Portrait of a Monk (early 1500s): Art, History and Details

Portrait of a Monk (early 1500s) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Gerard David (Netherlandish, 1450/60–1523).

The work and its context

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

This panel originally formed the right half of a diptych, a hinged two-paneled painting used for private worship. The missing left panel probably depicted the Virgin and Child. The entire composition showed the monk, with his prayer book open, kneeling in an interior before Mary and the infant Jesus. This panel is very similar to another painting of a monk now in the National Gallery (London) by Gerard David. Although we do not know the monk's name, he must have lived in the Netherlandish city of Bruges, because behind him appear two of that city's most famous towers: on the left is that of the Onze Lieve Vrouw (Our Dear Lady) Church; the Cathedral of the Saviour is on the right. Also, his simple gray garment and tonsure indicate that he likely belonged to an Augustinian religious community.

Object facts

• Title: Portrait of a Monk
• Date: early 1500s
• Creator attribution: Gerard David (Netherlandish, 1450/60–1523)
• Culture: Flanders, Bruges
• Type: Painting
• Technique: oil on wood
• Dimensions: Framed: 54.5 x 48.5 x 5.5 cm (21 7/16 x 19 1/8 x 2 3/16 in.); Unframed: 36 x 30.4 cm (14 3/16 x 11 15/16 in.)
• Collection: MED - Medieval Art
• Department: Medieval Art
• Accession number: 1942.632

Collection credit

Bequest of John L. Severance

Further reading listed by the museum

• Catalogue of the John L. Severance Collection: Bequest of John L. Severance, 1936. [Cleveland, Ohio]: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1942.
• Francis, Henry. "Department of Paintings." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 29, no. 9 (November 1942): 132-136 Published as "An Abbot Praying" and attributed to an anonymous painter.
• The Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art Handbook. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1958.

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.