Antropov Alexey

14 (25) March 1716 (St. Petersburg) - 12 (23) June 1795 (St. Petersburg)

painter-portraitist

born in the family official: the artist's father served in the Office of the buildings locksmith master Weaponry yard. From 1732 he studied at the Office in its relative A. Matveeva, and since 1739 worked there in the picturesque team "at IY Vishnyakova.

In 1742, as an artist took part in the celebrations of the coronation of Empress Elizabeth in Moscow. In St. Petersburg, he painted for the triumphal gate in Anichkov settlement. In 1744-1745, among other artists involved in the creation of the ceiling and icons for the Winter Palace, where there are numerous places his monumental and decorative painting in the spirit of Western Baroque. Under the leadership of J. Valeriani worked in the Summer Palace, created the scenery for the Opera House. I worked in Tsarskoe Selo (1749), Peterhof (1750), Anichkov Palace.

In 1752 received a separate order for a "letter of icons in the dome and other locations of the new church of St. Andrew, has just built in Kiev Michurin project architect Rastrelli. Prior to 1755 directed the decoration of the cathedral, the iconostasis of which can serve as an example of manners Antropov. Of his most significant monumental painting "The Last Supper" - altar altarpiece.

From Kiev, the artist went to Moscow, where he painted the ceiling for two Golovinskoe palace on Yauza. Here he met the patron I. Shuvalov, curator of the Moscow University in 1755. Shuvalov Antropov invited to teach at the Faculty of Arts and enrolled him at university for the post of "beautiful master».

However, in Moscow with Antropov had no permanent job, and he returned to Petersburg, where using the same Shuvalov in 1761 obtained a place for artists and guard painters at the Synod, with the obligation to take students and teach them dot the picturesque skilled painters, enamel and skill. The house settled Antropov students from Ukraine, one of whom was D. Levitsky.

In Moscow, the artist visited on short visits, designed the celebration of the ascension to the throne of Catherine II (1762).

as a portraitist Antropov first opened in Russia a new, post-Petrine stage genre of the portrait. Conventionality baroque pictorial etiquette expressed his weaker, so the image is not static, as before, he gets specific, sometimes the simple and rude, but the dynamic features. Style master inherent strengths coloristic contrasts (it leaves the warm tones, like a bright blush on the face) and subject materiality convex forms.

Among the best known, written in the new style works Antropov - portraits AM Izmailova (1759, Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow), Empress Elizabeth (1755, Museum of Russian Art, Kiev ), Archbishop Sylvester Kulyabko (1760, Russian Museum, St. Petersburg), Ataman FI Krasnoshchekova (1761, Russian Museum), AV Buturlina (1763, Tretyakov Gallery), M. ; Rumyantsev (1764, Russian Museum). His best - and most baroque-rocaille - front picture is a large portrait of Emperor Peter III, written for the Senate (1762, Russian Museum, the option in the Tretyakov Gallery).