This half-length portrait of an unidentified sitter has in the past been catalogued as 'A Young Widow', but because she has no veil this seems unlikely. The costume is probably from soon after 1580. The painter was perhaps not French but Anglo-Flemish, an ...

The young woman wears a richly embroidered, fur-trimmed dress typical of southern Germany. The coats of arms at the upper right corner, which were revealed when the painting was cleaned in 1968, identify the sitter as Susanna Stefan (died 1594), wife of Wolff Furter (1538?
- 1594) of Nuremberg. Her glance suggests that a companion portrait of her husband may once have existed.
...

The painting may originally have formed the left-hand part of a devotional painting. On the wall behind the sitter is an illuminated scroll with a prayer to Saint Veronica, decorated with the type of Head of Christ which usually appears on the saint's vei ...

This is a half-length depiction of an unidentified youth; the reverse of the support is marbled. This painting is almost certainly a forgery, made in Italy in the second half of the 19th century, of an Italian painting of the late 15th century. When bequea ...

The sitter holds a heart-shaped devotional book & his glance suggests that another picture, possibly an image of the Virgin & Child, was joined to this, to make a diptych. On the ledge are an inkpot & pencase. In the background is the church of Notr ...

This painting has in the past been described as a portrait of Raphael & the sitter does indeed resemble him. Recent examination suggests that the picture is an old one but the face is entirely repainted & the painting seems artificially aged. It also a ...

Rosso was one of the most talented & unconventional Florentine artists of the early 16th century. He assimilated the innovations of Leonardo, Michelangelo & Raphael but went on to experiment with brilliant colours, a freer technique & more abstract forms. This is the earliest of very few known portraits by Rosso. It was produced in Florence, while the artist was active in the workshop of Andrea del Sarto. It reveals something of his eccentricity, particularly in the strange spiky fingers, the curiously abstract style & the characteristically swift way of working the paint. Although it is not signed, the distinctive manner in which it is painted is as good as a signature. The features of the face all but dissolve when viewed close up, but the sketchy brushstrokes blend into a powerfully convincing & memorable likeness when seen from a distance. The sitter, as yet unidentified, glances up from a letter dated 22 June 1518. The letter bears further traces of writing which may yield clues to his identity. His gaze is at once dreamy yet also penetrating. This sense of psychological realism & immediacy was only just beginning to find a place in portraiture at the time the work was painted, appealing to the rising class of wealthy & intellectual patrons. ...

The sitter has in the past been identified as Lucius Cary, Viscount Falkland (1609/10
- 1643), but a documented portrait of Falkland
...

The young man depicted in this elegant portrait has not been identified. The date of the picture, 1657, is confirmed by the sitter's fashionable attire. Very little is known about the painter. He was probably living in the Dutch town of 's-Hertogenbosch when this portrait was painted. ...

The painting, which is in exceptionally good condition, probably dates from the 1480s. By then the three-quarter view had replaced the profile as the most popular type of portrait in Florentine painting. This development, & still more the use of landscap ...