Description
Oil, canvas; 46 x 60 cm
Signed in Cyrillic script p.d.: И. Бергeръ | 1884.
The author of this painting may be Ivan Aleksandrovich Berger (1866-1916), who worked (like his brother Boris) as a steward with Lev Tolstoy in Yasnaya Polyana. His father Alexander Danilovich Berger was a musician and painter, a gymnasium teacher, and his older brother Mikhail was an architect in Ryazan, so Ivan could also paint. Berger's mother, née Rajeevskaya, was a noblewoman - her father was a cousin of the famous General Nikolai Rajeevsky (and a friend of Leo Tolstoy). The Bergers lived in the former Bibikov estate of Mikhailovskoye near Zvyagorod, which Alexandra Rajeevskaya received as a dowry from her mother. The entire Berger family and their relatives are often mentioned in the correspondence of the writer and his family.
Asking price 6000
Estimate 8000 - 10000