Yuri Ivanovich Pimenov (November 13 (26), 1903, Moscow - September 6, 1977, Moscow) - Soviet painter, theater artist, set designer and graphic artist, teacher, professor. Academician of the Academy of Arts of the USSR (1962; corresponding member of 1954). People's Artist of the USSR (1970). Winner of the Lenin Prize (1967) and two Stalin Prizes of the second degree (1947, 1950).
Yuri Pimenov was born in Moscow in the family of a lawyer. In 1920–1925, he studied at Higher art and technical workshops under V. A. Favorsky and S. V. Malyutin. After graduation in 1925, he became one of the founders of the Easel Society. In the early period, Pimenov was greatly influenced by German expressionism, which largely explains the hysterical and dramatic acuteness of his best paintings of these years: «War Invalids» (1926, State Russian Museum), «Give Heavy Industry!» (1927); «Soldiers go over to the side of the revolution» (1932; both are in the Tretyakov Gallery). Over the years, he moved to a renewed impressionism, confessing the creative principle of the «beautiful moment», a light and artistic image-impression. In 1962 he was elected a member of the USSR Academy of Arts.
In 1966, Pimenov signed a letter to 25 cultural and science workers to the General Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU, L. I. Brezhnev, against the rehabilitation of Stalin.
Yuri Pimenov died on September 6, 1977. He was buried in Moscow at the Novodevichy Cemetery (station number 7).