Taras Shevchenko

Taras Hryhorovych Shevchenko (Ukrainian: Тара́с Григо́рович Шевче́нко, Taras Hryhorovych Shevchenko, Russian: Тара́с Григо́рьевич Шевче́нко, Taras Grigoryevich Shevchenko) (March 9 [O.S. February 25] 1814 – March 10 [O.S. February 26] 1861) was a Ukrainian poet, artist and humanist of the Russian Empire. His literary heritage is regarded to be the foundation of modern Ukrainian literature and, to a large extent, the modern Ukrainian language. Because there was no Ukrainian alphabet Shevchenko also wrote in Russian and left many masterpieces as a painter and an illustrator. Born into a serf family of Hryhoriy Ivanovych Shevchenko (1782? - 1825) and Kateryna Yakymivna Shevchenko (Boiko) (1782? - August 6, 1823) in the village of Moryntsi, of Kiev Governorate of the Russian Empire (now in Cherkasy Oblast, Ukraine) Shevchenko was orphaned at the age of eleven. He was taught to read by a village precentor, and loved to draw at every opportunity. Shevchenko went as a household servant with his Russian aristocrat lord Pavel Engelhardt to Vilnius (1828–31) and then to Saint Petersburg. "Engelhardt noticed Shevchenko's artistic talent, and apprenticed him in Vilnius to Jan Rustem, then in Saint Petersburg to Vasiliy Shiriaev for four years... There he met the Ukrainian artist Ivan Soshenko, who introduced him to other compatriots such as Yevhen Hrebinka and Vasyl Hryhorovych, and to the Russian painter Alexey Venetsianov. Through these men Shevchenko also met the famous painter and professor Karl Briullov, who donated his portrait of the Russian poet Vasily Zhukovsky as a lottery prize, whose proceeds were used to buy Shevchenko's freedom on May 5, 1838."