An artist from a royal family: how was the fate of the sister of Nicholas II in exile

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna Romanova was the youngest daughter of Emperor Alexander III and sister of Emperor Nicholas II. However, she is known not only for her noble origins, but also for her active charitable work and pictorial talent. She managed to avoid the terrible fate that befell her brother and his family - after the revolution she survived and went abroad. However, life in exile was far from cloudless: for some time, paintings were her only means of subsistence.

Olga Alexandrovna was born in 1882 and was the only crimson child - that is, born at a time when her father was already the reigning monarch. Very early, Olga showed the talent of an artist. She recalled: "Even during my geography and arithmetic lessons, I was allowed to sit with a pencil in my hand, because I listened better when I drew corn or wild flowers." All children were taught drawing in the royal family, but only Olga Alexandrovna began to paint professionally. Makovsky and Vinogradov became her teachers. The princess did not like the noisy metropolitan life and social entertainment, and instead of balls she preferred to spend time sketching.

From an early age, Olga Romanova was also involved in charity work: vernissages were held in the Gatchina Palace, at which her works and paintings by young artists were presented, and the proceeds from their sale went to charity. During the First World War, she equipped a hospital at her own expense, in which she went to work as a simple nurse.

At the age of 18, by the will of her mother, Olga Alexandrovna married the Prince of Oldenburg. The marriage was not happy, as the husband, as they said at the time, “was not interested in ladies,” and besides, he was a drunkard and a gambler: in the very first years after the wedding, he spent a million gold rubles in gambling houses. The Grand Duchess confessed: "We lived with him under the same roof for 15 years, but we never became husband and wife, the Prince of Oldenburg and I have never been married."

2 years after the wedding, Olga Alexandrovna met the officer Nikolai Kulikovsky. It was love at first sight. She wanted to divorce her husband, but the family was against it, and the lovers had to wait for the opportunity to marry for 13 long years. Their wedding took place in 1916. At the same time Olga Alexandrovna saw her brother, Emperor Nicholas II, for the last time.

When in 1918 the English king George V sent a warship for his aunt (Empress Maria Feodorovna), the Kulikovskys refused to go with them and went to the Kuban, but two years later Olga Alexandrovna with her husband and sons still had to go to Denmark after mother. “I couldn’t believe that I was leaving my homeland forever. I was sure that I would be back, - Olga Aleksandrovna recalled. - I had the feeling that my flight was a cowardly act, although I came to this decision for the sake of my young children. And yet I was constantly tormented by shame."

In the 1920-1940s. the paintings became for the emperor's sister a serious help and livelihood. The eldest son of the Kulikovskys, Tikhon, recalled: “The Grand Duchess became the honorary chairwoman of a number of emigre organizations, mainly charitable ones. At the same time, her artistic talent was appreciated and she began to exhibit her paintings not only in Denmark, but also in Paris, London, and Berlin. A significant portion of the proceeds went to charity. The icons painted by her did not go on sale - she only gave them away."

In emigration, her house became the real center of the Danish Russian colony, where the Grand Duchess's compatriots could turn for help, regardless of their political convictions. After the war, this caused a negative reaction from the USSR, the Danish authorities were demanded to extradite the Grand Duchess, accusing her of complicity with the "enemies of the people."

Therefore, in 1948, their family had to emigrate to Canada, where they spent their last years. There Olga Alexandrovna continued to paint, which she never left under any circumstances. Throughout her life, she painted more than 2000 paintings.

Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna died in 1960, at the age of 78, having outlived her husband by 2 years and by 7 months - her older sister, who also had a hard time in emigration: two lives of the Emperor's sister Xenia Alexandrovna