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Sir Anthony van Dyck (artist) Flemish, 1599 - 1641 Marchesa Elena Grimaldi Cattaneo, 1623 oil on canvas overall: 242.9 x 138.5 cm (95 5/8 x 54 1/2 in.) Widener Collection 1942.9.92 On View |
Anthony van Dyck's portraits of the Genoese nobility are generally recognized as one of the supreme achievements of Western portraiture and as the high point of the artist's career. Of these, his portrayal of Elena Grimaldi is the most brilliant. A marchesa both by birth and by marriage, the elegant Italian noblewoman is depicted in a stately setting expressive of her social status; she steps out of a Corinthian-columned portico onto a balustraded terrace. Behind her extends a luxuriant estate beneath a dramatically cloud-filled sky.
The painting hangs in an arrangement at the National Gallery similar to its original placement in the Cattaneo palace: flanked by Van Dyck's sensitive portraits of the marchesa's two children, Filippo and Maddalena. The entire composition of the mother's portrait—the low viewpoint, the two diagonals created by the advancing servant and the parasol handle, and the stairway balustrade—is planned to draw attention to her face.
In an oil sketch for this portrait (Smithsonian Institution), the marchesa wears a red flower at her right cheek. A careful study of the large, completed painting in the National Gallery reveals that the artist revised the final composition, replacing the flower with a parasol. This brilliant scarlet ellipse sets off her fair complexion, and the parasol's radiating spokes converge on her head.