Portrait of a Man (c. 1480–1500): Art, History and Details

Portrait of a Man (c. 1480–1500) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

Although the subject of this portrait wears rich clothing and a sword, nothing specifically associates him with aristocracy. Instead he may have been a wealthy member of the middle class. During the 1400s, portraiture became increasingly popular with prosperous merchants and tradesmen who imitated the portraits commissioned by the dukes of Burgundy and members of their court. The artist is equally mysterious and unidentified. The highly refined technique of oil painting suggests a familiarity with Netherlandish art, and the dark palette and clothing allude to Burgundian portraiture. However, the clothing and facial type relate more to French traditions. The artist may have hailed from France or the Low Countries, a region with a long artistic association with the Valois dukes of Burgundy who ruled the Netherlands in the late 1300s and 1400s.

Object facts

• Title: Portrait of a Man
• Date: c. 1480–1500
• Culture: Northeastern France or the Burgundian Netherlands, 15th century
• Type: Painting
• Technique: oil on wood
• Dimensions: Framed: 52.5 x 38 x 5 cm (20 11/16 x 14 15/16 x 1 15/16 in.); Unframed: 42.5 x 27.6 cm (16 3/4 x 10 7/8 in.)
• Collection: MED - Medieval Art
• Department: Medieval Art
• Accession number: 1963.503

A detail from the museum

The man pictured here didn't accidentally rip his coat, he is actually sporting highly fashionable slashed sleeves. Decorative openings in the sleeves of garments, revealing the rich fabric underneath, were all the rage in 15th-century society.

Collection credit

Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Lee, Sherman E. “Year in Review for 1963.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 50, no. 10 (1963).
• The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1966. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1966.
• Wixom, William D. Treasures from Medieval France. [Cleveland]: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1967.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.