Apart from historical paintings, which made Surikov famous, the artist often painted portraits. Painting other people played an important role in his life and work. Generally, the artist painted no commissioned portraits, as he liked to make portraits of close or familiar people. The master’s heritage includes a series of so-called follow-up portraits, when the same sitter posed for several artworks made over a considerable period of time. The personalities of his sitters were well-known and understood by the artist, so his portraits were filled with special, new and different meanings.

Alexandra Ivanovna Yemelyanova (1878-1943), nee Schreider, was born in a Moscow merchant family. She became acquainted with Surikov in the 1890s. In 1890-1900, Alexandra Ivanovna was Surikov’s favorite portrait sitter. Simple and clear features of her face captivated the artist and gave way to various portrait interpretations. This portrait is one of several portraits of Alexandra Ivanovna painted by Surikov.

Vasily Ivanovich Surikov is a Russian painter, a master of large-scale historical paintings, academician and full member of the Imperial Academy of Arts. His paintings enlivened the world of bygone eras in Russian history. Surikov’s artworks are notable for their polyphonic, always carefully balanced composition, masterly ability to paint a crowd of people, where each character is individual, subtle sense of color and thought-out color scheme of his paintings, appeal to Russian history, recreation of historical situations. He was a member of the Association of Traveling Art Exhibitions (Itinerants) for over 25 years.

Vasily Surikov was born in Krasnoyarsk, and all of his life he was extremely proud of his belonging to the old Cossack families. After the death of his father, the family found themselves in a tight financial situation. But Yenisey Governor Pavel Zamyatin and Siberian gold miner Pyotr Kuznetsov took an active part in his further career. Kuznetsov appreciated the paintings of Vasily Surikov and covered all his educational and living costs in St. Petersburg.

The first major artwork made by Surikov after his graduation was not a painting, but frescoes in the Cathedral of Christ the Savior. This also allowed him to find his place in a geographical sense, as Surikov decided to stay in Moscow; this city was really close to him, the most famous paintings were painted by the artist there.