Mikayil Abdullayev

Mikayil Huseyn oglu Abdullayev (19 December 1921, Baku - 22 August 2002, Baku) was an Azerbaijani painter, a People's Painter of the former USSR since 1963, and creator of a series of paintings entitled Through India.

Abdullayev was an alumnus of the Azimzadeh Azerbaijan Painting School (1939) and the Surikov Moscow State Painting Institute (1949). During his trips to India, Afghanistan, Hungary, Poland, Italy and other countries from 1956 through 71, Abdullayev painted Bengali Girls, Rajasthani Women, An Old Afghan, as well as portraits of Zsigmond Kisfaludi Stróbl, Renato Guttuso, Giacomo Manzù among others. Among portraits of Azerbaijani people, there are those of Uzeyir Hajibeyov, Samad Vurgun, Mirza Fatali Akhundov and Farhad Badalbeyli. Abdullayev's paintings were exhibited in cities such as Paris, London, Berlin, Montreal, Prague, Budapest, Belgrade, Sofia, Warsaw, Delhi, Cairo, Brussels. Abdullayev was also the designer of artistic panel in the Nizami Station of Baku Metro.

The Tolga family is the main collector of the 532 Abdullayev paintings in Turkey.

Notable works

• 1947 - An Evening
• 1948 - Mingachevir Lights
• 1951 - Builders of Happiness
• 1956 - Sevinj
• 1963-65 - On the Fields of Azerbaijan triptych
• 1964 - On the Absheron
• 1982 - Khachmaz Girls