Yuri Feoktistov

Yuri Feoktistov (21st of April 1913, Omsk, Russian Empire – 5th of September 1977, Riga, Latvian SSR) – a theatre artist.

Yuri Feoktistov was born in the family of a literateur and a school teacher. He graduated from a secondary school in Novosibirsk in 1930. In the same year the family moved to Moscow. In 1931 he started working at an industrial plant. 

At the end of 1931 Feoktistov was accepted into a theatrical studio. For two following years he had been participating in the work of the studio as an actor and an artist. In 1933 he left the studio and started working as a cartoonist in the newspapers of local industrial plants. In 1934 Feoktistov enrolled into the Institute of Graphics, but was forced to leave it at the 5th year of studies due to health issues. In 1937 Yuri Feoktistov participated in his first student exhibition. In 1938-1941 he had been working in different Moscow publishing houses, magazines and newspapers, as well as a decoration artist at the Park of Leisure and Culture and the House of People's Art.  

After the start of the war between the USSR and Nazi Germny, Yuri Feoktistov was conscripted into the Red Army (in the September of 1941) as a camouflage artist for the consturuction of the fortified areas in Kursk, Voronezh and Tambov regions. Starting from the November of 1942 Feoktistov served as a private at the 163rd Reflemen Division and starting from the March of 1943 - at the 56th Riflemen Division. He participated in the battles by Stary Oskol, Surzha and Kursk. On 9th of July 1943 he was imprisoned. Later Feoktistov was moved to Germany and contained at the POW camp by Ludvigsburg. He was released on 23rd of April 1945 and resumed his service. 

After being dismissed, Yuri Feoktistov worked as an artist at a Soviet military base in Frankfurt-on-Oder, and later moved to Berlin, where he received the post of the head artist of the Drama Theatre of Soviet Administration. 

Yuri Feoktistov was awarded with the medal "For the Victory over Germany."

In the July of 1947 Feoktistov returned to the USSR wher he worked as the head artist of the First Drama Theatre of Moscow Region in Orekhovo-Zuevo, and after its reorganization at the end of 1948 was sent to Vilnius as a stage-manager at the Russian Drama Theatre. In the February of 1950 he moved to Riga where became the head artist of the State Riga Russian Drama Theater. 

On the basis of his previous works on 29th of January 1952 Feoktistov was accepted as a member-candidate into the Union of Artists of Latvian SSR, at the section of theatrical artists and became a full member on 13th of April 1960. During 10 years of his work he had decorated more than 35 plays. On 28th of December 1958 Feoktistov became an Honored Artist of LSSR.  

He worked at the Riga Russian Drama Theatre until the retirement in 1977. 

Yuri Feoktistov died in Riga on 5th of September 1977. 

Alexander Malnach

Source of information:

Фото: ЛГА, ф. 230, оп. 3, д. 110.