Jacob Elshin

born St. Petersburg, Russia, 1892; died Seattle, Washington, 1976

BiographyJacob Elshin was born in Russia and studied at the Russian Imperial Academy in St. Petersburg before fleeing the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917. He settled in Seattle in 1923 and over the course of his career became one of the region’s most notable artists. His exhibition history included four solo exhibitions at the Seattle Art Museum and inclusion in exhibitions at the Palace of the Legion of Honor in San Francisco, the Corcoran Gallery, Washington, D.C. and Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Elshin also created a number of murals under the various Federal Art Projects during the Great Depression including the Seattle University District Post Office and the Renton Post Office.

Elshin worked in oil, watercolor, and tempera creating portraits, murals, port scenes, and religious images. He was a member of Puget Sound Group of Northwest Men Painters, Washington Artists Union, Northwest Watercolor Society, and Pacific Coast Artists Association.

For an inteview with the artist visit the Archives of American Art
https://www.aaa.si.edu/collections/interviews/oral-history-interview-jacob-alexander-elshin-12775
[accessed Nov. 2017]

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