Marc Chagall (1887-1985) was born to a poor family in western Czarist Russia. His early life was spent in a small Jewish enclave that was subject to persecution and official and unofficial events of violence. Young Chagall was at odds with family and faith by breaking Mosaic law that forbids the making of graven, or representative images. He studied in St. Petersburg from 1906-1910 and then went on to Paris where he remained until 1914. Unfortunately, while visiting family in Russia, World War I broke out, trapping him in the New Soviet Union. He prospered and wound up Commisar of Art for his village of Vitebsk in 1917. By 1922 the Soviet Union had grown more resistant to his nonpolitical art, so Chagall moved to France, which was overtaken by Germany in 1941. He spent the war years in America and returned to Paris in 1948.