Karl Brullov

This catalogue of a Russian Museum exhibition raises questions that pertain both to the work of Briullov and to the history of nineteenth-century Russian and Western European art. After training at the Academy of Fine Arts in St. Petersburg, where historical painting and portraiture were primary, Briullov traveled to Italy in the 1820s and came into contact with different artistic priorities: painting from life and an emphasis on rendering everyday reality accurately. The result was a body of work, much of it unknown until recently, so different from what art historians had associated with Briullov's style, that his authorship was doubted. These sketches and drawings, now in a Moscow private collection, are here juxtaposed with well-known works, which reveals much about Briullov's technique and what he learned in Italy. -- Summary written by John W. Emerich, Bronze Horseman Literary Agency.