Pezold's father was a doctor. Both of his parents died while he was still a child and he was raised by the Rehbinder family (former patients of his father) at their estate in
Udriku, Estonia. He then attended the "Domschule" (Cathedral School) in
Tallinn. From 1812 to 1814, he followed in his father's footsteps; studying medicine at the
Imperial University of Dorpat (Tartu). After that, he devoted himself to art and accompanied his friend,
Otto Friedrich Ignatius, to Berlin, where they enrolled at the
Academy of Arts. From 1815 to 1816, he studied at the
Academy of Fine Arts Vienna. After a year, he, Ignatius and
Gustav Adolf Hippius spent two years travelling in Italy, then a year in Switzerland. After detours to Paris and London, he returned to Estonia in 1821. Pezold worked primarily as a portrait painter, both there and in
Livonia, primarily
Riga. From 1824 to 1830, he was a drawing teacher at the
Smolny Institute in Saint Petersburg. He later travelled throughout central Europe and Finland but had to return home in 1837 due to the accidental deaths of two of his sons and his wife's subsequent illness. He was named a "free-artist" by the
University of Saint Petersburg in 1839. In 1842, he became one of the founders of the Estonian Literary Society and began teaching at the University in Saint Petersburg. In 1854, he was appointed a member of the
Imperial Academy of Arts. In addition to his portraits and some landscapes, he painted scenes of rural life and the peasantry in what later would be called the
Naïve style. He has also been referred to as a practitioner of Estonian
Biedermeier. == References ==