Description Leonid Afremov was born in Vitebsk, Belarus in 1955. He graduated from the Vitebsk Art School, which was founded by the art legend Marc Chagall in 1921. Like Chagall, Afremov favors the use of a palette knife rather than a paintbrush. Afremov enjoyed painting very much, however he realized that the only images that would be purchased in Russia would be propaganda posters. With this in mind he decided to move to Israel where, almost immediately, he found employment with a local advertising agency painting billboards. Shortly thereafter Afremov moved once again, this time to the United States, where he resides and continues to paint in his Florida-based studio.