New Hermitage Acquisition

On 21 June, 2002, when the new exhibition in the British art rooms was opened, public saw for the first time Portrait of Princess Ye.R. Dashkova, the miniature purchased on 6 November, 2001, at Christie's auction in London for the State Hermitage Museum. The miniature was executed by Ozias Humphrey (1742-1810) in the 1770s and set in a gold-cased carnet made by Jean-Jacques Prevost in 1764/65.
The carnet was probably bought by Ye.R. Dashkova in Paris and taken to England where the court painter O. Humphrey made her portrait, subsequently set into the carnet. The carnet contains a calendar and small pen drawing of a vase with flowers.
The miniature was purchased at the London auction by Mr. Niall Hobhouse. Later Mr. Arturo R. Melosi, President of The Arthur and Holly Magill Foundation, paid Mr. H. Hobhouse the price of the work and donated it to the State Hermitage Museum.
Yekaterina Romanovna Dashkova befriended Catherine II and took part in the 1762 coup. She later stood at the head of two Academies, the Academy of Sciences and the Russian Academy. She was often compared with Catherine the Great and she coquettishly called herself Catherine the Small.
Purchased at the same auction was the gold-framed miniature by Antoine-Charles-Horace Vernet (1758-1836) of 1802 depicting a Russian general. Specialists believe that this is a portrait of Leonty Ivanovich Depreradovich.

Portrait of Princess Ye.R. Dashkova
Ozias Humphrey
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