Count Feodor Tolstoy Biography

Count Feodor Petrovich Tolstoy was born into a noble family. In 1802, he graduated from the Naval Academy and the same year entered the St. Petersburg Academy of Fine Arts. In 1804, he retired from military service and devoted himself to art. He was fond of drawing and painting, but his highest success was in wax modeling.

In 1810, he was appointed designer of medals in the St. Petersburg Mint. Tolstoy had very good results there. One of his more interesting works of the late 1810s is a series of 21 medallions devoted to the Russian-Napoleonic war of 1812-1814.

Many representatives of the Tolstoy family are known in history as really talented. Feodor Tolstoy is also characterized as having versatile talents. In 1838, he wrote a ballet Aeol’s Flute, libretto, sketches of set designs and costumes and 60 sketches in which he denoted the choreography of the ballet. Four years later he wrote another ballet – Echo. In 1828, he became vice-president of the St. Petersburg Academy, in 1842 - professor, in 1859 - the first assistant of the president. By the end of his life he began to go blind and had to stop painting.

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  Self-Portrait.
  

  1804. Watercolor on paper. The Russian Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia.