Marc Chagall
France, 1887–1985

A French painter, draftsman, printmaker, designer, sculptor, ceramist, and writer,
Marc Chagall (sha-gal) was born in 1887 and died in 1985. He was a prolific artist
who followed the European tradition of subject painting and distinguished himself as
an expressive colorist.

He spent his childhood in a close-knit family environment with frequent visits to his
grandfather’s village home. He attended the traditional Jewish school, but afterward
entered a local Russian high school, where he excelled in geometry and drawing.

A major retrospective of Chagall’s work at the Museum of Modern Art in New York,
followed by important exhibitions in Paris, sealed his international reputation. He is
remembered for his success as a colorist and creator of meaningful, accessible
images that express his own Jewish and Russian inheritance.