Weisberg formulated his credo simply: “I study the palette”. And when asked about his place in contemporary art, he answered that “all I have in common with my contemporaries is a wall”. The main thing for him was his own world. Color was his religion. And his temple was a room in a communal apartment on the Arbat, painted all white and turned into a studio. Where only the closest associates were admitted.

In 2005 this painting was sold at Christie’s Russian Sales under the title “Portrait of a lady with dark eyes”. No clarification. Only later, experts identified the model as Ashkhen Melikova. She was a friend of the brilliant Salome Andronikova, who was called the last muse of the Silver Age. Melikova moved in the circle of artists and poets, which included Shukhaev, Grigoriev, Sorin, Sudeikin, Serebryakova, Tsvetaeva. Melikova is known, in particular, for the portrait of another Russian Parisian, Alexander Yakovlev, which depicts her and Salome in 1922.

What is Purygin appreciated for? For a special look, for a fantasy fairytale world inhabited by deep philosophical characters. An artist of a very difficult fate. He drank heavily, was in mental hospitals, participated in apartment exhibitions. In 1988, foreign collectors noticed Purygin at the first Moscow Sotheby's, and soon the artist left for America. But he didn't take root there. He returned to Russia and in 1995 died of a heart attack. A self-taught artist from the drawing circle of the Naro-Fominsk Palace of Culture is now one of the most expensive artists of the post-war unofficial art.