Interior with Christmas Tree and Cyclamen

Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna (1882-1960) was born the youngest child of Tsar Alexander III of Russia (1845-1894), and the younger sister of the future Tsar Nicholas II (1868-1918). Olga was raised in Saint Petersburg where she was very close with her father until his death when she was 12. At 19, Olga married Duke Peter Alexandrovich of Oldenburg (1868-1924), a union which was eventually annulled. Olga later married Nikolai Kulikovsky (1881-1958). At the outset of the Russian Revolution in 1917, Olga fled with her husband and children to Crimea, before escaping to join her mother in exile in Denmark. Feeling threatened by the Soviet regime, Olga moved again in 1948 to Ontario, Canada, where she lived until her death in 1960 at age 78.
Olga's interest in painting and drawing began at a very young age, and her output is estimated to be around 2,000 works, largely still lifes and landscapes, as well as some portraits. Olga began exhibiting and selling her work while in exile in Denmark, providing additional income for her family as well as various charities. A number of Olga's works have sold recently at auction, including from the collection of her family, such as a group of floral and landscape studies at Christie's, London, 25 November 2019, lot 29, as well as a still life of cyclamen and roses on a table from Faringdon House, Oxfordshire, Christie's, London, 12 April 2018 lot 139.