Contributor Profiles

I was born in Sevastopol, Crimea where I spent the first 12 years of my life before immigrating with my family in 1996 to Halifax, Nova Scotia. Over my lifetime, I have had the pleasure of living for extensive periods in Africa, Russia, Ukraine and Lithuania. I have traveled half the globe, from Los Angeles to Dubai, and deeply believe that travel is one of the greatest ways to learn.

Being a citizen of both Canada and Russia – while speaking, reading and writing fluently in the languages of both countries – has given me a unique insight into the North American and Eurasian cultures. Having translated a lot of printed materials from Russian to English and vice versa has expanded my thinking dramatically. In fact, translation was how I started my writing career and has led me to become an internationally published author.

Although I do a lot of writing, business, project development and venture capital is what I most enjoy. In 2005, I became president of Tamoikin Inc. and co-owner of Tamoikins Museum (www.tamoikin.com). In 2007, we sold the most expensive Russian icon in the world – the 16^th century Solovetsky Iconostasis shown in the Groninger Museum in the Netherlands – for $5 million (US).

Combining art and business

By then, I had co-authored one book and several publications. That same year, while living in Lithuania, I seriously started collecting fine art. That passion has resulted in the largest private collection of modern Lithuanian art. In 2008, I published my first solo book catalogue “DMT Collection - Lithuanian Art”. It is one of the few publications on this subject in the English language (www.dmtcollection.com).

In 2010, I launched a new company called Earth Sphere Development Corporation to focus on venture capital projects (earthspheredevelopment.com). Our first major project is called Soviet Jewelry (www.sovietjewelry.com), a development organization for the Soviet gold and silver market, which is growing rapidly worldwide. Due to its success, I’ve written and published three world-first books on this subject, available in both English and Russian.

In 2012, we launched another project called Tachi Sword which represents a very rare Samurai sword, bringing attention to these unique collectibles which have been greatly undervalued. Forbes 400 published an article about Tachi Sword in its U.S., EU, Asian and Korean editions.

I have already started working on new books which reflect the many political matters which are certainly of interest to me.