Portrait of an African man

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Portrait of an African Man (Jan Mostaert)
Portrait of an African man
Jan Mostaert , around 1525–1530
Oil on oak
30.8 x 21.2 cm
Rijksmuseum Amsterdam

The Portrait of an African Man ( Dutch Portret van een Afrikaanse man , English Portrait of an African Man ) is a painting by the Dutch Renaissance painter Jan Mostaert . Mostaert probably created the painting between 1525 and 1530. It is not known who the portrait represents. Based on the clothing, demeanor, and attributes, the African is believed to be a soldier at a European court . Presumably he belonged to the court of Margaret of Austria . It could be Christophle le More, a member of Charles V's bodyguard ., have acted. The painting has been in the possession of the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam since 2005 .

The portrait is the oldest surviving and only independently painted portrait of a black man in European painting from the late Middle Ages and the Renaissance. Earlier portraits and sculptures of Saints Mauritius and Balthasar , usually shown as blacks, were stereotyped .

Image description

The painting shows the half-length of a man in a three-quarter view turned to the left in the European clothing of the Renaissance against a blue-green background. His demeanor is confident, with a calm look and a slightly raised chin. He has a dark brown face, dark mustache, and beard. His black hair is largely covered by an orange-red cap to which a round gold (or silver-gold-plated) pilgrim badge is attached. He wears a white shirt without a collar, but with a ruffled, embroidered top. Over it he wears a deep red doublet , over it again a simple black coat, a so-called tabard , with sleeves that are cut open at the elbows and are held together by black, braided cords. These cords form a kind of double necklace and are tied together at the height of his belly. Underneath, the man wears two brown-colored leg warmers, which are attached to the gambeson with double seams . His fly is covered by the shirt and a crotch insert ( braguette ) that can be seen under the hilt of his sword.

The man in the painting also wears gloves made of thin white leather that end in a fine tassel. His right hand rests on the ornate hilt of a sword, which is attached to the weir hanger together with an embroidered pouch . Jan Piet Filedt Kok and Mareike de Winkel suspected that it is an ordinary sword with a straight blade, the cross handle of which is long enough to be held with the second hand if necessary. This type of sword can be seen on numerous shields from the period between 1465 and 1510 and was widespread throughout Europe. On the purse, floral motifs and a French lily are embroidered with gold thread and pearls .

History and provenance

An examination of the annual rings on the oak panel of the painting has shown that the portrait may have been created from 1520 onwards, but that it is more plausible that it was created from 1526 onwards.

Margaret of Austria as a widow, painting by Bernards van Orley , between 1510 and 1520

The portrait did not appear in public until the beginning of the 20th century. It was bought by the art dealer Thomas Harris in 1920. It is not known where or from whom Harris got the painting, only that many of the paintings Harris sold came from Spain. Harris sent a photo of the painting to renowned art historian Max Friedländer . Based on the photography, Friedländer attributed the painting to the Haarlem painter Jan Mostaert, which was never questioned in the following decades. Jan Piet Filedt Kok and Mareike de Winkel from the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam also confirmed the attribution as probable after their scientific investigation in 2005. The portrait has many similarities with other male portraits of the time, but in terms of style and painting technique it corresponds most closely to the portraits ascribed to Mostaert. Jan Mostaert was appointed an honorary painter by Margaret of Austria in March 1518 , probably at the intercession of the many nobles whom Mostaert had portrayed with great success.

Max Friedländer mentioned the portrait in the second edition of his handbook Von Eyck bis Bruegel in 1921 without further explanation . In his portrayal of old Dutch painting, he listed it in 1934 as Mostaert's painting. In 1924 the portrait became the property of Hans Wendland in Lugano , who sold it to the Fischer Gallery in Lucerne that same year . The gallery sold the picture in 1934 to Thomas D. Barlow (1883–1964) in London .

The public was first able to see the painting in 1936 when it was shown in an exhibition at the Boymans Museum in Rotterdam. The art connoisseur HP Bremmer then praised it. In the decades that followed, the portrait was shown in several exhibitions in the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. The art historian Friedrich Winkler was the first to point out the unique and independent character of the portrait in 1959.

After Thomas D. Barlow's death, his son Basil Stephen Barlow (1918–1991) inherited the painting. Its heirs loaned it to Kenwood House in London from 1998 to 2003 . From there it came to the art dealer R. Noortman in Maastricht in 2004 via Simon C. Dickinson Ltd, London . In 2005, the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, supported by several sponsors, acquired the portrait for € 600,000. An in-depth scientific study was carried out at the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam after the picture was acquired.

importance

At the Black Africans in Renaissance Europe 2001 conference in Oxford, the English historian Kate Lowe pointed out the importance of the portrait in her lecture “The stereotyping of black Africans in Renaissance Europe” analyzed it as a counter-example to the other stereotypical representation of blacks in the Renaissance.

The Portrait of an African Man is the earliest and only independently painted portrait of a Black African from the late Middle Ages and the Renaissance. During this time black people were regularly portrayed, e.g. B. as Balthasar, one of the three wise men . The earliest representation of a saint as a black man is the sculpture of Saint Mauritius in Magdeburg Cathedral , which was made around 1240/50. However, these representations were not portraits or individual people, but general types with constantly recurring characteristics.

Albrecht Dürer drew the head of an African in 1508. However, this is a study drawing that no other artist has seen. Dürer probably created it with the intention of using it later in a painting with the motif Adoration of the Magi . In 1521, in memory of a trip to Portugal, Dürer drew a twenty-year-old black woman, also a study drawing for his own use.

As the art historian Esther Schreuder noted, Jan Mostaert himself integrated depictions of black people in other pictures in the background, as Balthasar, as a servant or as a musician. These correspond to the otherwise usual stereotypical representations of blacks as secondary characters.

Pictured man

The posture, clothing and attributes of the depicted African show his connection with European court culture. The historian Kate Lowe concluded from Mostaert's affiliation to Margarete von Austria's court that the portrayed man belonged to the court in Mechelen . Paintings on oak panels were costly and usually came about as commissioned work, the commission usually coming from the portrayed or the court concerned. The man's clothing and attributes (sword and pilgrim badge) are expensive. Apart from his skin color, the man is no different from other depictions of Renaissance nobles. Lowe referred in particular to the lack of earrings and non-existent physical scars or branding, which otherwise stereotyped the depictions of blacks, who are depicted in many pictures as servants or slaves as an accessory or part of the scenery. The portrait also does not show any other established stereotypes of depictions of black people. These include the simple-minded laughing pose - laughter was seen as evidence of stupidity and lack of discipline - or laziness, drunkenness or crime. Overall, Lowe concluded that he must be a man of high standing.

Jan Piet Filedt Kok and Mareike de Winkel disagreed with Kate Lowe's assessment that the sitter's clothes were expensive and Spanish. In their opinion, it consisted of simple, practical fabrics and not of expensive brocade or damask , as is common with the nobility . In addition, the man's clothing was already out of fashion with the nobility by 1520. This applies to the cut of the shirt, the style of the white leather gloves and the hat and also the wearing of the purse on the belt. In contrast, the sitter with his beard, mustache and short hair was fashionable at the height of the times. At the beginning of the 16th century, men at the Dutch and Spanish courts were shaved. From around 1515, beards and short hair became common at the French court. The Habsburg court in Mechelen followed this fashion.

According to Filedt Kok and Winkel, the man was not dressed as one would expect from a nobleman or an envoy from another court, but more like a soldier, such as a mercenary or a bodyguard. Military uniforms did not yet exist. The dress and demeanor of the person portrayed exude a certain bravura and it seems likely that he was in the service of a noble gentleman (or lady). The pilgrim sign and his hair and beard make it probable that he lived in the circles of the Habsburg court in Brussels or Mechelen with Margaret of Austria.

The pilgrim badge on the hat proves that the person pictured was a Christian. On the badge a Madonna is depicted between two angels. It is the sign of Our Lady of Halle near Brussels, which was an important place of pilgrimage at this time thanks to a statue of the Virgin Mary in the Basilica of St. Martin . The person portrayed could have visited the place of pilgrimage himself and bought the badge there or received it as a gift from his employer. Another possibility is that the badge indicates membership of the Brotherhood of Our Lady of Halle. The wearing of a gold or gold-plated plaque on the headgear was a short-lived, especially courtly fashion phenomenon that originated at the French court and was adopted mainly in Italy and the Netherlands. This is evidenced by Dutch portraits from the period 1510 to 1530, including a number of male portraits by Jan Mostaert. Apart from the pilgrim badge, the man does not wear any other gold jewelry such as chains, collars, rings, buttons or nails on his hat, as would have been customary for a nobleman.

The painting has an unpainted edge of approx. 5 mm, which cannot be seen when framed. This border proves that the painted surface of the picture has been completely preserved and that the painting is not a fragment of a larger representation. Filedt Kok and de Winkel pointed out that this ruled out a representation of one of the three Magi, as they were never depicted alone.

The historian Ernst van den Boogardt has identified Christophle le More as the most likely candidate for the soldier on the basis of published archival sources, whereby he stated that further archive research could lead to further possible candidates. Christophle is mentioned several times between 1501 and 1506 as a lackey employed in the stables of Philip the Fair . Boogardt sees a possible origin that he could have been born the son of a slave around 1490 and would have been baptized and raised as a Christian. He might have been formally released, or his ascent might over time have blurred the distinction between slave and loyal servant. As a teenager he would have started to work in the stables, the school for the young court aristocrats who had to learn to ride. Christophle would have been in regular contact with them there, and Charles V must have known him from an early age. There was no further evidence of Christophle until 1517, when he appeared on Charles V's payroll. Boogardt assumes that, as an adult, he became a member of Charles V's bodyguard, an elite group of around a hundred men. These bodyguards were among the lower court servants.

In 2013, the director of the Rijksmuseum Wim Pijbes linked the portrait with the development of the Dutch folklore figure Zwarte Piet in a newspaper article . The literary historian Marie-José Govers responded in 2014 with the thesis that the portrait was a representation of Saint Mauritius. The art historian Esther Schreuder rejected these two theories, which were never scientifically published, as insubstantial.

Trivia

The 2005 conference volume Black Africans in Renaissance Europe used the portrait of an African man as the title page.

literature

  • Ernst van den Boogaart: Christophle le More, lijfwacht van Karel V? In: Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum . tape 53 , no. 4 , 2005, ISSN  0165-9510 , p. 412-433 , JSTOR : 40383403 .
  • Jan Piet Filedt Kok, Marieke de Winkel: A portret van een Zwarte Afrikaanse man by Jan Mostaert . In: Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum . tape 53 , no. 4 , 2005, ISSN  0165-9510 , p. 380-411 , JSTOR : 40383402 .
  • Jan Piet Filedt Kok: Jan Jansz Mostaert, Portrait of an African Man, Mechelen, c. 1525 - c. 1530 . In: Jan Piet Filedt Kok (Ed.): Early Netherlandish Paintings, online coll. Cat. Amsterdam . Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, 2010 (hdl.handle.net/10934/RM0001.COLLECT.431086 [accessed April 2, 2021]).
  • KJP Lowe: The stereotyping of black Africans in Renaissance Europe . In: TF Earle, KJP Lowe (eds.): Black Africans in Renaissance Europe . Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK 2005, ISBN 0-521-81582-7 , pp. 17-47 .

Web links

Commons : Portrait of an African Man  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b c d Jan Piet Filedt Kok, Marieke de Winkel: Een portret van een Zwarte Afrikaanse man by Jan Mostaert . In: Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum . tape 53 , no. 4 , 2005, ISSN  0165-9510 , p. 380-411 , here pp. 381-382 , JSTOR : 40383402 .
  2. ↑ a b Jan. Piet Filedt Kok, Marieke de Winkel: Een portret van een zwarte Afrikaanse one door Jan Mostaert . In: Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum . tape 53 , no. 4 , 2005, ISSN  0165-9510 , p. 380-411 , here p. 385 , JSTOR : 40383402 .
  3. ↑ a b Jan. Piet Filedt Kok, Marieke de Winkel: Een portret van een zwarte Afrikaanse one door Jan Mostaert . In: Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum . tape 53 , no. 4 , 2005, ISSN  0165-9510 , p. 380-411 , here p. 406 , JSTOR : 40383402 .
  4. ↑ January Piet Filedt Kok, Marieke de Winkel: Een portret van een zwarte Afrikaanse one door Jan Mostaert . In: Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum . tape 53 , no. 4 , 2005, ISSN  0165-9510 , p. 380-411 , here pp. 388, 403 , JSTOR : 40383402 .
  5. ↑ January Piet Filedt Kok, Marieke de Winkel: Een portret van een zwarte Afrikaanse one door Jan Mostaert . In: Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum . tape 53 , no. 4 , 2005, ISSN  0165-9510 , p. 380-411 , here p. 392 , JSTOR : 40383402 .
  6. ^ Max Friedländer: From Eyck to Bruegel. Studies on the history of Dutch painting . 2nd Edition. Bard, Berlin 1921, p. 200 .
  7. ↑ Max Friedländer: Lucas van Leyden and other Dutch masters of his time (=  The old Dutch painting . Volume 10 ). Cassirer, Berlin 1932, p. 123 (No. 30) .
  8. ↑ a b J.P. Filedt Kok: Jan Jansz Mostaert, Portrait of an African Man, Mechelen, c. 1525 - c. 1530 . In: JP Filedt Kok (Ed.): Early Netherlandish Paintings, online coll. Cat. Amsterdam . Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, 2010 (hdl.handle.net/10934/RM0001.COLLECT.431086 [accessed April 2, 2021]).
  9. ↑ Jeroen Bosch, noord-nederlandsche primitieven, 10 July - 15 October 1936, Museum Boymans, Rotterdam (exhibition catalog) . Van Waesberge, Rotterdam 1936, p. 29 (No. 44) .
  10. ↑ Friedrich Winkler: On the knowledge and appreciation of Jan Mostaert . In: Journal for Art History . tape 13 , 1959, pp. 177–214 , here p. 178 .
  11. ^ Rijksmuseum acquires unique Renaissance panel by Jan Mostaert. In: CODART. July 7, 2005, Retrieved April 3, 2021 (American English).
  12. ↑ January Piet Filedt Kok, Marieke de Winkel: Een portret van een zwarte Afrikaanse one door Jan Mostaert . In: Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum . tape 53 , no. 4 , 2005, ISSN  0165-9510 , p. 380-411 , JSTOR : 40383402 .
  13. ^ Ernst van den Boogaart: Christophle le More, lijfwacht van Karel V? In: Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum . tape 53 , no. 4 , 2005, ISSN  0165-9510 , p. 412-433 , JSTOR : 40383403 .
  14. ↑ a b K. JP Lowe: The stereotyping of black Africans in Renaissance Europe . In: TF Earle, KJP Lowe (eds.): Black Africans in Renaissance Europe . Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK 2005, ISBN 0-521-81582-7 , pp. 17–47 , here pp. 44–47 .
  15. ↑ January Piet Filedt Kok, Marieke de Winkel: Een portret van een zwarte Afrikaanse one door Jan Mostaert . In: Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum . tape 53 , no. 4 , 2005, ISSN  0165-9510 , p. 380-411 , here p. 401 , JSTOR : 40383402 .
  16. ↑ Esther Schreuder: Who is this man? (I). In: Esther Schreuder - art historian - writer - curator - researcher. February 21, 2012, accessed April 3, 2021 .
  17. ^ A b c Jan Piet Filedt Kok, Marieke de Winkel: Een portret van een Zwarte Afrikaanse man by Jan Mostaert . In: Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum . tape 53 , no. 4 , 2005, ISSN  0165-9510 , p. 380-411 , 387-388 , JSTOR : 40383402 .
  18. ^ A b c Jan Piet Filedt Kok, Marieke de Winkel: Een portret van een Zwarte Afrikaanse man by Jan Mostaert . In: Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum . tape 53 , no. 4 , 2005, ISSN  0165-9510 , p. 380-411 , here p. 387 , JSTOR : 40383402 .
  19. ^ Yvonne Hackenbroch: Enseignes. Renaissance has jewels . Studio Per Edizioni Scelte, Firenze 1996, ISBN 88-7242-271-X , p. 239-245 .
  20. ↑ January Piet Filedt Kok, Marieke de Winkel: Een portret van een zwarte Afrikaanse one door Jan Mostaert . In: Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum . tape 53 , no. 4 , 2005, ISSN  0165-9510 , p. 380-411 , here p. 384 , JSTOR : 40383402 .
  21. ^ Ernst van den Boogaart: Christophle le More, lijfwacht van Karel V? In: Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum . tape 53 , no. 4 , 2005, ISSN  0165-9510 , p. 412-433 , here p. 426 , JSTOR : 40383403 .
  22. ^ Ernst van den Boogaart: Christophle le More, lijfwacht van Karel V? In: Bulletin van het Rijksmuseum . tape 53 , no. 4 , 2005, ISSN  0165-9510 , p. 412-433 , here pp. 420-422 , JSTOR : 40383403 .
  23. ↑ Ernst van den Boogaart: Een portretwaardige slaaf. In: De Groene Amsterdammer. August 5, 2005, accessed April 3, 2021 (nl-NL).
  24. ↑ How is Zwarte Piet Eigenlijk? In: NOS. October 23, 2013, accessed April 10, 2021 (Dutch).
  25. ^ Marie-José Govers: Niet Zwarte Piet, Mauritius in Rijks. In: NRC Handelsblad. November 7, 2014, accessed April 10, 2021 (Dutch).
  26. ^ Esther Schreuder: St Mauritius en het portret van Mostaert. In: Esther Schreuder - art historian - writer - curator - researcher. November 9, 2014, accessed April 3, 2021 .
  27. ↑ TF Earle, KJP Lowe (ed.): Black Africans in Renaissance Europe . Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK 2005, ISBN 0-521-81582-7 .