Carlo Albacini. Bust of Peter the Great

This marble bust of Peter I was made by the Italian sculptor Carlo Albacini at the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries. According to the catalogue, it follows an original by Bartolomeo Carlo Rastrelli, the famous bronze bust of 1723 now in the Hermitage. In Rastrelli's original the emperor wears a ceremonial cuirass and an ermine mantle with the ribbon of the Order of St Andrew the First-Called.

Albacini (1735 – probably 1813) worked in Rome as a sculptor and restorer of ancient sculpture, trained under Bartolomeo Cavaceppi and in 1783 became a member of the Accademia di San Luca. He also carried out commissions for Catherine II, including a full-length portrait statue of her.

At Arkhangelskoye, portraits of crowned heads were gathered in the Imperial Hall, created from 1822: by the 1830s it held 8 busts of Russian rulers, from Peter I to Nicholas I. The museum also owns other works by Albacini, among them reliefs of Peter I and Catherine II.