Portrait of an Unknown Woman

The unknown is a 1883 's painting by the Russian painter Ivan Nikolayevich Kramskoi. It is one of his best known and most mysterious works.

In the picture a young, dressed all in black woman in an open carriage on the Anitschkow Bridge in winter Saint Petersburg is shown vorbeifahrend. It is according to the latest fashion of the 1880s wearing: A black beret made ​​of velvet with an ostrich feather, the jacket decorated with fur and belts, fine leather gloves and a decorated with blue satin ribbons fur muff. Your view is majestic and a little sad.

The unknown is still a mystery to the painter. Neither in his letters nor in the diaries he left the name of the unknown. There is a version that the prototype of the image the peasant girl Matrona Sawwischna that was married to the nobleman Bestuzhev performing. Kramskoi she had allegedly met in Saint Petersburg.

The painting is in the Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow, at the Kunsthalle zu Kiel found, however, a second version of the painting, which is also dated around 1883.

• Paintings (19th century)
• Women ( Fine Art)
• Woman portrait