Vladimir Afanasevich Ovchinnikov is one of the founders of the Leningrad ‘unofficial art’ and creator of the genre of the ‘free parable’ in painting. He did not study at an art school and admits himself that ‘he always felt too weak to handle this ‘pressing’ [social pressure] and to remain true to himself’. He studied the ’drip method’ of painting. His creative ‘school’ came from studying in libraries, roaming around stations, adventures in markets and working in churches and museums. Combining a ‘magical realism’ of landscape and genre painting with elements of traditional religious iconography (angels and biblical scenes amongst gloomy urban alleyways and railway stops), Ovchinnikov paintings became famous. Towards the start of the 1970’s, the artist found his own style – an original combination of Sots Art and the ‘ironic’ primitive object. For many of his works, the artist created replicas. In recent years, Vladimir Ovchinnikov has been striving for a figurative-textured ‘deprimitivisation’, he has also been interested in small sculptures. The artist’s creativity initially gained recognition in the West, then in Russia and is now studied by the leading art historians of the 20th century. Current member of the Academy of Modern Art of Saint Petersburg.