Konstantin Andreevich Somov

Sale: Sotheby's, London, November 14, 1988, lot 158, illustrated
Private collection, Oslo

Konstantin Somov's career was informed by an unusual breadth of knowledge. His father was a senior curator at the Hermitage while his mother was a singer, so he passed his youth in the midst of an eclectic community of artists. He developed into a true intellectual, and he became a close friend of Alexander Benois. After nine years at the St. Petersburg Academy of Fine Arts, Somov co-founded with Benois the 1898-1904 journal Mir Iskusstva (The World of Art), which sought to synthesize artistic disciplines and educate the masses in artistic tradition and progress.

Somov earned a reputation for his flamboyant and often taboo representations of 18^th century courtship, though he was definitely a well-rounded artist. He painted genre pictures, landscapes and portraits, and he also sculpted and created book illustrations. His portraits offer a stark contrast to his other works, for they appear inspired by Symbolism. With a reserved palette and exaggerated chiaroscuro, he fashioned a mysterious and psychological atmosphere for his subjects. In A Woman Smoking a Cigarette on a Sofa, his sitter glances off into the distance, her thoughts unknown, and the dim lighting casts an intriguing shadow across her face.