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Oil on canvas, oval format, 61 × 46.5 cm
Signed on the left and dated 1781, this portrait is the work of Joseph Friedrich August Darbes (1747–1810), a German painter trained under Johann Martin Preisler and Carl Gustav Pilo. Active for many years in the Russian Empire, he worked in Saint Petersburg and Courland for the Russian and German-Baltic aristocracy. In 1785, he settled in Berlin, where he became professor of portrait painting and a member of the Academy of Arts.
The work belongs to the artist’s Russian period. A telling comparison can be made with the portrait of Leonhard Euler (1778, Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow): the dimensions (61.3 × 47.4 cm) are almost identical, confirming Darbes’ use of standard oval formats for official portraits.
Other works by Darbes are today preserved in leading museums: Tretyakov Gallery (Moscow), Russian Museum (Saint Petersburg), National Museum in Warsaw, Museum of Fine Arts in Budapest, and the Statens Museum for Kunst in Copenhagen. Among his most renowned portraits is that of Duchess Dorothea of Courland.
The young woman is shown half-length, with a voluminous hairstyle typical of the 1770s–80s. Her dress is painted in a soft green with pearly, luminous shades, reflecting the transition from Rococo to Neoclassicism and recalling the lightness of 18th-century pastels. Her hair, appearing grey though she is young, was likely rendered so because of the powdered coiffures then in fashion, creating a refined contrast with the freshness of her complexion. The clear, carefully modelled skin demonstrates Darbes’ ability to combine precision with delicacy, consistent with his practice in both pastels and miniature on parchment.
Condition: very good. The painting is virtually intact, with only a fine surface craquelure, entirely natural for an 18th-century work.
Reverse: the inscription reads “Petrik” followed by a partly illegible topographical reference, perhaps to a street in Riga (Lazaretes iela?). This suggests the painting may have passed through a Baltic collection during its history.
