Zinovii Grzhebin

Zinovii Isaevich Grzhebin (Russian: Зиновий Исаевич Гржебин; 1877-1929) was a Russian illustrator and publisher.

Zinovii was born in Chuguev, in Ukraine. As the son of a soldier who had served 25 years in the Russian Army, he was less constrained by the anti-semetic measures regulating Russian society at the time. He graduated from Kharkov art school in 1899 and went to study art in Munich in the studio of Shimon Holloshi.

Grzhebin was closely associated with Maxim Gorky.

Zuphel

Grzhebin edited a short-lived satirical magazine Zhupel (Bugbear) in 1905-6. Two issues were published in December 1905 and one issue in January 1906. Grzhebin was arrested and imprisoned for a year for "disrespecting the Imperial authority".

• Жупел. №1. (1905).pdf

  № 1, complete issue

• Жупел. №2. (1905) — Обложка.jpg

  № 2, cover only

• Жупел. №3. (1906) — Обложка.jpg

  № 3, cover only

Brier

In 1906 Grzhebin set up the Brier publishing house at 31 Nikolaevskaya Street, St Petersburg with Solomon Yuryevich Kopelman. From 1907-11 they published Severnye sborniki (Northern Collections) and Sborniki literatury i iskusstva (Collections of Literature and Art). They also published Alexander Blok's Liricheskie dramy (Lyrical Dramas). In 1918 they moved the publishing house to Moscow, and then shut it down in 1922, when he emigrated to Berlin.

Vsemirnaya Literature

Grzhebin was employed by Vsemirnaya Literature (World Literature), a semi-official literary publishing house established by Maxim Gorky and Anatoly Lunacharsky, Peoples' Commissar for Education on 4 September 1918. Grzhebin loaned paintings by Isaac Levitan, Albert Nikolayevitch Benois, Kustodiev, and Boris Grigoriev which were hung on the walls of the offices.