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BILIBIN, Ivan Yakovlevich [Ivan Bilibine] (1876-1942). Fairy Forest at Sunset. c. 1906. Watercolor, goache (200 x 250 mm). Initialed lower right. Illustration for a Russian fairy tale. Provenance: exhibited at "Ivan Bilibine Exposition," Alexandria, Dec 1924 (gallery label). Purchased from Dobuzhinsky estate, Jenack Auction, Chester, NY 2 Aug 2004; lot 95. Ivan Bilibin was the greatest illustrator of Russian skazki or fairy tales. He was also a distinguished painter, stage designer and art teacher of the Silver Age. After studying with Ilya Repin, he joined Sergei Diaghilev's Mir Iskusstva (World of Art) group. Although he did design some costumes for the Ballets Russes, he is better known for his contributions to the opera. (Diaghilev thought his art was too stiff for the dance.) His work is noteworthy for its scholarly preservation of Russian folk art and culture. After the Revolution, Bilibin defected to the West and settled in Paris in 1925, where he continued to design for the stage and illustrate children's books. He eventually returned to Russia in 1936 and died during the Siege of Leningrad. This watercolor is somewhat reminiscent of Bilibin's stage design of night on the shores of Lake Ilmen for act two of the Rimsky-Korsakov's opera Sadko in 1914.