3-094-394 - Heritage Art/Heritage Images

Portrait of Sergey G. Volkonsky (1788-1865), 1823. Participant of the 1825 Decembrist revolt, a failed coup d'état led by liberal military and political dissidents against the Russian Empire. English portraitist George Dawe (1781-1829) was commissioned by Alexander I to paint 329 portraits of senior Russian military staff who had successfully fought Napoleon during his invasion of Russia, for the Military Gallery of the Winter Palace. Dawe worked in Saint Petersburg from 1822 to 1828, with his assistants, Alexander Polyakov and Wilhelm August Golicke, and was officially appointed First Portrait Painter of the Imperial Court.