The Russian painter and portraitist Vasily Andreevich Tropinin was born in 1776 in the village of Korpovo, Novgorod region, into a family of serfs. Vasily received his initial four-grade education at the public school. Soon the young Tropinin found himself among the dowry of Anton Sergeevich Minikh’s daughter, who married Count Irakli Ivanovich Morkov.

The count did not approve of his serf’s passion for drawing. At the age of 22, Vasily Tropinin was sent to St. Petersburg to study confectionery. While mastering the profession, the future painter secretly attended lectures at the Imperial Academy of Arts.

Irakli Morkov’s relatives in St. Petersburg persuaded the count to send Tropinin to study at the Academy of Arts, promising to pay for his studies. According to the charter of the Academy, serfs could only attend the institution as non-matriculated students and for an appropriate fee.

In 1804, at an exhibition at the Academy of Arts, Tropinin’s work was acknowledged by both the associate rector and the president of the educational institution. Irakli Ivanovich Morkov, having heard about the attention paid to his serf, forbade him to study at the Academy and ordered him to come to Kukavka, where he lived with his family at that time.

In 1821, the artist came to Moscow, and in 1823 he received the long-awaited freedom, although his wife and son remained serfs for another five years. In the 1820s–1840s, Vasily Andreevich Tropinin was very popular in Moscow. It was during this period that he created the Portrait of Alexander Pushkin.

Vasily Tropinin stood at the origins of the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture. Its forerunner was the public art class, which opened in 1833. In this institution, Tropinin worked with students on a voluntary basis.

The Russian painter finished the work “Portrait of a Woman, ” which is now featured in the museum’s collection, in 1841. By that time the artist had already gained universal fame and recognition. In the chamber portrait, the master depicted a representative of the Moscow merchant class.

On May 3, 1857, the painter died. He was buried at the Vagankovo Cemetery in Moscow. Vasily Tropinin lived a long artistic life and created many portraits of his contemporaries. This particular work was received by the Gorlovka Art Museum in 1962.