Portrait of a Nobleman

c. 1570

Shown from the chest up, a pale-skinned man wearing a ruffled collar and ornately decorated doublet looks at us from the corners of his eyes in this vertical portrait painting. His shoulders and face angle to our left, but he gazes steadily our way with bright blue eyes under low, thin brows. He has a straight nose with a rounded tip, and his coral-pink lips are closed under a faint suggestion of a mustache and perhaps a beard. His short brown hair is brushed back from his high forehead, and his white collar curls in figure eights high along his chin and up the back of his neck. His doublet is brown patterned with gold horizontal stripes lined with silver zig-zags. Flower-shaped buttons lead down the front of his doublet from a high collar, and a long gold chain falls out of view below the bottom edge of the painting. His ivory-white sleeves have slashes in rows of alternating diagonals separated by gold embroidery. The background is dark ash brown.

Media Options

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On View

West Building Main Floor, Gallery 35

Artwork overview

  • Medium

    oil on fir or pine

  • Credit Line

    Chester Dale Collection

  • Dimensions

    original panel: 31.2 x 22.7 cm (12 5/16 x 8 15/16 in.)
    overall (with wooden shims): 32.4 x 23.6 cm (12 3/4 x 9 5/16 in.)
    framed: 47.9 x 38.1 x 7.3 cm (18 7/8 x 15 x 2 7/8 in.)

  • Accession

    1942.16.1

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

De Burlett, Berlin.[1] (Étienne Bignou, Paris), by 1927;[2] purchased 25 March 1931 by Chester Dale [1883-1962], New York; gift 1942 to NGA.
[1] Chester Dale Papers, copy in NGA curatorial files, not verified independently. This reference might possibly be to the Berlin dealer Charles Albert de Burlet.
[2] Christian Zervos, "Nos enquêtes: entretien avec Étienne Bignou," Cahiers d'Art 2 (1927): 276. A letter dated 7 August 1931 from Bignou to M. Knoedler & Co., New York, details shipping instructons, M. Knoedler & Co. Records, Getty Research Institute (copy NGA curatorial files).

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1931

  • Renoir and His Tradition, Museum of French Art, New York, no. 1.

1965

  • The Chester Dale Bequest, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1965, unnumbered checklist.

Bibliography

1927

  • Zervos, Christian. "Nos enquêtes: entretien avec Étienne Bignou." Cahiers d'Art 2 (1927): 276, repro.

1931

  • Flint, Ralph. "Renoir and His Tradition Seen in Loan Exhibit, Museum of French Art." Art News 30 (28 November 1931): 5.

1953

  • French Paintings from the Chester Dale Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1953: 17, repro.

1965

  • Eighteenth and Nineteenth Century Paintings & Sculpture of the French School in the Chester Dale Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965: 17, repro.

  • Summary Catalogue of European Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965: 53.

1968

  • National Gallery of Art. European Paintings and Sculpture, Illustrations. Washington, 1968: 45, repro.

1975

  • European Paintings: An Illustrated Summary Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1975: 134, repro.

1984

  • Walker, John. National Gallery of Art, Washington. Rev. ed. New York, 1984: 227, no. 285, color repro., as by French School.

1985

  • European Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1985: 24, repro.

2009

  • Conisbee, Philip, et al. French Paintings of the Fifteenth through the Eighteenth Century. The Collections of the National Gallery of Art Systematic Catalogue. Washington, D.C., 2009: no. 47, 222-224, color repro.

Inscriptions

On cradle: in pencil, "D168" (or "8910'" if read from the opposite direction).

Wikidata ID

Q20176733

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