Johann Köler

By the 1860s Johann Köler had painted his way into the Russian imperial court in St Petersburg, giving drawing lessons inside the ruling family. He had begun life about as far from that palace as possible, born in 1826 the seventh child of an Estonian peasant family, and he first reached the capital in 1846 to work as a humble sign painter before his talent was noticed.

He is remembered as the first professional Estonian painter, known above all for his portraits and for scenes of Estonian country life, at a time when Estonians were still a peasant people under German-speaking landlords. Köler used his standing at court quietly, pressing officials on behalf of the Estonian cause during the national awakening, the movement in which that people began to claim its own language and culture.

He led the Society of Estonian Literati, a driving force of that awakening, in the early 1890s. He died in St Petersburg in 1899.