About the artist

George Costakis describes in his memoirs how he found for his famous collection works by Elena Guro and Mikhail Matiushin:

“I had to do special research in Leningrad too, in order to find some specific works… There I obtained a big collection of works by the Ender brothers, this incredible team of artists, which was named ZORVED (See – Know) and was led by Mikhail Matiushin. Matiushin’s wife, Elena Guro, was brilliant. She blew life into Matiushin, but she died at a young age in 1913. Her ideas were marvelous, and she is said to have painted abstractions as early as 1908.

The ZORVED team was very active during the years 1922-1925. I bought a huge amount of their works but many of them were later on stolen. I manage to save some 250 paintings and drawings.”