Portrait of Russia's last tsar found hidden under water-soluble paint layer

PanARMENIAN.Net - Russian art restorers on Friday, November 18 unveiled a recently discovered portrait of the last Tsar Nicholas II, almost a century after it was hidden behind a giant painting of his Bolshevik foe Lenin, Art Daily reports.

A team of art restorers led by Tatiana Potseluyeva painstakingly uncovered the tsar's image over the last three years.

The portrait of Nicholas -- shot by the Bolsheviks in 1918 -- was hidden under a layer of water-soluble paint, suggesting it was meant to be preserved and eventually found.

"The ceremonial portrait painted by Ilya Galkin in 1896 was hidden for almost 90 years on the back of another portrait -- depicting Lenin," Potseluyeva told AFP.

Galkin, a little-known artist who painted several portraits of tsars, died in 1915 before the October Revolution of 1917.

The portrait of Lenin wearing a peaked cap and standing in front of Saint Petersburg's Peter and Paul fortress was painted by another artist, Vladislav Izmailovich, in 1924, Potseluyeva said.

Since then, the giant portrait measuring four by three metres (13 by 10 feet) has hung in the assembly hall of a school in the historic centre of Saint Petersburg.

The painting was damaged in the 1970s but restoration experts from the city's Shtiglits Arts and Craft Academy only began restoring it in 2013, leading to the discovery of the hidden portrait.

"We were really surprised!" recalled Potseluyeva, adding that the first detail they discovered was the ornate carpet on which the tsar was standing.