Artist Dmitry Levitsky was called Russia’s first brush. He was the most important painter of the 18th century, a master of grand and intimate portraiture. Levitsky was among the top three painters of Catherine the Great’s reign, alongside Vladimir Borovikovsky and Fyodor Rokotov.

Dmitry Levitsky was born in Ukraine. The boy’s father, an engraver, was his first teacher. Professional studies of painting began at the Kiev Academy, under Alexei Antropov, one of Russia’s topmost portrait painter at the time.

In the 1760s, Levitsky went to St. Petersburg. In the capital city, the artist got acclaim quickly. The entire beau monde and members of the imperial family commissioned portraits to the young master. Dmitry Levitsky painted ladies in powdered wigs and masquerade costumes, ruddy actresses with beauty marks, gentlemen in ceremonial clothes. Among his works were portraits of the architect Alexander Kokorinov, industrialist Prokofy Demidov, French philosopher Denis Diderot, pupils of the Smolny Institute for Noble Young Ladies, and many others.

Portraits produced by Levitsky’s brush were distinguished for being true to real life and authentic. His sitters seemed to be always ready for action. The artist tried to find an expressive posture and select an appropriate color array for every one of his sitters.

In the 1780s, Baron Alexander Stroganov commissioned his own portrait to Dmitry Levitsky on the advice of his cousin, one of the painter’s first clients in St. Petersburg.

A Portrait of Alexander Stroganov is among the best oeuvres of the early period of Levitsky’s artistic career. Solemnity of the image speaks about the character’s high rank: Baron Alexander Stroganov was active privy councilor, i.e. held the highest but one civil rank in the empire. He was also fond of arts and patronized aspiring artists. In the first decade of the 19th century, Stroganov was President of the Imperial Academy of Arts.

In the portrait, the Baron is depicted with a hairstyle known as catogan. It was en vogue in the 18th century: Curled hair was pushed back in a ponytail and attached by a black ribbon. Stroganov wears the uniform of the Russian army infantry, which was popular during Catherine the Great’s reign. The Order of Saint Stanislaus, 1st Class, can be seen on his chest, worn on a neck ribbon; the Baron was awarded for military exploits.

Before it came to the Tambov Picture Gallery, the portrait had stayed at the Stroganovs’ manor house in the Tambov Governorate. They had received it in the 19th century from the Zagryazhskys: Baron Alexander Stroganov was married to Elizabeth, the daughter of Lieutenant-General Alexander Zagryazhsky.