Adrian Prakhov

In Munich, he attended the lectures of several scientists, including Heinrich Brunn, and studied the examples of Ancient Greek art in the collection of the Glyptothek.

[1] After that, he turned to Ancient Russian art of the early Christian period, researching and sketching the mosaics and murals at Saint Sophia's Cathedral and St. Cyril's Monastery in Kyiv.

While there, he was in charge of managing interior decoration for St Volodymyr's Cathedral, including marble and bronze works, frescoes and furniture.

He made two trips to Greece to study Byzantine decorative styles and oversaw a large group of well-known Russian and Ukrainian painters, including Victor Vasnetsov and Mikhail Nesterov.

His wife, Emilia Lestel [ru], was a concert pianist who had studied with Franz Liszt and also posed as a model for the painter, Mikhail Vrubel.