Honoured art worker of the Russian Federation

Damir Ismagilov was born in Moscow in 1959. In 1987 he graduated from the Production Department of the Moscow Art Theatre School.

He has been working in the Moscow Art Theatre since 1977 (since 1987 – as the chief lighting designer) and has designed about 90 productions there.

Since 1996 Ismagilov has been working in the Bolshoi Theatre (since 2002 – as the chief lighting designer).

He has contributed to the work on productions in leading Russian theatres such as the Mariinsky Theatre, Oleg Tabakov’s Theatre, the Maly Theatre as well as in other theatres in Saint-Petersburg, Novosibirsk, Omsk, Krasnoyarsk, Norilsk, Kazan, Ufa, Oryol and Orenburg. Throughout his career he has designed over 350 productions.

Damir Ismagilov cooperated with such directors as Oleg Efremov, Boris Pokrovsky, Eimuntas Nekrošius, Peter Ustinov, Kama Ginkas, Tadashi Sudzuki, Boris Eifman, Alexei Ratmansky, Peter Konvichny, Dmitry Bertman, Robert Sturua, Roman Viktyuk, Valery Fokin and others. He also cooperated with such theatre set designers as Valery Levental, Sergey Barkhin, David and Alexander Borovsky, Oleg Sheinzis, Stanislav Benediktov, Yury Ustinov, Boris Messerer, Igor Popov, Mart Kitayev, Georgy Alexi-Meskheshvili and others.

Since 2000 Ismagilov has been teaching at the Moscow Art Theatre School at the Chair of Creating the external forms in a theatre production.

In 2005 together with E. Drevaleva he published a book entitled “Theatre lighting”.

Damir Ismagilov is currently the chief lighting designer at The Theatre Art Studio, the Bolshoi Theatre, the Moscow Art Theatre, the Novosibirsk Theatre of Opera and Ballet and Gelikon-opera. He is also vice-chairman of the Russian Association of Lighting Designers.

Together with Sergey Zhenovach, Damir Ismagilov designed such productions as “The White Guards” in the Moscow Art Theatre and “The Imaginary Invalid” in the Maly Theatre. In The Theatre Art Studio he worked on all Zhenovach’s productions in “The Theatre Art Studio”.