PAUL TROUBETZKOY (1866-1938) Mother and Child (Princess Gagarina and her daughter Marina) Moscow, 1898

signed and inscribed on the base plate: ‘Paul Troubetskoy/Moscou 1898’ bronze 47 x 26 x 28 cm In 1898, the Italian sculptor Prince Pavel Petrovich Trubetskoy, who was of Russian origin, was invited to teach at the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture. His encounter with his extended Muscovite family, the Trubetskoy clan, resulted in a series of magnificent and intimate family portraits. Many of these were exhibited at various exhibitions in Russia, including the Universal Exhibition in Paris in 1900 and the Salons in Vienna and Munich. The maestro’s works were hugely successful everywhere. Grabar wrote about P. Trubetskoy: ‘Troubetzkoy charms with his grace and elegance; his refined and aristocratic taste is one of the most appealing qualities of his sculptures. He dared to question the immutability of truth in sculpture, considering form as an objective greatness and approaching it from the perspective of impression — a totally new and unknown characteristic of sculpture in the past. One cannot help but notice that this artist has a talent that would suffice for dozens of good sculptors.’ The sculpture ‘Mother and Child’ was a great success. The sculptor depicted his cousin, Princess Marina Nikolaevna Gagarin (née Princess Troubetzkoy; 1877–1924), the wife of the amateur artist Prince Nikolai Viktorovich Gagarin, with her daughter, also named Marina. The Tretyakov Gallery collection has two copies of this work, one in plaster and one in bronze.