Empress Maria Feodorovna 1912

Empress Maria Feodorovna was captured here on canvas with oil by Vladimir Makovsky, and it’s now housed in the Russian Museum. There's something really opulent, yet restrained, about the way Makovsky built up the surfaces here. The velvet cloak just seems to shimmer with depth, doesn’t it? You can almost feel the plushness, the weight of it. But it’s really the details in the dress that grabbed me. Look at the way he suggested the embroidery, those delicate golden threads, how the light catches them. It's not about perfect representation, but about giving you just enough information for your mind to fill in the gaps. It reminds me of how art is really about a conversation across time. You can imagine Manet looking at someone like Velazquez, and then Makovsky looking at Manet, each picking up on something, interpreting it in their own way. And us, as viewers, get to join in that conversation, adding our own layers of meaning to it.