Antonello da Messina - Portrait of a Man

• Title: Portrait of a Man
• Artist: Antonello da Messina (c.1430-1479)
• Date: 1475-76
• Medium: Oil on poplar panel
• Dimensions: 26 × 36 cm

Antonello da Messina’s style is remarkable for its union of Italian simplicity with Flemish concern for detail. Despite no documentary evidence that he ever travelled outside of Italy, Giorgio Vasari, the 16th century painter, best known for being the historian of the Renaissance with the book “The Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects”, credited Antonello with introducing oil paint into Italy. That is not believed anymore but Antonello is still credited with bringing Flemish techniques to Italy.

The man is depicted from three-quarters and looking straight at the viewer, differently from the tradition of the time in Italy but like many other portraits executed by Antonello and quite typical for Flemish Primitives such as Petrus Christus. Also typically Flemish is that the person depicted is not an aristocrat or a soldier but a middle-class person. And the dark, uniform background can also be found in a number of Flemish paintings.