Georgy Konstantinovich Zhukov (1896–1974): Soviet military commander, Marshal of the Soviet Union (1943), Hero of the Soviet Union (1939, 1944, 1945, 1956). Deputy People’s Commissar of Defence of the USSR and Deputy Supreme Commander (from 1942). Commander-in-chief of the Soviet occupation force in Germany (1945–46).
Pyotr Kotov painted this portrait of Marshal Zhukov when the famous commander served as the Soviet representative on the Allied Control Commission for Germany. Around the same time, Pavel Korin also painted a well-known portrait of Zhukov (Tret. Gal.). Unlike Korin’s generalised image, Pyotr Kotov’s work is an artistic document depicting a concrete person. Portrait of Georgy Zhukov was shown at many exhibitions, includ¬ing the recent display marking the fifty-fifth anniversary of VE Day at the Central Museum of the Great Patriotic War in Moscow. The literature is silent about the circumstances surrounding the painting of the portrait, possibly linked to the fact that the popular commander fell into official disfavour in March 1946 and was removed by Stalin from the post of Deputy Minister of Armed Forces.

KOTOV, Pyotr Ivanovich
1889, Vladimirovka, Astrakhan Province — 1953, Moscow
Painter, graphic artist, monumentalist, genre artist, portraitist, author of still lifes, landscapist. Studied at the Kazan School of Art (1903–1909) and at the Higher School of Art, Imperial Academy of Arts (1909–1916). Contributed to exhibitions (from 1916). Taught at the Astrakhan Free Art Studios (1919–1922), Kiev and Kharkiv Institutes of Art (1937–1941), the Institute of Cinematography (1944–1948) and the Vasily Surikov Institute of Art (1949–1950). Professor (1940). Honoured arts worker of the RSFSR (1946), full member of the Academy of Arts of the USSR (1949).