Mikhail Petrovich Klodt

A gift from Armand Hammer to the father of the previous owner, late 1960s
Sotheby's London, Russian Art: Paintings, 25 November 2008, lot 424

St Petersburg, Moscow et al., XXV Itinerant Exhibition, 1897-1898

Exhibition catalogue XXV vystavka Tovarishchestva peredvizhnikh khudozhestvennykh vystavok, 1897, p.58, no.86 illustrated in b/w
S.Goldshtein et al., Tovarishchestvo peredvizhnikh khudozhestvennykh vystavok 1869-1899: pis'ma, dokumenty, Moscow: Iskusstvo, 1987, vol.2, p.515, no.86 illustrated in b/w
G.Romanov (Ed.), The Society of Itinerant Art Exhibitions, 1871-1923, An Encyclopaedia, St Petersburg: Sankt-Peterburg Orkestr, 2003, p.189, no.111 iillustrated in b/w

Oil on lined canvas. The surface is covered with a thick layer of varnish. There is minor craquelure visible. Under UV pigment fluoresces in the lower right corner and in the figure of the man (right of center), and in some of women at center; the varnish is discoloured and prevents a conclusive analysis. Held in a black painted wood frame. Unexamined out of frame.
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A favourite of the Imperial Courts of Alexander III and Nicholas II, Baron Mikhail Klodt was a member of a celebrated Russian artistic dynasty and the son of sculptor Petr Jakob Klodt. He was well-travelled visiting France and Germany where he studied with some of the greatest artists of the period. When he returned to St Petersburg to accept a post as Academician and then Professor at the St Petersburg Academy of Arts his style shifted towards Realism and he joined the Society of the Itinerants. A total of 122 of his paintings, including the present lot were featured in the Peredvizhniki exhibitions between 1871 and 1915, and were praised for their attention to detail and historical accuracy. The present lot was exhibited at the 25th exhibition. One of the major works exhibited, The Joker is mentioned in various pre-revolutionary periodicals, such as Russkaya mysl’, Russkoe slovo, Sankt-Peterburgskie vedomosti and Birzhevye vedomosti.

The Joker was acquired by the extravagant American industrialist and patron of the arts Armand Hammer (1898-1990) who moved to Moscow in 1921 to oversee operations of one of his projects.  While in Russia he was able to take advantage of the sales by the Bolsheviks of Russian artistic treasures.