"Sunny"

This is my favorite portrait of the Empress Alexandra Feodorovna of Russia. It was painted by Frederick August von Kaulbach in the early 1900s.

Below is a description about the Empress taken from the book Royal Romances of Today by Kellogg Durland. When I first read it, the very first thing that came to my mind is this Kaulbach portrait, a favorite of her husband Nicholas I, which perfectly captured the Empress's beauty and melancholy.

"The most beautiful Queen on any throne," she was called when she first became Empress of all the Russias. She is tall and stately, her hair is luxuriant and rich in colour. Eyes that some call blue and some call grey look out through long, dark lashes, and in them lies a great sadness, an appealing wistfulness touched with regret, a silent melancholy betraying soul tragedy. Yet as a child she was known as "Sunny".