The ''Portrait of a Young Man with a Lamp'' is an oil-on-canvas painting by the
Italian High Renaissance painter
Lorenzo Lotto, dating to c. 1506. It is housed in the
Kunsthistorisches Museum
The Kunsthistorisches Museum ( "Museum of Art History", often referred to as the "Museum of Fine Arts") is an art museum in Vienna, Austria. Housed in its festive palatial building on the Vienna Ring Road, it is crowned with an octagonal do ...
of
Vienna,
Austria.
The work is generally ascribed to Lotto's stay in
Treviso. It was acquired by the Viennese museum in 1816.
Description
The picture portrays the bust a young man from three-quarter, looking at the viewer. It shows an extreme attention to details, such as the slight epidermic imperfections, the elongated nose, the soft hair. The use of light and the composition are similar to other early works by Lotto, such as the ''
Portrait of Bishop Bernardo de' Rossi'' (1505). The face is framed by the dark clothes and hat, painted over a white
brocade
Brocade is a class of richly decorative shuttle-woven fabrics, often made in colored silks and sometimes with gold and silver threads. The name, related to the same root as the word "broccoli", comes from Italian ''broccato'' meaning "embos ...
drapery with a green border.
On the right, an opening to a darker background shows a burning lamp, a symbol which could allude to the man's personality or deeds, and which has been variously interpreted (from a reference to an evangelic episode to an allegory of the human life's shortness, due to the dimness of the flame).
The subject has been identified as Broccardo Malchiostro, the young chancellor of the
bishop of Treviso,
Bernardo de' Rossi, who both risked their lives in a plot in 1503. The decoration of the drapery would thus be a
charades
Charades (, ). is a parlor game, parlor or party game, party word game, word guessing game. Originally, the game was a dramatic form of literary charades: a single person would act out each syllable of a word or phrase in order, followed by the w ...
: it is a brocade with
carduus
''Carduus'' is a genus of flowering plants in the family Asteraceae, and the tribe Cardueae, one of two genera considered to be true thistles, the other being ''Cirsium''. Plants of the genus are known commonly as plumeless thistles. , whence "Brocade + carduus = Brocardus". Such allusions are contained in several Lotto works, such as the ''
Portrait of Lucina Brembati
The ''Portrait of Lucina Brembati'' is an oil-on-panel painting by the Italian High Renaissance painter Lorenzo Lotto, dating to ''c.'' 1518. It is housed in the Accademia Carrara of Bergamo, northern Italy.
The work is known since 1882, when ...
'', painted during his maturity.
See also
*''
Portrait of Lucina Brembati
The ''Portrait of Lucina Brembati'' is an oil-on-panel painting by the Italian High Renaissance painter Lorenzo Lotto, dating to ''c.'' 1518. It is housed in the Accademia Carrara of Bergamo, northern Italy.
The work is known since 1882, when ...
''
Sources
*
External links
Page at the museum's website
{{Lorenzo Lotto
1506 paintings
Young Man
Paintings in the Kunsthistorisches Museum