Portrait Of Man (Antonello Da Messina, London)
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''Portrait of a Man'' is the conventional title of several male portraits by the
Italian Renaissance The Italian Renaissance ( ) was a period in History of Italy, Italian history between the 14th and 16th centuries. The period is known for the initial development of the broader Renaissance culture that spread across Western Europe and marked t ...
artist
Antonello da Messina Antonello da Messina (; 1425–1430February 1479), properly Antonello di Giovanni di Antonio, but also called Antonello degli Antoni and Anglicized as Anthony of Messina, was an Italian painter from Messina, active during the Italian Early Ren ...
.


''Portrait of a Man'' (Pavia)

One such painting is in the Civic Museums of
Pavia Pavia ( , ; ; ; ; ) is a town and comune of south-western Lombardy, in Northern Italy, south of Milan on the lower Ticino (river), Ticino near its confluence with the Po (river), Po. It has a population of c. 73,086. The city was a major polit ...
, in
Lombardy The Lombardy Region (; ) is an administrative regions of Italy, region of Italy that covers ; it is located in northern Italy and has a population of about 10 million people, constituting more than one-sixth of Italy's population. Lombardy is ...
in northern Italy. It is signed in the Flemish manner by directly engraving the painter's name on the parapet in the lower foreground (instead of using a false glued panel), as with the Madrid portrait. Despite the sign, the similarity to Flemish portrait paintings and the poor state of preservation have caused some scholars to doubt the attribution to Antonello. The work has been dated to the 1460s based on the fashion of the subject's dress and headgear.


''Portrait of a Man'' (Madrid)

Another painting, executed in c. 1475, is housed in the
Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza The Thyssen-Bornemisza National Museum (, ; named after its founder, Baron Heinrich Thyssen, Heinrich Thyssen-Bornemisza), or simply the Thyssen, is an art museum in Madrid, Spain, located near the Museo del Prado, Prado Museum on one of the city ...
in
Madrid Madrid ( ; ) is the capital and List of largest cities in Spain, most populous municipality of Spain. It has almost 3.5 million inhabitants and a Madrid metropolitan area, metropolitan area population of approximately 7 million. It i ...
. Among Antonello's portraits, it is among the most expressively animated. The subject, a young man, is drawn from a quite near point of view, with the master's usual skill in rendering detail. The work has been dated approximately to the early 1470s, based on the typical "zuccotto" headgear, a fashion more characteristic of 1460s Italy.


''Portrait of a Man'' (Turin)

Often called the ''Trivulzio portrait'', this portrait is housed in the
Turin City Museum of Ancient Art The Museo Civico d'Arte Antica is an art museum located in the Palazzo Madama in Turin, Italy. It has a renowned collection of paintings from the medieval, Renaissance and Baroque periods. It reopened in 2006 after several years of restorations. ...
. It is signed by Antonello and dated 1476. It was part of the Florentine noble family Rinuccini's collection, which was later acquired by the Trivulzio. In 1935 the collection was scattered, although most of the material went to Milan. The Turin museum obtained this portrait and the
Turin–Milan Hours The Turin–Milan Hours (or Milan–Turin hours, Turin Hours etc.) is a partially destroyed illuminated manuscript, which despite its name is not strictly a book of hours. It is of exceptional quality and importance, with a very complicated histo ...
.


''Portrait of a Man'' (London)

''Portrait of a Man'' is an oil painting of c. 1476 in the
National Gallery The National Gallery is an art museum in Trafalgar Square in the City of Westminster, in Central London, England. Founded in 1824, it houses a collection of more than 2,300 paintings dating from the mid-13th century to 1900. The current di ...
, London. It was reproduced on the Italian 5,000 lire note issued from 1979 to 1983. The work portrays an unknown man, whose garments belonged to the "middle-upper class" of the time. He wears a leather blouse, under which a white shirt is visible, and a red cloth beret. The man is depicted from three-quarters, a departure from the custom of the time. The dark background and the essential composition are derived from
Early Netherlandish painting Early Netherlandish painting is the body of work by artists active in the Burgundian Netherlands, Burgundian and Habsburg Netherlands during the 15th- and 16th-century Northern Renaissance period, once known as the Flemish Primitives. It flour ...
, such as the work of the Flemish painter
Petrus Christus Petrus Christus (; 1410/1420 – c. 1475/1476) was an Early Netherlandish painter active in Bruges from 1444, where, along with Hans Memling, he became the leading painter after the death of Jan van Eyck. He was influenced by van Eyck and R ...
, whom Antonello knew personally in Italy.
X-ray An X-ray (also known in many languages as Röntgen radiation) is a form of high-energy electromagnetic radiation with a wavelength shorter than those of ultraviolet rays and longer than those of gamma rays. Roughly, X-rays have a wavelength ran ...
analysis has proved that the eyes originally looked in a different direction. There may also once have been a parapet, later cut off, which bore the artist's signature. It has been suggested that this late work could be a self-portrait.


Other portraits

* ''Portrait of a Man'', Berlin * ''Portrait of a Man'', Rome * The portrait usually known as ''The Condottiero'' in the
Louvre The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is a national art museum in Paris, France, and one of the most famous museums in the world. It is located on the Rive Droite, Right Bank of the Seine in the city's 1st arrondissement of Paris, 1st arron ...
, Paris


References


Sources

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Further reading

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External links


National Gallery: ''Portrait of a Man'' by Antonello da Messina

Mostraantonellodamessina.it: Exhibition of Antonello da Messina's main works
{{DEFAULTSORT:Male Portraits By Antonello Da Messina . . M M da Messina, Antonello