Portrait of a Man with a Roman Medal

Portrait of a Man with a Roman Medal

Artist	Hans Memling
Year	c. 1480
Medium	Oil on panel
Dimensions	31 cm × 23.2 cm (12 in × 9.1 in)
Location	Royal Museum of Fine Arts, Antwerp

The Portrait of a Man with a Roman Medal is a painting by the German-born Flemish artist Hans Memling, dating to c. 1480 and housed in the Royal Museum of Fine Arts, Antwerp, Belgium.

Description

The painting portrays a man from a three-quarter point of view, with an attention to details typical of Flemish painting. The man is wearing a black coat and a hat of the same color. In the left hand, he is showing a Roman medal of emperor Nero, a symbol of his attention to Humanism. In the background is a lake landscape: Memling was one of the first painters to use natural landscapes for backgrounds of portraits (instead of the traditional black one), influencing later Renaissance artists such as Sandro Botticelli and Pietro Perugino.

The identity of the subject is unknown. It has been supposed that he could be one of the numerous Italians living at the time in Antwerp or Bruges, who often commissioned artworks to local painters. It has been variously identified as Bernardo Bembo, or with the Florentine artist Niccolò di Forzore Spinelli, who died in Lyon, where the painting was in the early 19th century. Or it may be Giovanni di Candida.^[1]

See also

• Portrait of a Man with a Medal of Cosimo the Elder

References

1. ↑ Norbert Schneider. The Art of the Portrait: Masterpieces of European Portrait-painting, 1420—1670. Taschen 2002. P. 44

Sources

• Zuffi, Stefano (2004). Il Quattrocento. Milan: Electa. ISBN 88-370-2315-4. 

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Portrait of a man with a Roman medal.

• Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp: Man with a Roman Coin

Hans Memling
Single religious panels	Virgin and Child Enthroned with two Musical Angels, c. 1467 Scenes from the Passion of Christ, c 1470 Adoration of the Magi, c. 1471 Mater Dolorosa, c 1475 Allegory with a Virgin, c. 1479–1480 Advent and Triumph of Christ, c. 1480 Mater Dolorosa, c 1480 Mystic Marriage of St Catherine, c. 1480 Angel Musicians, 1480s Annunciation, c. 1482 Christ Surrounded by Musician Angels, c. 1480s
History paintings	Adam and Eve, c. 1485 Bathsheba, c. 1485
Polyptychs	Last Judgment, c. 1467–1471 Diptych of an elderly couple, c. 1470-1472 Diptych of Jean de Cellier, c. 1475 St John Altarpiece, 1479 Donne Triptych, c. 1480 St. Ursula Shrine, c. 1489
Portraits	Portrait of a Man, c. 1470–1472 Portrait of Tommaso Portinari, c. 1470–1472 Portrait of Maria Portinari, c. 1470–1472 Portrait of an Elderly Man, c 1470-75 Portrait of an Elderly Woman, c 1470-75 Portrait of a Man with a Pink Carnation, 1475 Portrait of Benedetto Portinari, 1478 Portrait of Willem Morell, c. 1480 Portrait of a Man with a Roman Medal, c. 1480 Portrait of Barbara van Vlaendenbergh, c. 1480 Sibylla Sambetha, c 1480