About Project

This project has a long story. It started back in 1991, when Alexei Maximov and Leonid Efros organised their private exhibition at the State Armoury in the Kremlin. In March 1992, the first Queen Elizabeth II’s sitting took place. It was the first time that a ruling English monarch has sat for Russian artists.



Queen Elizabeth II’s sitting. Buckingham Palace, 3 March, 1992.

Two more sittings took place the same month with the approval of the Queen – Princess Anne sat at Buckingham Palace, Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother sat at Clarence House. The idea to create a series named “Royal Portraits” emerged later, inspired by Irina Aleksandrovna Rodimtseva, Director of the Kremlin Museum. With her assistance and a favourable set of circumstances the project continued. The royal sittings were arranged in the Hague and Oslo. In 1994, Queen Beatrix sat for Alexei Maximov, in 1999 he went to Oslo to paint King Harald IV of Norway and Queen Sonja. In 1994, the State Armoury organised the second private exhibition of Alexei Maximov, prepared days ahead of Queen Elizabeth II’s first royal visit to Russia.


The opening of Alexei Maximov’s first private exhibition
at the State Armoury in the Kremlin, 1994.

In the spring of 2012, the “Royal Portraits” exhibition was organised at the Ritz Hotel in London, dedicated to the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee (60 years of Her Majesty’s accession to the throne). When the exhibition was over, Her Majesty kindly agreed to receive one of her life sketches as a gift.


“Royal Portraits”, the Ritz,
London, April 2012.