Elizaveta Merkurievna Boehm (1843-1914) — artist, draftswoman, silhouette artist.

In 1870, the Academy of Arts awarded her a large incentive medal for her drawings of animals, done in watercolor and pencil.
From 1875 to 1889, the artist released 14 albums with silhouettes. These albums were so successful that she was awarded a silver medal for these works at an international competition in Brussels.

Elizaveta Merkurievna draws peasant children.

Elizaveta Boehm devoted especially many of her works to children’s themes. She painted plump, cheerful, happy children – at that time, the Russian art school became famous for its realistic portraits of social themes, showing a hard, poor, joyless childhood (remember at least the classic painting by V. Perov “Troika”, created back in 1866). But Elizaveta Merkuryevna’s drawings, with their asociality, are somewhat reminiscent of problem-free popular prints – her painted children all have doll-like faces, beautifully dressed, as if from an advertisement. In fact, the artist did not strive for social painting – her characters inhabited festive Easter and New Year cards, which enjoyed great success. Her drawings-cards had another quality – sincerity. In total, she created more than 300 cards.