Vasily Kreitan

The Sower, 1862, plaster; Russian Museum, St. Petersburg, shown as photographed by Nikolai Gogol, 1892–1896, bronze bust; Alexander Garden, St. Petersburg, shown as photographed by Andrey Butko Wilhelm Ferdinand Kreitan, commonly russified as Vasily Petrovich Kreitan (Russian: Васи́лий Петро́вич Крейта́н; 1832, Hamina — 10 June 1896, Saint Petersburg) was a Russian sculptor of Huguenot descent, active in St. Petersburg during Tsars Alexander II and Alexander III's reigns.

Biography He was born in what is now Finland to a sculptor of Huguenot origin named Peter Kreitan, who participated in the restoration of the Winter Palace after the fire of 1837, and began his education at Saint Peter's School.

In 1858, he enrolled at the Imperial Academy of Arts, where he studied sculpture with Pyotr Clodt and Nikolai Pimenov. In 1862, he won a gold medal for his sculpture The Sower, now on display at the Russian Museum. and gave private lessons.

In 1880, the city of Saint Petersburg decided to establish a sculpture park, with busts of prominent figures from the sciences and arts, in the Alexander Garden, with a selection committee headed by Nicholas Benois. Originally, sixteen busts were planned, but there were concerns that it might look like a cemetery, so only four were finally proposed. In 1884, Kreitan won the commission for a bust of Vasily Zhukovsky, which was dedicated in 1887. Four years later, he was chosen to do the bust of Mikhail Lermontov and, the following year, the bust of Nikolai Gogol. Both were completed just before his death in 1896.