Stories about the fatum related to this picture are regularly found on the Internet and even in some popular science publications. We checked whether they really existed in the 19th century.

The portrait of Maria Lopukhina written in 1797 is considered one of the main masterpieces of the artist Vladimir Borovikovsky. An 18-year-old girl is depicted here in the year of the wedding with a man who was ten years older. Five years later, Lopukhina died of consumption. These sad facts on the Internet are overgrown with mystical details, as if possessing a picture or even a look at it brought misfortune.

Similar stories are presented in many sources. “In the time of Pushkin, it was believed that it was worth a young girl to look at this picture, and she herself will soon die from a terrible illness. There were rumors that the portrait became fatal for more than a dozen young beauties, ”the portal reports "Secrets. NO". “In the capital's salons, they were fucked that the portrait of Lopukhina carried away about a dozen girls to the width”, they write "Independent edition of Sokolniki" and Valentina Spirina in the book “The third son of winter. Nine lives ". Author of the text published on the portal "The Estate of Valuevo", clarifies: “After her (Lopukhina. - Approx. Ed.) The portrait began to grow in death with mystical rumors. So realistic, vividly and mysteriously dead looked from the canvas that people began to think that her father, the master of the Masonic lodge and the famous mystic, Ivan Tolstoy managed to lure his daughter’s soul into this picture. ” Some sources have clarifications The fact that after buying a picture by Pavel Tretyakov the myth was scattered. This topic is operated in the recent book of Irina Shlion "Mystical art: hidden meanings and controversial theories".

Several scientific monographs and many articles are devoted to Vladimir Borovikovsky. Art historians did not deprive the portrait of Lopukhina - in 2019, the Tretyakov Gallery released even a separate Pamphole Ekaterina Evseeva about this canvas in the series "History of one masterpiece." None of these texts report any rumors that went around the picture in the 19th century. Evseeva even emphasizes: “A variety of legends arose around the portrait. For all the obvious apocryphys, and sometimes complete absurdity (from stories in the spirit of “soap operas” about the novel between the artist and his model to the mystical plot about the spell on the portrait), they were extremely tenacious and reproduced again and again. The task of this small edition is to free the portrait of Lopukhina from the adhering "shell -making" speculation, myths and gossip. "

There is practically no references to this portrait in the 19th century (before entering the collection of the Tretyakov Gallery). Apparently, the earliest is the episode from the life of the poet Yakov Polonsky by about 1885. How write Biographers, he saw a canvas in one Moscow house, “fell in love” with a picture and composed a poem "To the portrait", which is now often remembered, speaking of the picture.

She has passed for a long time, and there are no longer those eyes
And there is no that smile that they expressed silently
Suffering is a shadow of love, and thoughts are a shadow of sadness.
But her Borovikovsky saved her beauty.
So part of her soul did not fly away from us,
And this look and this charm of the body will be
To her indifferent offspring to attract,
Learn him to love, suffer, forgive, be silent.

The poem “To the portrait” was dated to the January 1885, however, they printed it in the Early Morning newspaper only in 1913 (after the author’s death) and without the name - with the report that the unknown person donated this leaflet with the text of the Polonsky Tretyakov Gallery. The clarification that these verses “to the portrait of M. I. Lopukhina” appeared already in later publications.

Portrait of M.I. Lopukhina in the exposition of the State Tretyakov Gallery
(photo of the author)

Apparently, this is a poem in which the author hints at the tragic fate of the model, and has become the first step to the complication of modern Internet legends about a fatal portrait. It became known to the general public after Mikhail Gershenzon brought him in his book "Pushkin's wisdom" (1919), Further, the poem was often mentioned by scientists, literary critics and philologists, including Yuri LotmanWhich contributed to the growth of the popularity of the portrait.

Art critic Nina Molieva in a rather late (published in 2010) book “Portrait of a Lieutenant Lieutenant, or Voyage of the Empress”, nothing Doesn't write About mystical rumors, although Borovikovsky is one of the main characters of the text. The author is known for another speculation associated with the fact that her husband was older than Lopukhina. “Arounded in our century, undoubtedly, under the impression of Polonsky, the version of the unsuccessful marriage M. I. Lopukhina does not find confirmations in the family archives,” Molieva reports. It is curious that the art critic blame the poet in this. Boris Kraevsky in the book “Lopukhins in the history of the Fatherland. On the 1000th anniversary of the genus ”(2001) also does not write about mysticism or tragedy.

Moreover, at the end of the 18th century, the early death of Lopukhina from the consumption would hardly have been considered something unique-at that time this was enough common phenomenon. Yakov Bulgakov, who informs his son about the death of Maria in his correspondence (“Prince S. I. Golitsyn is in new sadness: his wife died at his cousin Stepan Abrahamovich Lopukhin”), notes this event only because the mentioned Golitsyn is married to his niece, that is, it is just a family grief.

At the same time, there were plenty of memories of a house where a portrait, most likely, hung in the Pushkin era. Evseeva suggests that after the marriage of Lopukhina in 1797, the picture could remain as a memorable gift in the house of her parents, and then passed to her brother-the famous Fedor Tolstoy-American, who died in 1846. At least it is indisputable that in 1885 his daughter, the Moscow governor Praskovya Fedorovna Perfilieva, owned the picture. The portrait of a fat-American brush of an unknown artist (possibly S. S. Kurlandsev) compositionally and in mood resembles a portrait of a sister, Evseeva points out, and, apparently, in 1803 was written with an eye on him or even to be hanged in the pandan. However, despite the fact that a lot of evidence of contemporaries has been left about Fedor Tolstoy because of his colorful lifestyle, his sister is never mentioned in them, although he would have a perfectly lie into the mosaic of his personal legend.

Unknown author. Portrait of Fedor Tolstoy-American.
State Museum of Leo Tolstoy

The daughter of Fyodor Tolstoy, between 1885 and 1890, was bought by Pavel Tretyakov, but he did not dispel any “terrible myth” with this purchase, according to the memories of his family. The daughter of Tretyakov reports Just: “He must point out the love and admiration of Pavel Mikhailovich“ by the elderly ”, the love that he fully conveyed to us. He had several wonderful portraits of Borovikovsky’s work, of which we especially loved Lopukhin. ”

Finally, we will dwell on the phrase "as if her father, the master of the Masonic lodge and the famous mystic, Ivan Tolstoy managed to lure his daughter's soul into this picture." Its authors, apparently, mixed up the father of Maria Lopukhina, Count Ivan Andreevich Tolstoy (1747–1811), a completely ordinary historical figure, with his contemporary, a truly famous Mason Ivan Vladimirovich Lopukhin (1756–1816), the author of the mystical book “Inner Church” - a note where he talks in detail, in particular, about the persecution of Masonic Masons, Ekaterina the Great.