A Feodor Rückert En Plein and Cloisonné Enameled Gilt Silver Casket After Makovsky's Boyar Wedding. Feodor Rückert...

Description

A Feodor Rückert En Plein and Cloisonné Enameled Gilt Silver Casket After Makovsky's Boyar Wedding
Feodor Rückert, Moscow, 1908-1917
1-7/8 x 4-1/2 x 3 inches (4.8 x 11.4 x 7.6 cm)
380 grams (gross)


PROVENANCE:
Ruth S. Nelkin acquired this box in October 1978 for $11,000.


The offered lot features an image from Konstantin Makovsky's famous work A Boyar Wedding Feast in the Seventeenth Century which was painted in 1883 and, from the moment of its presentation to the public, became an iconic work which conjured up a romantic ideal of pre-Petrine Russia, so appealing and comforting to Russians who faced modernization and upheaval in fin-de siècle Russia. Makovsky intended the painting to go to Alexander III, but after winning the médaille d'honneur at the Exposition Universelles d'Anvers, it was purchased by American collector Charles William Schuman and was sent to the United States, where it is now to be found in the permanent collection of the Hillwood Museum in Washington DC (Inv. 51-79). The work found its way onto pieces by many other Russian enamellers, including works by Ovchinnikov, Kurliukov, and Khlebnikov (cf. Salmond, W., Martin, R. & Zeisler, W., Konstantin Makovsky: The Tsar's Painter in America and Paris, Hillwood / D. Giles: London, 2015).

Rückert returned repeatedly to Makovsky and in particular to the Boyar Wedding as a subject for his enamels. The painting, well known from engravings and photographs to Russians, Europeans, and Americans alike, appears to have been one of his most popular images. Other examples have been sold: Sotheby's, London, Fabergé, Imperial & Revolutionary Works of Art, July 11, 2023, lot 45; Christie's, London, Russian Art, June 3, 2019, lot 263; and may now be seen in the McFerrin Collection (Inv. 567, illus Opulence, p. 146).

Property from the Nelkin Collection

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