| The Portrait of a Man bears the date "1456", the only clear information there is about it, placed prominently in the background. A man dressed in black fixes the viewer with his hypnotic gaze, only his hand protruding a little over the edge of the balustrade that separates one from the other. The composition as a whole, with its carefully painted details in the face and the subtle modelling of light and shade, reveals detailed knowledge of the early Netherlandish portrait, especially the work of Jan van Eyck (c. 1370–1426). He and his contemporaries enriched the portrait genre by adopting a style in which reality was reproduced faithfully, almost ruthlessly, and which did not even shy away from ugliness. In its close attention to detail, it traces every feature in a face, regardless of unflattering peculiarities, as is seen here in the portrait in the Princely Collections. Light and shade are not used arbitrarily to achieve three-dimensional effects, but result from a consistent treatment of incident light. Apart from these aspects, which suggest connections with the north, the picture has a monumental quality that is scarcely found in contemporary Flemish portrait painting. Painters trained in the north preferred a narrow focus, which made a more direct impact on the viewer. A tentative attribution to the French court painter Jean Fouquet (c. 1420– c. 1480) was certainly a step in the right direction. But it was someone else, a Flemish painter working in the south of France, who combined all the above-mentioned characteristics. Barthélemy d’Eyck (doc. 1440–1470) was related to Jan van Eyck and began his career as a book illustrator in van Eyck’s Bruges workshop, a fact that explains his meticulous painting technique. He was court painter to René I, Duke of Anjou and King of Naples, from 1447 to 1470, the period when the portrait in the Princely Collections was produced. |
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Oil on parchment on panel
height 51 cm, width 42 cm
Dated on both sides of the subject: 1 4 5 6
Inv.-No. GE729
Provenance: 1677 acquired by Prince Karl Eusebius von Liechtenstein from the imperial court painter Johann Spillenberger in Vienna, as “Ein sehr alter kopff von Mantenia anno 1426 gemahlt“ (A very old head painted by Mantenia anno 1426)
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