15 Facts About Vladimir Tretchikoff

Vladimir Tretchikoff worked in oil, watercolour, ink, charcoal and pencil but is best known for those works turned into reproduction prints.

Vladimir Grigoryevich Tretchikoff was the youngest of eight children in a well-to-do family in Petropavlovsk, in what is Kazakhstan.

Vladimir Tretchikoff worked as a scene painter at the city's Russian opera house, and went to school until the age of 16.

In Shanghai, Vladimir Tretchikoff worked as an art director and illustrator for Mercury Press, an American-owned advertising and publishing company.

Vladimir Tretchikoff met and married Natalie Telpougoff, a fellow Russian emigre.

The couple moved to Singapore, where Vladimir Tretchikoff worked for an advertising agency, gave art lessons, and contributed artwork to the Straits Times.

In February 1942, Vladimir Tretchikoff was on board a ship evacuating ministry personnel to South Africa.

Vladimir Tretchikoff quickly became known in South Africa thanks to a book that collected his portraits of Asian women and paintings of flowers, and held successful exhibitions in Cape Town and Johannesburg.

Vladimir Tretchikoff became known in the United States, where the Rosicrucians of San Jose invited him to launch an American tour.

Vladimir Tretchikoff requested and was granted the privilege of having his exhibition in the ground-floor exhibition space, which was attended by more than 205,000 visitors.

Vladimir Tretchikoff said of British prima ballerina assoluta, Alicia Markova, who sat for Alicia Markova "The Dying Swan", that she was his most stimulating sitter.

In 1973, Vladimir Tretchikoff published his autobiography, Pigeon's Luck, with Anthony Hocking, an account of his wartime experiences.

Vladimir Tretchikoff suffered a stroke in 2002 that left him unable to paint, and died on 26 August 2006 in Cape Town, his home since 1946.

Vladimir Tretchikoff once said that the only difference between himself and Vincent van Gogh was that Van Gogh had starved whereas he had become rich.

In 2011, the first Vladimir Tretchikoff retrospective was held at the South African National Gallery in Cape Town.