Hunting For Aristocrats

"Are you Countess Tarnovsky?"

"Yes. What is it you want?"

"Your ancestors lived in Ukraine. Would you like to see your grandfather's portrait?"

The lady's eyes are round and she is frowning, but the young man is nonplused. Deftly he produces a picture neatly wrapped in a piece of cloth, unwraps it and shows it to the lady.

"There are also documents enclosed."

With disbelief and squeamishly the aristocratic woman leaves through faded sheets, then looks at the picture again. Realization comes slowly. And surprise. She stares at the portrait and at the documents. Finally she asks:

"Where did you get all this? Who are you?"

The young man is well prepared for any questions.

"I work for an art and history society. We found this portrait in an antique salon in Kharkiv. The artist is unknown, but we made an expert examination. The picture dates from the mid-nineteenth century and it shows Count V. I. Tarnovsky. Further inquiry revealed that his descendants live in Paris. So here I am."

"Further conversation is kept very businesslike. In the end the visitor hears the trite, "How much do you want for all this?"

"If you will pardon my saying so, we also have some information about your financial status, so the one hundred thousand dollars I will charge you is a worthy and realistic price for this picture. Please think it over. Here is my telephone number when you make up your mind."

Three days later the phone in the young man's hotel room rings. The countess' lawyer is prepared to bring the money and collect the picture. The deal is done. Time to board a flight to Spain where they have located Baron von Stiemach.

This young and intelligent man is the financial director of a thriving Moscow firm. The latter avoids publicity for the simple reason that its business is taking artistic valuables out of the country - in other words, smuggling, which is strictly forbidden by the law.

The antique business is generally known to be extremely profitable, but until now no one thought of increasing its profits dozens of times trading not in masterpieces but in aristocratic portraits (considered the most illiquid commodity), thousands of which are collecting dust in art salons all over the former Russian Empire. The names inscribed are mostly unknown. However, the smart people making up this firm realized that by making certain efforts (hiring experts and restorers) some four or five thousand such pictures could be traced to living descendants, since at least half the aristocrats managed to escape the Red Terror by fleeing to the West. Every fifth of these several thousand families is quite prosperous and every tenth is rolling in dough. In other words, some 200 well-to-do aristocratic families which are very pedantic about their family trees and revere their ancestors' memory are this firm's potential customers. Unfortunately, most of these families, due to generally known historical reasons, cannot boast many family relics. When fleeing the Bolsheviks, salvaging ancestral portraits was the least of their concerns. Nostalgic, they are often willing to pay staggering sums to have some of such relics back - a whim which pays well and which the said firm is willing to oblige.

The case with Countess Tarnovsky is one of several as in the summer of 1998 the Demidovs' descendants living in the United States paid $75,000 for a portrait of Varvara Demidov (mid-nineteenth century) found and bought by the Moscow firm in Nizhni Novgorod for $250. One of the offshoots of the Pashkovs, now in Holland, paid $180,000 for a portrait of Yelena Pashkov (early nineteenth century and in an excellent condition; the portrait was sold by an antique shop in Moscow for $1,200). The firm also operates in Ukraine. This September a portrait of Vasyl Kapnist (1758-1823) was sent to his descendants in France, the firm pocketing $37,000, after spending $800 on its purchase at an art salon in Kharkiv.

This business is brand new. Our files say there are no aristocratic portrait dealers in Ukraine, not yet. And there are still plenty of such portraits in art salons and antique shops.