Alex Grinshpun was born in Bandera in 1949. At age 15 Grinshpun went to work in a wood processing plant; in the evenings he studied 'naturalistic painting'. The class would go 'on site', and learned how to translate the three-dimensional landscape they observed onto the two-dimensional canvas. Soon Grinshpun decided to study art more seriously and attended a local art school from 1965-1968, but it did not satisfy him, and Grinshpun was determined to leave his small town. He headed for St. Petersburg, which was the center of art and culture, and was accepted to the art academy despite his Jewishness. He remained there until 1978, specializing in creating sets for the theatre and opera. At the same time he delved deeper into the professional secrets of painting and drawing, he was exposed to works of past and present artists; he visited museums and got to know people in the 'big city'. From 1979-1982, Grinshpun utilized the knowledge that he had acquired in the academy and applied it to the sets he painted and the books he illustrated in black and white. Describing the situation in the former USSR, Grinshpun explained that creative artists were officially classified according to their areas of work, leaving graphic artists and set painters out of the official definition of 'artists', i.e., 'painters and sculptors'. Museums were not eager to open their doors to 'non-artists', yet Grinshpun succeeded in having several small one-man exhibitions in the cities of Bender (Tighina), Tiraspol, Kishinev and Odessa, and participate in several group exhibitions. Over the years, the idea of being a painter began to filter down into his consciousness, leading him to the extreme change in his life: he left the USSR and immigrated to Israel in 1991.