The Imperial Porcelain Factory was established in 1744 by the Empress Elizabeth I (r. 1741–61).  For several years production was hampered by unreliable or inexperienced workmen, but by the 1750s the factory had begun producing porcelain in the Meissen style.  This plate is from the factory's first table service, made for the empress about 1756–60.  Every piece was decorated with a graceful molded trellis pattern, which suggests they were part of a dessert service, perhaps to be used in summer.

Peter Carl Fabergé (1846–1920) was a visionary and talented artisan and jeweler. In 1872 he took over his father's small jewelry atelier in Saint Petersburg and within forty years had transformed it into the world's largest enterprise of its kind, employing some five hundred craftsmen and designers. His methods encompassed streamlined production, fair pricing, and global marketing. The firm built a devoted clientele that included cabinet ministers and the newly rich and, above all, members of the Russian imperial family, the Romanov, for whom they made the most precious pieces and extraordinary Easter eggs. In 1917 the Russian Revolution brought an end to the Romanov dynasty and a definitive halt to the House of Fabergé. Peter Carl Fabergé died in exile in Lausanne, Switzerland, in 1920.Matilda Geddings Gray (1885–1971) acquired her first piece of Fabergé in 1933. An artist herself with refined aesthetic sensibility, she was already a wealthy and sophisticated collector who had begun buying Fabergé when the Russian jewelery firm was almost unknown in the United States. Upon her death, her collection passed to the foundation she had established in 1969, with the express wish that a broad public should be able to enjoy it.[Wolfram Koeppe, 2011]

Cyrillic script on a fictive plaque adorning a trompe l’oeil frame identifies “A. Van Dyck”, the artist of the painting this tapestry imitates. Large-scale figurative tapestries like this one had been woven in Saint Petersburg since at least 1716 when Peter the Great founded a tapestry weaving workshop under royal protection; by 1756, its weavers were directed by Jean Baptiste Rondet, who had worked at the great Manufacture Royale des Gobelins in Paris. This tapestry, woven during the reign of Empress Catherine II of Russia, was probably entirely the work of Russian weavers, and is part of a large group of technically proficient tapestries modelled after great paintings in the Russian royal collection.

Finely detailed armor, a fluttering jabot, and an extravagantly combed wig set off the smoothly burnished face of the military commander portrayed in this wooden bust. His direct gaze is emphasized by the scooped truncation of his cuirass, which slices aggressively forward beneath it. The head turns slightly, against the flow of the lace cravat, imparting a sense of movement. Beneath the soft elements of lace and hair, sharply engraved images appear on the breastplate. The enwreathed ovals have been identified as scenes of Alexander the Great and his close friend Hephaestion at the tent of King Darius (to the viewer’s left) and the Justice of Trajan (slightly obscured, to the viewer’s right). Medallions on the pauldrons of Alexander the Great (left) and of the emperor Trajan (right) repeat the principal military figures seen in the ovals. Livia Drusilla, wife of Augustus Caesar (erroneously paired with Alexander), and Plotina, Trajan’s wife, occupy the pauldrons on the back of the cuirass.The identity of this exceptional bust’s subject and of its maker puzzled scholars until research by Wolfram Koeppe and Marina Nudel resolved some of its mysteries.[1] The medium, which at first appeared to be boxwood, is in fact red pine stained to look like boxwood.[2] Sections of the bust were assembled with metal clips, a technique used by craftsmen accustomed to working with dense materials like boxwood or ivory that were only available in small pieces. While red pine is native to northern Europe, the Baltic region, and Russia, this method of construction is most often associated with woodworking in southern Germany and Austria. An explanation for this discrepancy is found in the biography of the man Koeppe and Nudel identified as the subject of the bust: a Russian known to have employed German and Austrian artists, Alexander Danilovich Menshikov. Of modest background and beginnings, Menshikov caught the eye of Czar Peter the Great when he was about twenty. He rose quickly through the ranks to become Commanding General Field Marshal of the Russian armies and was eventually appointed governor of Saint Petersburg. [3] His military prowess distinguished him, and his close friendship with the czar brought him to the pinnacle of wealth and power. He was made a count in 1702 and a prince in 1705 and became virtual ruler of the country for several years after Peter’s death in 1725. But in 1729 his enemies, the old Russian nobility, succeeded in having him exiled, and he died in Siberia that same year.As Koeppe and Nudel noted, the wooden portrait bears a striking similarity to painted, etched, carved, and modeled images of Menshikov.[4] The exaggerated wig fashionable in the early eighteenth century appears in all of his portraits, as do the high forehead, large nose, and cleft chin. Positive identification of a figure from other portraits is notoriously difficult, but other evidence points to Menshikov as the subject here. He would naturally appreciate association with one of history’s greatest military leaders and especially Alexander, his namesake. The scene of Alexander with his friend and counselor Hephaestion would have reminded everyone of Menshikov’s close relationship with Peter the Great. The Russian commander would also have appreciated the reference to the Roman emperor Trajan, whose many victories in battle brought about an auspicious moment in the Roman Empire’s history.[5] Both of the oval scenes on the cuirass show a ruler’s magnanimity, flattering compliments to any leader. Furthermore, Menshikov appreciated dexterity in wood carving: his private study, the Walnut Room, featured marquetry, and he installed a turnery for working wood and other materials in his Saint Petersburg palace. The first in the city made of stone, that building was richly decorated. We also know that a sculptor, probably Swiss, named Franz Ludwig Ziegler, or Zingler, residing in Russia, made a trip at Menshikov’s expense to western Europe and returned to Russia in 1703 accompanied by three sculptors, two Austrian and one German. There is no documentary evidence that any of them or Ziegler carved the bust, but they were available for the task. It has been proposed that the bust dates from that time, since after 1703 it probably would have incorporated the insignia of the Order of Saint Andrew, Russia’s highest military honor, which Menshikov received that year. His ennoblement in 1702 in the wake of his military victory over the Swedish army at Schlüsselburg may have been the occasion for commissioning the bust. Although our evidence is circumstantial, a strong case is made for identifying this striking image with one of Russia’s great heroes.[Ian Wardropper. European Sculpture, 1400–1900, In the Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 2011, no. 51, pp. 154–55.][1] Wolfram Koeppe and Marina Nudel. "An Unsuspected Bust of Alexander Menshikov." Metropolitan Museum Journal 35 (2000), pp. 161–77.[2] J. Thomas Quick, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Madison, Wisconsin, identified the wood as pinus sylvestris on March 17, 1996. Carbon dating of the wood was conducted by Dr. George Bonani, Institute of Particle Physics, Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule, Zurich, on March 28, 1996; he concluded that the tree that was the source of the wood was felled no later than 1667. As it was common practice to cure wood for long periods of time before working it, the pieces from which this bust was made could certainly have been seasoned in a shop for thirty-five years before they were put to use, about 1703. [3] See Nikolai Ivanovich Pavlenko. Aleksandr Danilovich Menshikov. Moscow, 1981 and the other biographical studies cited in Koeppe and Nudel 2000, p. 176, nn. 19, 20, 25.[4] Koeppe and Nudel 2000, figs. 6 – 9, 11 – 13.[5] For a full discussion of the classical references, see ibid., pp. 170 – 73.

Cyrillic script on a fictive plaque adorning a trompe l’oeil frame identifies “Rembrandt”, the artist of the painting this tapestry imitates. Large-scale figurative tapestries like this one had been woven in Saint Petersburg since at least 1716 when Peter the Great founded a tapestry weaving workshop under royal protection; by 1756, its weavers were directed by Jean Baptiste Rondet, who had worked at the great Manufacture Royale des Gobelins in Paris. This tapestry, woven during the reign of Empress Catherine II of Russia, was probably entirely the work of Russian weavers, and is part of a large group of technically proficient tapestries modelled after great paintings in the Russian royal collection.

Cyrillic script on a fictive plaque adorning a trompe l’oeil frame identifies “Rembrandt”, the artist of the painting this tapestry imitates. Large-scale figurative tapestries like this one had been woven in Saint Petersburg since at least 1716 when Peter the Great founded a tapestry weaving workshop under royal protection; by 1756, its weavers were directed by Jean Baptiste Rondet, who had worked at the great Manufacture Royale des Gobelins in Paris. This tapestry, woven during the reign of Empress Catherine II of Russia, was probably entirely the work of Russian weavers. It is part of a large group of technically proficient tapestries modelled after great paintings in the Russian royal collection; in this instance, though, the painting, acquired by Catherine II in 1768 and remaining in the Hermitage until 1930, is now in the National Gallery of Art, Washington DC.

Czar Alexander presented this egg to his wife, Maria Feodorovna, on Easter 1890. The egg is extraordinary in its conception and technical virtuosity. It possesses one of the most sophisticated palettes of all the imperial Easter eggs. Divided into twelve sections in opalescent pink enamel, it opens on a hinge to reveal its surprise—a folding ten-panel gold screen in a crimson velvet pocket. Resting on Greek-key feet, the screen bears ten miniatures of the empress's favorite Danish and Russian retreats. A nostalgic reminder of her home country, the egg accompanied her on her travels.From left to right: imperial yacht Polar Star; Bernsdorff Palace, Copenhagen; Emperor Villa in Fredensborg Park, Hvidøre, Copenhagen; Fredensborg Palace, summer residence, Copenhagen; Amalienborg Palace, Copenhagen; Kronborg Castle, Elsinore; Cottage Palace, Alexandria Park, Peterhof; Cottage Palace, Alexandria Park, Peterhof (south main entrance); Catchina Palace, Saint Petersburg; imperial tacht Tsaverna.[Wolfram Koeppe, 2011]

In 1716, Tzar Peter the Great founded a tapestry-weaving workshop in his new capital city, Saint Petersburg. Although many of the tapestries made in the workshop took Old Master paintings by the likes of Rembrandt and van Dyck as their models, some were more unusual. Exceptional is this portrait of the scandalous mistress of Tzar Peter III. Only aged twenty-three at the time of weaving, the soft blush of her cheeks, and sumptuous materials of her gown have been admirably captured by the Gobelins-trained weaver.

1755 / 1760, St Petersburg

1755 / 1760, St Petersburg

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