1949 Nicouline Pictorial Gastronomic Map of Italy

Vsevolode Nicouline (Vsevolod Petrovič Nikulin, Всеволод Петрович Нікулін; November 27, 1890 - July 18, 1968) was a Russian-born Italian artist, illustrator, and set designer. Born in Mykolaiv, Russian Empire (now Ukraine) to an Orthodox priest, he attended the Odessa Art College (now the Grekov Odessa Art School), where he studied with Italian sculptors Luigi Iorini and Giuseppe Mormone, before enrolling at the Imperial Academy of Arts in 1917. The Russian Revolution derailed Nicouline's studies, and he became an officer in the White Russian forces. As the Bolsheviks gained the upper hand, he fled to Constantinople and then to Genoa. Soon afterwards, he began to publish woodcuts that were heavily inspired by Japanese woodblock printing and took on Japanese themes (such as samurai and Japanese folk tales). He then moved on to watercolors and then towards illustrations, focusing on mythologies of various cultures. Later in his career, his illustrations appeared in popular formats, such as fiction, magazines, and children's literature. More by this mapmaker...

Giovanni De Agostini (August 23, 1863 - November 21, 1941) was an Italian cartographer and publisher. In 1901, he founded the Istituto Geografico Italiano del dott. G. De Agostini and C. in Rome. In addition to school atlases, the group published the Calendario Atlante de Agostini, a compact yearbook, calendar, and atlas, which was highly successful. After his death, the institute and publishing house he had founded continued to use his name. His younger brother, Alberto Maria de Agostini (1883 - 1960) was a Salesian priest and polymath who lived most of his life in Tierra del Fuego and Patagonia, contributing greatly to the geographic and ethnographic knowledge of the region. Learn More...