Nikolai Bodarevsky was a Ukrainian painter and art professor associated with the Peredvizhniki. He studied at the Imperial Academy of Arts, where he was awarded several medals, and later became a member of the Peredvizhniki movement. Bodarevsky painted numerous female portraits in the style of Whistler and was commissioned to paint fourteen portraits of famous composers for the Great Hall of the Moscow Conservatory. He collaborated on the decoration of the new Church of the Savior on Blood along with Viktor Vasnetsov, Mikhail Nesterov, Andrei Ryabushkin, and others, providing sketches for sixteen mosaics depicting scenes from the Bible and the history of the Russian Orthodox Church.

He also provided sketches for sixteen mosaics in the Church of the Savior on Blood, for which he was named an Academician. Despite his achievements, his art is hardly known outside of Russia because he never exhibited abroad. Bodarevsky died during an Odessa famine, while the actual cause of his death is unknown.