Sobko, Nikolai

Sobko, Nikolai Petrovich 

Born July 9 (21), 1851, at Tsarskoe Selo, now the city of Pushkin; died Aug. 16 (29), 1906, in St. Petersburg. Russian art historian and bibliographer. Son of P. I. Sobko.

Influenced by V. V. Stasov, Sobko studied and popularized the work of the peredvizhniki (the “wanderers,” a progressive art movement). He collected vast and remarkably informative materials, including biographies of Russian artists and bibliographical data on Russian art. He published parts of these materials in his Dictionary of Russian Artists. Only the following sections appeared in print: vol. 1, fasc. 1 (“A,” 1893), vol. 2, fasc. 1 (“I,” 1895), and vol. 3, fasc. 1 (“P,” 1899). Sobko was also editor of the journal Iskusstvo i khudozhestvennaia promyshlennost’ (Art and the Art Industry). He wrote works on I. N. Kramskoi, V. G. Perov, and G. G. Miasoedov and compiled illustrated catalogs of the exhibits of the peredvizhniki.