Elena Shchapova de Carli

in: Models

She is a dissident, an ex-fashion model, a writer and a poetess, her full name may sound something like 'contessa Elena Kozlova Shchapova Limonova de Carli'. Born Elena Kozlova (Елена Козлова) in 1950 in Moscow, she started her career as a model, at the age of 18 married a much older artist Victor Shchapov (Виктор Щапов) and became a part of the social life of early '70s Moscow beau monde, frequenting movie festivals, art gallery presentations and foreign embassy receptions.

Elena's affair with a dissident writer and poet Eduard Limonov (Едуард Лимонов) let to the divorce with Shchapov; she married Limonov in October/1973. In the picture taken in 1974 in Moscow, nude Elena is sitting in front of Limonov, who is wearing his famous 'national hero's blazer' made of 114 pieces of different fabric.

In 1974, using fake invitation to Israel, Limonov and Shchapova left Soviet Union and arrived in New York, USA via Vienna, Austria. Living as émigrés in NYC, Elena and Edward fell in the circles of self-proclaimed dissident intellectuals, but while Eddie was writing his novels and living on a welfare, Elena managed to get a fairly successful career in fashion modeling, allegedly becoming the first Russian model in New York. Soon enough they drifted apart due to the increasingly different lifestyles and Elena's numerous self-admitted infidelities, and had a pretty ugly break-up in circa 1975.

Elena became a central character of Limonov's first major novel, profanity-filled It's Me, Eddie: A fictional memoir («Это я, Эдичка»), completed in 1976. Limonov was pretty rough in his judgement about his ex-wife, exposing intimate details of their relationship and calling her 'treacherous, adulterous, childless pleasure-seeker'.

In a mean time Elena married italian count, thus became countess de Carli and started writing pretty bleak poetry. She played a small role (credited as Schapova) in 1989 movie 'Torrents of Spring' starring Nastassja Kinski. In the early '80s she retaliated by writing a book It's Me, Elena: Interview with myself («Это я, Елена»), edited by poet Konstantin K. Kuzminsky and published in 1984 (never translated in English). Naturally enough, Elena dubbs Eddie a 'psycho loser' and reveales yet even more private and intimate information.

The book was supplemented with a photo gallery, containing nue pictures from Elena's modeling portfolio. To the great susprise of the editor Kuzminsky, contessa was very upset about the presence of these pictures in the book.

"выпустил роман графини Щаповой (бывшей жены Эдички) "Это я, Елена", включив в него дюжину модельных фот и столько же ню в студии Шемякина - графиня в истерике: ее, блядищин, голый зад показали! При том, в прозе - описывает лесбос, наркоту, детский онанизм, начинает с мата и заканчивает - описанием говна ..."

from Kuzminsky's journal, Nov/1984

In these pictures from "It's Me, Elena" contessa is with artist Mihail Chemiakin, taken in his Paris studio in 1980.


These days countess Shchapova de Carli lives in Rome and rubs elbows with Italian aristocrats. She has an 8-year-old daughter Nastia; count de Carli passed away 5 years ago.

Few years ago I put together a website shchapova.netfirms.com, check it out for more pictures and info on Elena and her book.