The view of Tallinn from the Sugar Factory

If many of the 19th century views of Tallinn tend to look somewhat inelegant, then Carl von Kügelgen’s city vedutas are of more professional quality. This painting belongs to a larger series of views of Tallinn, a collection of 10–12 paintings. The series was most likely courtly contract work and it decorated the Estonian residences of the imperial family in Kadriorg. The picture, painted in 1827–30, depicts a view of Tallinn from Maarjamägi, where the Sugar Factory stood at the time, but where there is now a branch of the Estonian Museum of History.