VALENTIN SEROV Portrait of a sitting young girl in a pink dress (Granddaughter of P. Tretiakov, daughter of A.P. Botkina, niece of L. Bakst, later on - a well known soviet movie star Alexandra Sergeevna Hohlova (born 1891), spouse of the director L. Kuleshov- compare with her 1911 photo in R. Buckle “Nijinsky”, Simon and Shuster, NY, 1971p. 206 where she is photographed with Tamara Karsavina, Nijinsky, Diaghilev, Benois, and Stravinsky; Alexandra Hohlova has her portraits executed by F. MALIAVINE and A. Lentulov (1919) as well ), [1900], oil on canvas, 28 x 20" c.1899. Exhibited: “Mir Iskusstva”, 1901, Petersburg-Moscow; “Faces of Russia”, February 2007, West Palm Beach International Art Fair, USA (illustrated on page 28 of the catalog). ; exhibited: “A Time to Gather… Russian Art From Foreign Private collections”, State Russian Museum, Saint-Petersburg, February-June 2008, Moscow - Exhibition Center "Tsaritsyno", June-July 2008, Palace Editions,2008, illustrated in the catalog p. 88 ill 45)
[“In 1890s Valentin Serov revealed his talent as a portraitist. The main feature of his oeuvre was truthful psychological treatment of his models. Having mastered all the modern painterly media, he and his close associate painter Konstantin Korovin, strove to achieve virtuosity of each brush-stroke. All this enabled him to achieve peculiar spirituality of image, particularly felt in his portraits of children and young people. In the portrait of a sitting young girl the artist, presumably, depicted Alexandra Sergeyevna Botkina, daughter of a famous St. Petersburg doctor and collector Sergei Botkin. Serov was on friendly terms with the Botkins and painted and draw the members of the family many times. It is a well known fact that the painter made sketches very quickly, but he was very scrupulous when painting portraits, they took him much time. The delicate harmony of soft colors combined with the expressive rendering of the young woman’s glance lend the portrait an especially lyrical mood.”] Provenance: Phillips Bayswater, 02.10.01, lot 75. Initial study for this portrait is in State Russian Museum, Petersburg - see illustration in "Serov" by D. Sarabianov, Art-Rodnik, Moscow, 2000, p.9. Serov is mentioning that portrait in his letters to A.P. Botkina twice – first 12.2.1900 promising “to grill your girl the day after tomorrow i.e. on Monday” and second 5.1.1901 in connection with the opening of “Mir Iskusstva” Exhibition [ Valentine Serov in Letters, Documents and Memoirs, Hudojnik RSFSR, Leningrad, 1985, v.1 pp 278, 316]. At the same time period Paolo Troubetzkoy also created a sculptural portrait of the girl (together with her mother) – see TROUBETZKOY Paolo 1866-1938. Il Quadrante Edizioni. Text by G. Piantoni, P. Venturoli. Verbania Pallanza 29.4-29.7. 1990. Torino, p148 ill 87. Compare also with the portrait of her mother, sitting at the sofa with same accessories, painted the same year – catalog of paintings, State Russian Museum, 1980, #5411, illustrated.. In original last quarter of 18th Century Italian (Emilia?)Louis Philippe style carved and gilded frame, octagonal, lion feet, cresting with putty head, acorn at the volute and flower festoons to the sides, with a canvas inner slip (provenance for the frame: Dorotheum Rahmen. Wien 10.04.2003, lot 414 - compare also LODI Roberto La Collezzione Di Cornici Catalog N4, Modena 1996, N47
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