Portrait of Prince A.B.Kurakin

Prince Alexander Borisovich Kurakin was one of the most flamboyant figures of the Pauline and Alexandrine courts, notorious for his extravagant dress and legendary diamond collection, earning the nickname 'the diamond prince'. Borovikovsky's 1801 portrait of him in the Tretyakov Gallery is a tour de force of ceremonial portraiture — Kurakin depicted in the full splendour of his court costume and decorations, a figure who understood his own image as part of his political performance. The painting is among the most visually spectacular in the entire corpus of Russian Neoclassical portraiture, and it reflects Borovikovsky's ability to rise to the challenge of subjects who demanded grandeur rather than intimacy.

The large canvas is dominated by the brilliant white, gold, and jewel-encrusted costume, painted with extraordinary attention to material differentiation — lace, silk, metal, gemstone — all distinguished through different paint handling. The face is modelled with careful precision amid the surrounding splendour. Strategic lighting picks out the decorations with maximum brilliance.