Casket with Miniature: The Bride's Attire

Konstantin Yegorovich Makovskii (1839-1915), a popular artist and member of the Peredvizhniki, or Wanderers, is best known for historical genre scenes. Depicted in glossy enamel is The Bride's Attire (or Dressing the Bride) (1889). In a 17th-century interior, some lavishly attired women and a solitary youth have assembled to watch the bride as she is being dressed. A young girl kneels at the bride's feet a young girl and behind, an elder woman combs the subject's hair. To convey a sense of verisimilitude, the artist has included such details as a jewel box and a teremok-shaped casket in walrus ivory and bone of the type associated with the town of Kholmogory in northern Russia. An icon is also discernible on the wall in the background.

An unusual feature of this casket is the Viking-style interlace in turquoise over black enamel on the lid's sloping deck. These patterns bear striking resemblance to those in an illustration of the Aberlemno Cross in Inigo Jones's The Grammar of Ornament (1856), a resource that would most likely have been available in Moscow. Another possible source for the interlace could have been found in late 17th-century Russian manuscripts. The sides and ends of the box have vignettes of brightly colored flowers and buds over a cream ground. These, in turn, are framed by patterns of interlace in blue, olive, violet, and black. By this time, Rückert increasingly employed black enamel in his works.

The lid of the box opens to reveal a turquoise, en plein counter enamel over a ground engraved with flowers and buds.

The box is equipped with handles at both ends and with bracket feet.

Inscription

Provenance

Provenance (from the French provenir, 'to come from/forth') is the chronology of the ownership, custody, or location of a historical object.

Sale, Sotheby's, New York, December 15, 1989, Lot 322; Jean M. Riddell, Washington, D.C., December 20, 1989 (through Leo Kaplan, New York, as agent); by bequest to Walters Art Museum, 2010.