The ''Portrait of a Clad Warrior'', also known as ''Portrait of Gaston of Foix'', is an oil on canvas painting by the Italian

High Renaissance In art history, the High Renaissance was a short period of the most exceptional artistic production in the Italian states, particularly Rome, capital of the Papal States, and in Florence, during the Italian Renaissance. Most art historians stat ...

painter Giovanni Girolamo Savoldo, dating to c. 1529 and housed in the

Louvre Museum The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is the world's most-visited museum, and an historic landmark in Paris, France. It is the home of some of the best-known works of art, including the ''Mona Lisa'' and the ''Venus de Milo''. A central l ...

, in

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

History and description

The subject was traditionally identified with the French military leader

Gaston of Foix, Duke of Nemours Gaston de Foix, duc de Nemours (10 December 1489 – 11 April 1512), nicknamed The Thunderbolt of Italy, was a famed French military commander of the Renaissance. Nephew of King Louis XII of France and general of his armies in Italy from 1511 t ...

, or as a self-portrait, although there is no documentary evidence for either hypothesis. The identification with Gaston de Foix is devoid of documentary evidence, as well as certainly improbable, since it would have been a posthumous portrait lacking the composure more suited to this purpose. The painting depicts a man wearing military armor in a small room with two mirrors. In a narrow space, the man is portrayed leaning against a shelf, while he also leans forward towards the viewer, settling along a deep diagonal, which ends with his outstretched left arm, indicating the reflected image. The presence of the triple image (front, back and side) certainly refers to a lost painting by

Giorgione Giorgione (, , ; born Giorgio Barbarelli da Castelfranco; 1477–78 or 1473–74 – 17 September 1510) was an Italian painter of the Venetian school during the High Renaissance, who died in his thirties. He is known for the elusive poetic qualit ...

, who had been created to demonstrate the superiority of painting in the lively debate on the " comparison of the arts". Savoldo, like Giorgione, wanted to demonstrate that painting was also capable of representing multiple views of the same subject, in the same way as sculpture, and without having to go around it. The theme of light and reflections is also magnified by the metallic luster of the armor and the red velvet sleeves, which create those chromatic flashes between dense and dark shadow fields, typical of the painter's production.

External links

Page at the museum website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Portrait of a Clad Warrior 1529 paintings Paintings in the Louvre by Italian artists Clad Warrior Paintings by Girolamo Savoldo Clad Warrior

History and description

See also

External links