Aristarkh Lentulov was born in the town of Nizhny Lomov in Penza Oblast, Russia into the family of a rural priest. He studied art in the Penza and Kiev art schools from 1897 to 1905, and then in the private studio of Dmitry Kardovsky in Saint Petersburg in 1906. He lived in Moscow from 1909, and he was one of the founders of the avant-garde exhibiting association of artists, the Jack of Diamonds group. This group remained active until its dissolution in 1916. From 1910 to 1911 Lentulov studied at the studio of Henri Le Fauconnier and the Académie de La Palette in Paris. Lentulov was working at the theatre all his life passing a difficult way from avant-garde to realism. He worked with such directors as A.Y. Tairov, A.D. Dikiy, U.A. Zavadsky, B.A. Babochkin, K.S. Stanislavsky, V.I. Nemirovich-Danchenko, F.F. Komissarzhevsky. His first stage was "Merry wives of Windsor" in Moscow Chamber Theatre (1916). Then Lentulov, Tairov and Koonen become friends. Lentulov participated in organization of VKhUTEMAS where he was teaching from 1918 to 1925. The only exhibition of Lentulov took place in 1933. His play "Spanish priest" by John Fletche had a great success (in Moscow Art Theatre-II) for which he received the first prize at the International theatre festival in Moscow in 1936.