Vilen S. Karakashev was born in a family of artists in Baku. At the age of 13 he came to Moscow and entered the Secondary Art School officiated to the Suricov Art Institute.

In 1962 he graduated from Surikov Moscow Art Institute with honors at the poster’s studio of professor Tcheremnih M.M. In 1964 he joined the Artist Union. Vilen Karakashev works in graphics, posters, oil-painting, applied graphics, monumental Art. At the same time he studies culture, religion and philosophy of different nations. His favorite country is India, he tries to understand its esoteric mysteries.

In 1982 he visited this wonderful country and made series of works in pen and oil-pastel. Since 1986 the primary interest of the artist is connected with color graphics and oil-painting.

Works of Vilen Karakashev are in the private collections in the USA, Japan, Italy, France, German, Switzerland, Cyprus, China.