Valentin
Dmitrievich Totmer

(1904, Kharkov – 1970). Schedule. Childhood and youth in the Urals, in the city Lisiev, and since 1918 – in Perm. In 1919, he entered the Perm art-industrial workshops available. In the same year he began to participate in political campaigns: wrote posters, decorations for the holidays, buildings, etc. In 1922 the workshops was transformed into an Art College where a teacher was Zelmer V. V. Obolensky (the pupil of the Moscow School of painting, friend and ally of Larionov), and A. B. Kaplun.

After graduating in 1924 Perm art College he entered the graphic Department of the Moscow VKhUTEMAS, where he studied with N. N. Of Kupreyanov, L. N. Bruni and V. A. Favorsky. From 1927 began to participate in art exhibitions. He graduated from the vkhutein in 1930.

In 1930-e years has worked primarily in magazine illustration (magazine "pioneer", etc.), continuing to engage in heavy figure. Participated in the design of plants to the October and May holidays, the decoration of Moscow for the launch of the metro, etc. Worked in the publishing houses: "True", "Molodaya Gvardiya", "Detizdat", "Peasant newspaper", etc.

During the great Patriotic war was in the Navy. As an artist, performing a number of tasks for the production of front-line literature, he worked in the propaganda team of the Main political Directorate of the black sea fleet.

In 1944 was transferred to the reserve, once again began to work in publishing houses, to participate in exhibitions. The center of creative interests became heavy work and work on printmaking (lithography, etching, and the last 9-10 years of my life linocut).

In the collections of the Art gallery of Krasnoarmeysk stored 75 the works of V. Zellmer, almost monograficheskoe representing his work of the 1920s-1960s (ink drawings, pencil, charcoal, watercolors, gouaches, etchings, lithographs, linocuts).