Lucas Conrad Pfandzelt

German painter, copier, restorer, collector, dealer. Born in the family of German portraitist Georg Friedrich Pfandzelt in the Free Imperial City of Ulm (1716). Studied painting under his father and travelled across Germany. Moved to the Russian Empire with Georg Christoph Grooth, settling in Reval (1741) and St Petersburg (1743), where he worked as an apprentice to Georg Christoph Grooth. Supervised and restored paintings in the imperial palaces after Grooth’s death (1749–70), becoming the first professional restorer of oil paintings in Russia. Painted a portrait of Peter III (1761). Awarded the title of master (1763). First keeper of the Imperial Hermitage Picture Gallery (1764–75). Restored paintings at the Hermitage (from 1765) and an equestrian portrait of Tsar Alexis Mikhailovich in the Kremlin in Moscow (1766). Married the daughter of a Livonian provost called Anna Svenska (1782). Died in St Petersburg and buried at the Smolensk Lutheran Cemetery on Decembrists’ Island (1786 or 1788).