Marc Chagall was one of the most successful artists of the 20th century. He was an early modernist, and created art in a variety of different mediums, including painting, book illustrations, stained glass, stage sets, ceramics and tapestries. He was born in 1887 to a poor Jewish family in Russia, and grew up near the city of Vitebsk. Although he spent much of his adult life in France, images and memories of his childhood remained the center of his art. Chagallís paintings incorporate themes from Jewish life and the Bible, in a style suggestive of a dreamlike reverie, and marked by an extraordinary use of color.