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Portraits of Russian grand duchesses ⌠live■ in Norway

The famous Russian poet of XIX century Fedor Tutchev wrote: ⌠Those who were born during the world▓s hard times are blessed■. It seems that renowned collectors of the past belong to such ⌠blessed■ people, as times of troubles, social disorder, revolutions, wars and economic crisis ideally suit for founding of comprehensive art collections┘

The Russian diplomat P. Dubrovsky lived in Paris during the Great French Revolution of the late XVIII century. He managed to buy for a mere song many important manuscripts, documents and autographs of celebrated writers, scientists, politicians and royalties. His collection significantly enriched the Manuscript Fund of the Imperial Public Library in St. Petersburg.

Reforms initiated by Alexander II broke financial well-being of Russian nobility. Numerous paintings, drawings, engravings and prints, manuscripts and rare books flooded Moscow and St. Petersburg antiquarian markets. At that time, D. Rovinsky established his celebrated collection of Russian engraved portraits as well as the collection of etchings by Rembrandt, which was considered the best in Europe then. The well-known Russian geographer and traveler P. Semenov-Tyan-Shansky gathered an extremely comprehensive collection of paintings by Dutch and Flemish artists.

V. Gau. Portrait of Grand Duchesses Catherine, Elizabeth and Maria. 1838. Watercolor on paper. The State Russian museum, St. Petersburg. The portrait is published for the first time [zoom (92k)]

A tragic social cataclysm ≈ the October turnover (or as it was called in Soviet times ≈ the Great October Socialist Revolution) took place in Russia in 1917. Many representatives of the possessing class ≈ noblemen, military officers, public officials and businesspersons emigrated to Europe and left their art collections and other valuables to the mercy of fate. Those who chose to stay in the Soviet Russia were fired without the right to receive pension. They had to earn their daily bread selling clothes, jewelry and art pieces remained from previous ⌠tsarist■ times.

Unfortunately, the new power had to deal with numerous problems and did not have enough time and desire to preserve unique art pieces and found new museums and collections, while those connoisseurs of art that remained in the Soviet Russia did not possess funds to acquire important artworks.

Thus, the majority of Russian antiquarian works was purchased by European and American traders. Alexei Gorky wrote in his essay titled ⌠Untimely Thoughts■ (Petrograd, 1918): ⌠They say that about sixty antique shops were opened in Stockholm recently. Those shops trade in paintings, porcelain, bronze and silverware, rugs and carpets, etc. taken from Russia┘ The same situation is now in Petrograd. Just spend two or three days visiting galleries of the Alexandrovsky market, antique shops and numerous second-hand shops. Everywhere you can meet many well-shaved businesslike persons speaking bad Russian who are purchasing any art pieces of artistic and historical value■.

American businessman Armand Hammer, the devoted ⌠friend■ of Vladimir Lenin made his fortune reselling in the USA Russian art pieces bought for trifling sums in Moscow. The Bolsheviks used to practice the terror policy against ⌠exploiter classes■; by 1930s, that policy reached its heights. The so-called ⌠former people■ were arrested and executed, while their property was confiscated and sold at second-hand shops. According to the last will of a Leningrad actor and collector Grigoriy Dushin, his collection of Russian portraits of XVIII√first half of XIX century was passed to the State Hermitage in 1990.

The renowned collector wrote about Moscow of 1930s in his ⌠Memoirs■ (Cultural Monuments. New Discoveries. Annual 1993. M., 1994. p. 225): ⌠Second-hand shops were full of old paintings dark with age. Those portraits haunted me day and night. Though they were extremely cheap, I did not have enough money to buy them. Still, I somehow managed to save some cash and purchased two oval portraits dating XVIII century. I was very happy then■.

A Norwegian trader Jonas Lidt founded his collection in 1920s buying selected Russian art pieces: watercolor portraits, miniatures, oil paintings. Thus, during his stay in Moscow, the Norwegian businessman managed to establish a rather small but comprehensive collection of Russian art of the second half of XX century.

In 2005, the Museum of Private Collections (a branch of the State Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts in Moscow) hosted a temporary exhibition titled ⌠With Love to Russia■. The interesting and important showcase featured Russian artworks from the collection of Jonas Lidt (Norway).

V. Gau. Portrait of Grand Duchesses Catherine and Maria. 1837. Watercolor on paper. 21,0 x 18,0 cm. Norway. Collection of Jonas Lidt [zoom (41k)]

Zinaida Bonami wrote in the article dedicated to that exhibition (⌠Russian Art■ journal, 2006, No2, p. 108√113): ⌠In post╛revolutionary Moscow where people were starving, the wealthy foreigner purchased works of art in ruined and desolated mansions and manors. The highlights of his collection were pieces dating to the Pushkin age ≈ the golden age of Russian culture, when Russian art reached its heights in literature, music and fine arts■.

Among unique works from the collection of Jonas Lidt we can name two portraits relating to the golden age of the Russian watercolor portrait. Both pictures were created by the prominent Russian artist Vladimir Gau (1816√1887) in 1837. The first portrait represents a young woman in a white dress, while the other depicts two girls (watercolor on paper, 21 x 18 cm).

The life and oeuvre of Vladimir Gau, named by Soviet art critics ⌠the singer of aristocracy■, was little known among the wide public and poorly studied by researchers, although his watercolor portraits are exhibited at many Russian museums and art galleries. The artist was born in Revel (now Tallinn, Estonia) in the family of a German landscapist and stage designer Johann Gau. Vladimir▓s first teacher was the court painter Karl von Kugelchen. At the age of sixteen, the young artist created a watercolor portrait of a renowned seafarer F. Litke. The latter, impressed by the talent of the young man introduced Vladimir Gau to Empress Alexandra. Under the order of the Empress, the artist made two watercolor portraits of Grand Duchesses ≈ daughters of Emperor Nicolas I.

In 1832, Vladimir Gau entered the Imperial Academy of Arts in St. Petersburg where he became a student of Alexander Zauerweid, a peintre de batailles. On September 24, Gau was awarded the big golden medal (the highest reward for students) and the title of a ⌠free-lance artist■ for significant academic progress. Following the advice of Zauerweid (who had studied at the Dresden Academy of Arts), the portraitist went to Germany and Italy.

Interestingly, Vladimir Gau gained the status of the Court artist in 1840. However, the Imperial Academy of Arts made the artist a pretender for an academician only two years later. In order to receive the honorable title the young artist had to create a watercolor portrait of his teacher Alexander Zauerweid. The portrait is now exhibited at the State Russian museum in St. Petersburg.

On September 27, 1849 Vladimir Gau became an academician of the Imperial Academy of Arts. For more than thirteen years, the artist was considered the leading Russian master of watercolor portrait. He was able to create different kinds of portraits ≈ from small intimate works to splendid life-size portraits of high-society representatives.

The artist had a lot of clients. He received many orders from the Imperial Court and from Russian and foreign noble families. Gau made portraits of the reigning beauties of the Nicolas▓ age ≈ Duchess E. Musina-Pushkina, Baroness E. Mengden, N. Pushkina-Lanskaya as well as pictures of leading actresses of Imperial theatres, military officers, public officials.

Being the Court artist, Gau created portraits of members of the Royal family: Emperor Nicolas I, Empress Alexandra, their daughters Grand Duchesses Alexandra, Olga, Maria, and the family of the Emperor▓s younger brother Grand Duke Michael.

Researchers have found out that the untitled portrait of two girls from the collection of Jonas Lidt represents two daughters of Grand Duke Michael ≈ Grand Duchesses Catherine (1827√1894) and Maria (1825√1846).

There is a large watercolor picture by Vladimir Gau in the State Russian museum in St. Petersburg. That interesting and important portrait dating 1838 depicts three daughters of Grand Duke Michael and Grand Duchess Elena. Three Grand Duchesses ≈ Catherine, Elizabeth and Maria pose on a background of a gothic window richly decorated with fruits and flowers.

In the late 1830s, a French artist Jean-Batiste-Adolph Lafosse made a lithograph copy of that portrait. The small watercolor portrait of the two girls is, most likely, a sketch for the 1838 watercolor portrait. The watercolor sketch dates 1837 and is signed by the author. The young girls in a portrait wear light decollete dresses. The Duchesses have features typical for women of the Romanov family: an oval face, straight nose and blue eyes.

In the watercolor picture (1837), the elder sister Grand Duchess Maria (1825√1846) is depicted on the right. In the 1838 portrait, the Duchess is represented in the same posture rightmost. Her fate was tragic. Unlike her sisters ≈ Catherine and Elizabeth, Maria was in delicate health. The first signs of serious malady appeared when she was about twenty years old. However, her relatives as well as the family doctor noticed nothing.

In 1845 Grand Duchess Elena with two elder daughters Maria and Elizabeth went on a tour across Europe. The unprofessed aim of the journey was to get acquainted and then select potential bridegrooms for the Grand Duchesses. Baron Modest Korf who was aware of secret affairs of the Russian Imperial Court life noted in one of his letters that, taking into consideration bad health of Duchess Maria, she should have better searched for a good doctor rather than have ⌠hunted■ for a fiance.

After visiting a number of European capitals, Grand Duchess and her daughters arrived to Vienna. Maria fell badly ill with galloping consumption there. The Duchess died on November 7, 1846 when she was twenty-one. Grand Duchess Elena was struck with grief and could not follow her daughter▓s body to the family vault in St. Peter and Paul▓s Cathedral in St. Petersburg.

The younger sister Catherine (1827√1894) is depicted on the left in the watercolor from Jonas Lidt▓s collection. She resembles her cousin ≈ a daughter of Emperor Nicolas I Grand Duchess Olga. Grand Duchess Catherine have lived a long life and died in 1894 in the late reign of Emperor Alexander III. In 1851, she married Duke Mecklenburg-Strelitsky George-August-Adolph-Karl-Ludwig (1812√1876).

Catherine lived in the Russian Empire and bore the titles of the Grand Duchess and Duchess Mecklenburg╛Strelitsky. She was a member of the St. Petersburg Women▓s Patriotic Association (from 1870 the chairperson of that organization). Besides, she patronized scientific and medical institutions founded by her mother Grand Duchess Elena.

Duchess Catherine was the last owner of the family nest ≈ Mikhailovsky palace built in the center of St. Petersburg by celebrated Italian and Russian architect Carl Rossi. Since 1898, the famous palace hosts the treasure house of Russian art ≈ the State Russian museum.