Oscar Ivanovich Schmerling (1863-1938) - Russian artist of German origin. Born and raised in Georgia. In 1884 he entered the engraving department of the Petersburg Academy of Arts. Then he continued his studies at the Munich Academy with a degree in battle painting. In 1892, immediately after returning to Tiflis, Schmerling began teaching. He taught at the Transcaucasian Girl's Institute. In 1902-1916, Oscar Schmerling was the director of the School of Painting and Sculpture at the Caucasian Society for the Promotion of Fine Arts, and since its founding in Tiflis Academy of Arts, its professor.
Schmerling participated in exhibitions of the Caucasian Society for the Promotion of Fine Arts, and illustrated a lot of Georgian children's literature. Most of all I remembered the caricature series from the life of old Tiflis, which were first published in the 1910s in the form of postcards. He collaborated with the popular magazine «Molla Nasruddin», published in the Azerbaijani language in Tiflis in 1906-1914, and other publications.
