Lot 43: Pietro de Rossi (St. Petersburg 1761/65 - St. Petersburg 1831)

A young Lady, head and shoulders, her hair upswept, blue background
enamel, signed on the white counter-enamel, dated P de Rossi f/ 1809 and with location Moscau, gilt-metal frame with glazed reverse
Circular, 41mm. (1 9/16ins.) diam.

S.N.P.G., 2000-2003

Pietro de Rossi was the most distinguished of the native-born miniaturists working in Russia during the early 19th Century. He studied enamelling under Peter Zharkov at the Academy of Arts in St. Petersburg and was later, in 1813, made a member of that institution. His work both on ivory and in enamel is characterised by smooth high finish, however examples of the latter are rare. Two examples were in the David David-Weill collection, Paris, see C. Jeannerat and H. Clouzot, Miniatures and Enamels from the D. David-Weill Collection, 1957, nos. 349 & 350. The present miniature with the head depicted in cameo form, a style made fashionable by Charles Bourgeois in France, is notable in that the it was painted in Moscow as opposed to St. Petersburg where de Rossi lived.