Zinaida Serebriakova was born on December 10, 1884, at the Neskuchnoye estate near Kharkov into the artistically distinguished Benois-Lanceray family.
Zinaida Yevgenyevna Serebriakova was born on December 10, 1884 (November 28, 1884, Old Style) at the family estate of Neskuchnoye near Kharkov in the Russian Empire (now Ukraine). She was born into the celebrated Benois-Lanceray artistic dynasty, a family that produced numerous painters, architects, and sculptors who shaped Russian art and culture for generations.
Her father, Yevgeny Lanceray, was a noted sculptor, and her mother, Ekaterina Nikolayevna Benois, was a graphic artist and member of the illustrious Benois family. Her grandfather, Nicholas Benois, was a prominent architect, and her uncle, Alexandre Benois, became one of the founders of the influential Mir Iskusstva (World of Art) movement, which profoundly shaped Zinaida's early artistic environment.
Growing up surrounded by art, music, and intellectual discourse, Serebriakova was immersed from infancy in an atmosphere that nurtured creative talent. Her father died when she was only two years old, after which the family relocated to Saint Petersburg, where she continued to be steeped in the artistic circles of her extended family. This rich heritage and upbringing would prove foundational to her later emergence as one of the most significant Russian female painters of the early twentieth century.
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