Artwork Title: Portrait of a Man

Portrait of a Man, 1475

Antonello Da Messina

Artwork Title: Portrait of a ManArtwork Title: Portrait of a ManArtwork Title: Portrait of a Man
Between circa 1475 and circa 1476. ...Previously Italians had painted in tempera, their colours lacking the lucidity, depth and finesse that van Eyck and other northern Europeans achieved with oils. The earliest oil portraits relish the mimesis of the face that the new medium made possible; Antonello's portraits, including this one and his enigmatic Portrait of a Man (1465) in the Museo Mandralisca, Cefalu, Sicily, translate this look from Flemish to Italian art.... This was said traditionally to be a self-portrait by Antonello, but there is no evidence of the man's identity. Distinguishing features: The light is held in the man's eyes, which are big, shiny orbs. This is not a Bruges merchant, but an Italian whose unshaven face is tough as well as pensive. This Renaissance man has more important things to think about than shaving, and his stubble is painted with realism, the pores just darkening. The hairs sticking out from his red cap are just as sharply real, contrasting with the rich, smooth skin tones, the finely sculpted and shadowed cheekbone. The behaviour of light - sinking into the flesh at some places, making his cheek red and brown, reflecting off his eyeballs and nose as it reflected on the water rippling in the Venetian lagoon - is painted here in a way that would have astonished the painting's first beholders. To them, the new art of oil painting was almost a magical practice, so convincingly did it simulate life. This painting might feel gimmicky in its naturalism, a demonstration work. But it has an emotional strength, a gravitas that gives its subject the look of an intellectual or a man involved with art and science. You can see why it was long identified as a self portrait, because this man does not have the look of a noble. He's a bit hard, maybe quick to anger, maybe with a saturnine temperament. This man is a mysterious character, guarded, as if he doesn't quite trust us. [https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2001/aug/11/art]
Uploaded on Dec 23, 2017 by Suzan Hamer

Arthur is a
Digital Museum