Mikhail Ivanovich Belsky

His father, Ivan Ivanovich Belsky, was a history painter and Academician at the Imperial Academy of Arts.

[2] In 1773, together with the engraver, Gavriil Skorodumov, he was awarded a travel grant to study abroad, in London.

[2] When they arrived, they were placed under the patronage of Count Alexei Musin-Pushkin [ru], the Russian Envoy.

Classes at the Royal Academy of Arts were open to them, they were able to copy the Old Masters, attend lectures and travel throughout the provinces.

[2] Very little is known of his life beyond that point, except that he returned to Russia and worked as a portrait painter in St. Petersburg.