Natalia Nesterova:
1944   Born in Moscow, April 23, to a family of architects
1962   Graduated from the Moscow Arts School
1968   Graduated from the Moscow Surikov Art Institute
1969   Joined the Artists' Union of the USSR
1982, 1986, 1989   Won Russia's Prize for Best Artwork of the Year
1990   Awarded Honors Silver Medal, Russian Academy of Fine Arts
1991   Professorship of Painting at the Russian Academy of Theater Arts
1994   Awarded title "Honored Artist of Russia"
1997   Elected Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Fine Arts
1998   Awarded State Prize of Russia in the Fine Arts

 SELECTED EXHIBITIONS
2000   Art of the 20th Century, The State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow, catalogue
Natalya Nesterova: Paintings. Lazar Gadaev: Sculpture, Plastov Museum of Contemporary Art, Ulyanovsk, touring exhibition: State Museum of Fine Arts, Samara; Radischev State Museum of Fine Arts, Saratov
Russian Art of the 1990s, The Schimmel Center for the Arts, Pace University, New York
Natalya Nesterova: Last Supper, Russian Gallery, Tallinn
Natalya Nesterova, Historical Museu m, Obninsk
Natalya Nesterova: Paintings, Tarussa State Gallery of Fine Arts, Tarussa
1999   Natalya Nesterova: Last Supper in the Exhibit of Paintings in Competition for the State Prize of Russia in the Fine Arts, The State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
Exhibit of Painting in Commemoration of Bicentennial of Alexander Pushkin, Russian Academy of Fine Arts, Moscow; Gallery on Neglinnaya, Moscow
Russian Women Artists and Collapse of the Soviet Society, INTART Museum of Upstate New York at Oneonta, Oneonta, New York
1998   Modernism and Post-Modernism: Russian Art of the Ending Millennium, The Yager Museum, Hartwick College, Oneonta, New York, catalogue, touring exhibition: Plattsburgh Art Museum, SUNY, Plattsburgh, New York, 1998; Elaine L. Jacobs Gallery, Wayne State University, Detroit, Michigan, 1999; Evergreen House Museum, The Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland, 2000; Fondo del Sol Visual Arts Center and Museum, Washington, DC, 2001; Willington B. Gray Gallery, School of Art, East Carolina University, Greenville, North Carolina, 2001; The Schimmel Center for the Arts, Pace University, New York, 2001
Natalya Nesterova, Hal Bromm Gallery, New York
Russian Seasons, Cite des Arts, Paris; Central House of Artists, Moscow
Russian Artists Visiting Chagall, Chagall Museum, Vitebsk
1997   The World of Perceptible Things in Pictures, State Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts, Moscow, catalogue
Last Supper: Paintings by Natalya Nesterova, Central House of Artists, Moscow, catalogue
Meaning as a Second Language: A Contemporary Russian Initiative, Hofstra Museum, Hofstra University, Hempstead, New York, catalogue
1996   Here and There, Then and Now: Contemporary Artists from the Former Soviet Union, National Jewish Museum, Washington, DC, catalogue
Natalya Nesterova, Hal Bromm Gallery, New York
Art-Manege - International Art Fair: XX Century Art, Central Exhibition Hall Manege, Moscow
Post-Art-Moderne, Central House of Artists, Moscow
Galleries in Gallery, The State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
1995   From Gulag to Glasnost: Nonconformist Art from the Soviet Union, Zimmerli Art Museum, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, New Brunswick, catalogue
1994   Before 'Neo'and After 'Post', Lehman College Art Gallery, The City University of New York, New York, catalogue
1993   Four Russian Messages: Carnival and Drama, Evergreen House Museum, The Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, catalogue
Natalya Nesterova, Maya Polsky Gallery, Chicago
Classic-IV, 4th International Biennial, Kortrijk, Belgium
1992   Natalya Nesterova: A Retrospective, The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, Montreal, catalogue
Natalya Nesterova, The State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
The Tale of Bread and Tears: Twenty Russian Artists Witness Their Time, Ljubljana Krizanke, Yugoslavia
1991   Natalya Nesterova, Maya Polsky Gallery, Chicago
Artistas Rusos Contemporanes, Santiago De Compostela, Auditorio De Galicia, Spain
1990   Natalya Nesterova: New Paintings, Hal Bromm Gallery, New York
Contemporary Soviet Art, The Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, Ridgefield, CT
The Quest for Self-Expression: Paintings in Moscow and Leningrad 1965-1990, Columbus Museum of Art, Columbus, Ohio, catalogue, touring exhibition: Weatherspoon Art Gallery, University of North Carolina, Greensboro, NC, 1991; Arkansas Art Center, Little Rock, Arkansas, 1991
1989   Natalya Nesterova and Lazar Gadaev, Central Exhibition Hall Manege, Moscow
Exhibition of 30 Moscow Artists in London, Municipal Gallery, London
1988   Russian Avant-Garde and Soviet Contemporary Art, Sotheby's, Moscow, catalogue
Soviet Art at the Ludwig Museum, Ludwig Museum, Cologne, catalogue
Natalya Nesterova: Recent Works from Moscow, Hal Bromm Gallery, New York, catalogue
Contemporary Russian Art, Arte Contemporaneo (ARCO), Madrid
Chicago International Art Fair, Chicago
1987   Contemporary Russian Art, Foire International d'art Contemporain (FIAC), Grand Palais, Paris
Six Moscow Artists, Riga; Tallinn
1986   Kunstler aus Moskau, West Berlin
1985   Exhibition at Ludwig Gallery, Cologne
1984   Exhibition of Five Soviet Artists, Ludwig and Nikolai, Cologne
1982   Exhibition at Ludwig Gallery, Cologne
1981   Art 81, Basel
Art Exhibition, Central Exhibition Hall Manege, Moscow
1974   Exhibition of Four Artists, Exhibition Hall Kuznetsky Most, Moscow


SELECTED PUBLIC COLLECTIONS
B'nai B'rith Klutznick National Jewish Museum, Washington, DC
China National Museum of Fine Arts - Ludwig Museum, Beijing
Duke Museum of Art, Duke University, Durham, NC
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York
Hofstra Museum, Hofstra University, Hempstead, New York
Ludwig Forum for International Art, Aachen
Ludwig Museum at The State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia
The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, Montreal
Museum of Contemporary Art - Ludwig Museum Budapest, Budapest
National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington, DC
National Museum of Contemporary Art, Seoul
Radischev State Museum of Fine Arts, Saratov, Russia
Slovak National Gallery, Bratislava
The State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
The State Russian Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia
The Jane Voorhees Zimmerli Art Museum, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, New Brunswick, NJ

Provided by: Lis Janstrup, Denmark

Laureate of the State Prize of the Russian Federation (1999). Natalia Nesterova represents ‘carnavalism’, a current in the Soviet art of 1970s and 80s that applied surrealistic techniques to tamper into the canons of socialist realism. She graduated in 1962 from the secondary art school at the Surikov Moscow State Art Institute and entered this institute where she studied from 1962 to 1968 under D. Zhilinskiy. She regularly participated in exhibitions, including youth ones; from 1984 on she exhibited her works in West Germany and other western countries. Her style was greatly influenced upon by primitivism and naïve art (especially Niko Pirosmanashvili); T.Nazarenko was among the modern artists who had a substantial impact on Nesterova's early work. In the early 1970s Natalia Nesterova made herself a name with pictures travestying the clichés of the socialist realist thematic picture and highlighting the absurdity of Soviet life. The artist’s works are in the State Tretyakov Gallery, the State Russian Museum, the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, the Guggenheim museum in New York and in many other large collections of modern art.