Portret van Peter I de Grote, tsaar van Rusland 1752

Jacob Houbraken created this portrait of Peter I, or Peter the Great, the Tsar of Russia, using etching and engraving. Houbraken, an artist from the Dutch Republic, never met Peter, who died in 1725, so this is likely a copy of another artist's rendering. The Dutch Republic played an important role in Peter's development. In 1697, Peter traveled through Europe incognito, and spent four months in the Dutch Republic studying shipbuilding, military science, and the arts. Peter hoped to westernize and modernize Russia, and the Dutch Republic, an ascendant maritime power at the time, served as his model. His reforms included reorganizing his army and founding St. Petersburg, a new city meant to emulate Amsterdam. This portrait of Peter, however, is a vision of power. Encased in armor, he appears as a European-style military leader. It's worth considering what the Dutch Republic thought of Peter, and what the image of a powerful Russian Tsar meant to them.