Mstislav Dobuzhinsky

Mstislav Valerianovich Dobuzhinsky or Dobujinsky (Russian: Мстислав Валерианович Добужинский, Lithuanian: Mstislavas Dobužinskis; August 14, 1875, Novgorod – November 20, 1957, New York City) was a Russian-Lithuanian artist noted for his cityscapes conveying the explosive growth and decay of the early 20th-century city.

On his return to Russia, he joined the Mir iskusstva, an artistic circle which idealized the 18th century as the "age of elegance".

He often painted seedy or tragic scenes from urban life which expressed the nightmarish bleakness and loneliness of modern times.

He was renowned as an excellent art teacher; among his young pupils was Vladimir Nabokov, with whom he maintained correspondence for decades.

In Lithuania he worked at a state theatre as scenographer and created scenography for 38 plays, besides running a private painting school (1930–1933).

Among his later works are series of masterful and dramatic illustrations, notably for Fyodor Dostoevsky's White Nights (1923) and Yury Olesha's Three Fat Men (1925).