Igor Kashinsky started painting when he was just five years old.
At the tender of age of 13, he is already well on his way to becoming one of Russia's great artists.
"I'm sure I will be famous one day," says Igor shyly and his proud mother, Galina, adds, "It's not just a daydream, either."
A seventh-grader at the Russian Museum's Art Gymnasium, Igor is currently staging an exhibition of his work at Alexander Blok's Library, on Nevsky Prospect.
The paintings, dedicated to the 50th anniversary of Victory Day, have been greeted with rave reviews from local art critics.
The extraordinarily mature works express the horror of war as well as the importance of peace.
Although his grandfather is a war veteran, Igor admits that he knows very little about the Second World War, which claimed around 20 million lives in the former Soviet Union.
And yet, his paintings, "For The Motherland," (which he completed in just two weeks,) and "The Face Of War," prove that his work serves as a reliable testimony to the suffering.
The first painting depicts a fierce battle between the Nazis and the Red Army while the latter portrays the cruelty of a Nazi soldier dreaming of world destruction.
Galina Kashinskaya explains that her son has a fantastic imagination and works late into the night on his creations.
"When he is working on a painting, he forgets to eat," she added.
Mrs Kashinskaya went on to say that Igor was the only artistic member of the family. "His parents and ancestors could hardly draw a straight line," she admitted.
Igor's canvases deal with serious contemporary issues, both international and domestic. They delve into all spheres of life and betray strong philosophical motifs which are exceptionally advanced for a child of his age.
For Igor, life is everything. His philosophy does not draw distinctions between animate and inanimate objects.
All his subjects have an animate existence: machines, insects, birds, animals and men are all part of a whole, a celebration of life's unifying harmony. In his paintings, ants and flies build their homes using man-made instruments. You can interpret this any way you like -- but Igor urges us to learn from their way of life.
And man, as a superior life-form, should contribute to the well-being of lesser creatures on this earth.
The young artist's parents are appealing for public support or a sponsor to help their son develop his talent and realize his ambitions.