Portrait of Field Marshal Mikhail Golitsyn (?)
1711–1725
- oil on canvas. 148 х 112,2
Received after 1945 as part of the collections of the Gatchina Palace Provenance State Hermitage (until 1940)- State Museum «PAVLOVSK»
Mikhail Golitsyn (November 12, 1675 – December 21, 1730) Associate of Peter the Great, Russian military commander, Field Marshal, member of the Supreme Privy Council (1727), president of Military College (1728–1730), holder of the Order of St. Andrew the Apostle the First-Called (1708) and the Order of St. Alexander Nevsky (1725). He earned fame during the Northern War.
The style and pictorial properties of the painting allow us to attribute it to Johann Gottfried Tannauer. For a long period of time, it was considered to be a portrait of Alexander Menshikov; it is known that Tannauer created portraits of His Majesty the Prince and his consort in 1722. However, the fact that iconographically this portrait is very different from the well-established portraits of Menshikov made researchers doubt the traditional attribution. The version accepted today stating that this is a portrait of Field Marshal Mikhail Golitsyn was first suggested after a careful examination of the iconography of “His Highness”.