The meeting with Alexey was already a special one, when it led to a true revelation. Along with his lovely wife, Alexey had yet another person for me to meet.

Yuri, retired physicist, now in his 80s like his lifelong friend Alexey. Yuri has spent much of his life, and litterally each and every day of the last 20 years, drawing. Not amateurish sketches, but mind blowing pieces of art. Hundreds. Probably thousands. Most of them gathered in series: stories from the Bible, Don Quixote, etc. A vast, unique, yet undiscovered talent. Undiscovered because Yuri never sought fame or recognition. Yuri never promoted, exposed or published his work. Yuri never asked for likes. Yuri has always been motivated by nothing but his own personal need to express his inner world and how he sees ours: a kaleidoscopic world where there’s no border between reality, imagination and dream, where it’s perfectly normal for animals to engage in human activities and where humans, animals and fantasy creatures together create a complex and extremely fascinating universe. Just as if Dante Alighieri’s “Divine comedy” had been illustrated by Leonardo Da Vinci’s pencil.

A few examples of Yuri’s masterpieces.