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Portrait of Prince Alexander Kurakin. 1799
Borovikovsky Vladimir,
Oil on canvas
178 x 137
State Russian Museum
Annotation
Prince Alexander Kurakin is depicted in the mantel of St Andrew, worn above a dalmatic of St John of Jerusalem, with the chain and star of St Andrew and the cross of St John of Jerusalem. Prince Alexander Borisovich Kurakin (1752–1818): Russian statesman, diplomat. Fellow pupil and close friend of the future Tsar Paul. Studied at Leipzig University.
Gentleman of the bedchamber and procurator-general of the Senate (1778). Vice chancellor (1796), dismissed (1798), reinstated (1801). President of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (1801), member of the State Council (1802). Helped to negotiate the Treaty of Tilsit with Napoleon (1807). Visited Vienna with a Russian diplomatic mission. Russian ambassador in Paris (1809–12).
Buried in the parish church of St Mary Magdalene in Pavlovsk, where the inscription on his gravestone To the Friend of My Husband was written by Empress Marie Fyodorovna.
Author's Biography
Borovikovsky Vladimir
Borovikovsky, Vladimir Lukich
1757, Mirgorod - 1825, St Petersburg
Painter, draughtsman, miniaturist, icon painter, portraitist. Born into a family of low rank Cossacks. Studied painting under his father, the icon painter Luke Borovik, in Mirgorod. Listed "above the specified number" in the Mirgorod regiment where his father and relatives served (1774). Awarded the rank of "comrade of the colours" (1783), resigned with the rank of lieutenant. Moved to St Petersburg (1788) and studied under Dmitry Levitsky and Johann Baptiste I Lampi. Nominated to the Imperial Academy of Arts (1794), academician of portrait painting (1795). Councillor of the Imperial Academy of Arts (1802). Contributed to the iconostasis of the Kazan Cathedralin St Petersburg (1804). Mason and member of Ekaterina Tatarinova''s mystical sect.