakov Gallery (Moscow), the Astrakhan Regional Picture gallery (Astrakhan, Russian Federation), the art museum of Moldova and others.
Zair Azgur was born on 2 January 1908 in the village of Molchany of Mogilev province (now Vitebsk region of Byelorussia), into a Jewish family. He graduated from the Vitebsk Art Practical Institute in 1925, his teachers were Y. Pen and MA Kerzin. In 1925-1928 Zair studied at Higher Artistic – Technical Institute in Leningrad; Art Institute of Kiev and Tbilisi Academy of Fine Arts (1928-1929).
Portrait of a Hero of the Soviet Union E. Kolosova. 1970. Plaster. Soviet sculptor Zair Azgur
In 1945, Zair Azgur married Galina Gorelova, daughter of Academician GN Gorelov, a member of the Academy of Arts of the USSR (1958). In 1980, Zair was the head of the creative workshop of USSR Academy of Arts (Department of Sculpture) in Minsk.
Soviet sculptor Zair Azgur is the author of lots of monumental portraits: Dzerzhinsky (1947), AI Molodchy (1943), MF Silnitsky (1943), AI Rodimtsev (1943), DM Pozharsky, Lu Xun (1953-1954), R. Tagore (1958), which are exhibited in Tretyakov gallery. The monuments created by the artist decorate streets of many cities of the former USSR – Pushkin (1956, Astrakhan), ensemble in the Yakub Kolas square (1972, Minsk), three monuments to Vladimir Ilyich Lenin in Minsk (1980), Makhachkala (1960), Vladikavkaz (1957); monuments to Marx (1980) and SI Gritsevets in Minsk, PM Masherov (1981) in Vitebsk, VI Talash in Petrikov, Bagration in Volkovysk. Among the works of easel stands half-figure of the Belarusian poet and Latin scholar M. Gusovsky (1980).
Soviet sculptor Zair Azgur
Commemorative silver coin of 2008 dedicated to Zair Isaakovich Azgur
Z.I. Azgur (1908-1995) in his workshop
In the workshop
Yakub Kolas (writer). Gypsum. 1940
Chinese writer Lu Sin (1881-1936). 1953-1954. Marble
Hero of the Soviet Union Fyodor Smolyachkov. 1942
Partisan Polina Pototskaya
Gracchus Babeuf. Gypsum. 1934
M.F. Selnitsky. 1943
A.I. Rodimtsev. 1943
Garkusha. 1945
Old woman, bust
Shmuel Yefimovich Plavnik (April 23, 1886 – November 3, 1941), pen name Zmitrok Biadula, Jewish Belarusian poet, prose writer
Felix Dzerzhinsky with a boy. 1953-1954
Filon Garkusha, Colonel of the Cossack detachment, associate of the Ukrainian Hetman Bogdan Khmelnitsky. 1944-1946, gypsum
Francysk Skaryna (1470-1552) Belarusian humanist, physician, translator
Iosif Stalin. 1950
Joseph Stalin, 1948
Konstantin Rokossovsky (1896-1968) twice Hero of Soviet Union, Marshal of the USSR and Poland
Lenin. 1975
Minai Filippovich Shmyrev (1891-1964) Hero of Soviet Union. 1943, gypsum
Modest Mussorgsky (21 March 1839 – 28 March 1881) Russian composer. 1958, gypsum
Nikita Bogoslovsky (May 22, 1913 – April 4, 2004), Soviet Russian composer. 1982
Nikita Khrushchev, First Secretary of CPSU of the USSR. 1950s
Prince Vladimir Polotsky. Gypsum, 1943
Pyotr Mironovich Masherov (1918-1980). 1983 Bronze
Semyon Moiseyevich Krivoshein (1899 – 1978). Hero of Soviet Union. Gypsum. 1942
Stalin. 1945-47
Vasilko Konstantinovich (7 December 1209 – 4 March 1238) the first Prince of Rostov, Russia
Wasyl Ciapiński (1540s – c. 1604) Belarusian-Lithuanian noble, humanist, educator, writer, publisher
Ded Talash and Panas
Poet Aloiza Pashkevich. 1948, gypsum
Portrait of wife, Galina Azgur. 1955, gypsum
Simon and Hanna
Suleiman Stalsky
Yakub Kolas, Belarusian writer
Belarusian poet and writer Yanka Kupala posing for Azgur
Soviet sculptor Zair Azgur (1908-1995)
Sources: Illustrated album
Masters of Soviet art
Tenth exhibition of works by members of the USSR Academy of Arts “Painting
Sculpture Graphics”. Publisher “Art”, Moscow 1972
