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Vasily Andreevich Tropinin
About museum
Vasily Andreevich Tropinin was a Russian painter, a master of Romantic and realistic portraiture. He was born in the village of Korpovo in the Novgorod Governorate. He received his primary education at the Novgorod People’s School and showed artistic abilities from an early age. After his studies he returned to his native village of Karpovo, which at that time belonged to Minikh’s son-in-law, Count Irakly Morkov. In the early 1790s Morkov sent Tropinin to St. Petersburg to train as a confectioner. However, in his free time the young man attended the Imperial Academy of Arts, studying anatomy and copying engravings.
The Patriotic War of 1812 forced Tropinin to move to Moscow with the Morkov family. After the war the artist began working in the genre of society portraiture, creating portraits of Moscow aristocrats and prominent figures. In 1818 Tropinin lived for a time in the village of Kukavka, where he produced a number of landscapes and peasant portraits, among which the portrait "Ukrainian with a Stick" gained particular fame. It was there that his first genre paintings also appeared, such as "Wedding in Kukavka."
In 1821 Tropinin returned to Moscow and continued working on "people’s images" — portraits of Ukrainian peasants. From 1824 until the end of his life Tropinin lived and worked in Moscow, becoming one of the most sought-after portraitists of his time. During this period he created such well-known works as "The Guitarist," "The Mason," and "Lady in a Green Dress." In 1827, commissioned by Sergey Sobolevsky, Tropinin painted a portrait of Alexander Pushkin.
In 1833 Tropinin began teaching in an art class that was later transformed into the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture — an educational institution open to members of all social estates. For a decade of contribution to education he was awarded the title of honorary member of the Moscow Art Society. In 1846 Tropinin completed his famous self-portrait against the backdrop of the Moscow Kremlin. His wife died in 1855, and two years later, on May 3, 1857, the artist himself passed away. Vasily Andreevich was buried at Vagankovo Cemetery in Moscow.
Date of birth
30 March 1776
Date of death
16 May 1857
Occupation
Artist