Early Life and Artistic Beginnings
Born in Poltava, Ukraine, Anna Staritsky was raised in an aristocratic family. Her early education in drawing, music, and poetry was shaped by instructors such as Tatiana Soukhotina-Tolstaïa and Vladimir Favorsky. Following a period spent in France to address health concerns, she resided in Prague before studying at the Beaux Arts de Sofia in Bulgaria. In 1932, she moved to Brussels to study advertising at La Cambre, where she worked as a commercial artist between 1933 and 1940. During this period, she also produced portraits.
Her life took a significant turn when she met the painter Bill Orix. The couple eventually settled in France, moving first to Nice and later to Paris. During the post-war years, she became active in the avant-garde movement, exhibiting at the Salon des Réalités Nouvelles between 1951 and 1956.
Evolution of Style and Technique
Staritsky's artistic practice underwent a notable transition in her later years. While she initially worked with oil, she eventually moved away from the medium due to the sensitivity of her lungs to the scent of turpentine. This shift led her to explore abstraction through various methods, including collage—utilizing materials such as wood, stone, and crumpled paper—as well as gouache. Her work often integrated lyrical elements, including typography, calligrams, and texts in both French and Russian.
From the 1960s onward, she focused heavily on printmaking, specifically woodcut and lithography. She became a notable illustrator of poetry, creating unique books in collaboration with various poets. Her diverse body of work is held in several public collections, including the Bibliothèque Nationale de France and the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Grenoble.
