Alexander Volkov is a Russian American oil painter who born in St. Petersburg (then Leningrad) in 1960 and has lived and worked in New Jersey for more than three decades. Volkov’s photorealistic paintings cause the viewer to pause and find themselves transported to another place entirely.  It is in this space we not only feel but can feel as though the crisp winter air over a frozen river, or listen to the quaking autumn leaves on the wind, or the sacred stillness of a chapel.  It is in this space we find light and the light within that inspires us most.  Light is Volkov’s ability to work within the chambers of the soul yet along in the confinement of in his canvas.. Just like the mind of man we find ourselves at times in moment of illumination whether that is being dimmed or brightened, it is truly something special and must be witnessed in person to fully experience just as our own experiences create the tangible experience in life

Alexander started painting with oil as a young high school student. From the age of 7 to 17 he attended a special English school and in 1986 graduated from the Department of Physics at Leningrad State University. Following graduation, Alexander worked as an animator at Leningrad Studio of Science Films and later as a stage artist in a small Leningrad theatre.

In 1981 Alexander Volkov began to exhibit his paintings with a group of 200 Leningrad artists known as the "Brotherhood of Experimental Arts," a conglomeration of underground art groups active in Leningrad at the time. Later, he joined a splinter group called Ostrov or "Island" which united 30 artists who felt that, ideologically, their work was neither socialist realism nor extreme Avant Garde.

When asked about his education, Volkov states the following: "We really teach ourselves. If you want to learn, you will always find someone to learn from, be they dead or alive, great or unknown. you will learn from everything you see, seek, and hear around you - if you are willing to pay attention even in your ‘unnecessary mistakes’, you will have the enormous advantage of picking your own teachers." Alexander Volkov attributes his learning to creatives in every spectrum, people like William Turner, Vermeer, Franz Hals, Rembrandt and many others from the previous centuries as well as Edward Hopper, Maxfield Parrish and Andrew Wyeth of the 20th century. They also were Beethoven and Satie, Nabokov and Steinbeck, Einstein and Tarkovsky. They were school and university friends, physics professors and struggling artists.