Jan Gossaert (Jean Gossart), 'A Man holding a Glove', about 1530-2

A bearded man gazes out intently from this painting. We don't know who the sitter is, but the cut of his beard and the fashion of his hat and clothing suggest a date towards 1530, and the fact that his doublet and gown are lined with fur probably indicates that the portrait was painted during the winter months. The pose, with the sitter’s hands resting on a table placed at an angle, recurs in other, undated portraits by Gossart. He might be Italian: the painting was once owned by the dukes of Mantua. But Netherlandish painting was very fashionable at the Italian courts and dukes acquired pictures from many sources.

The painting was done at great speed with immense skill; perhaps neither sitter nor artist had much time to spare. The fur has been worked wet-in-wet, and the paint of the whites of the eyes has been feathered into the irises. Similarly, the pink paint of the cheek is feathered into the shadow cast by the nose, and the shadow cast by the fur at the collar is feathered into the white shirt.

The portrait is rather small and the panel is a single board of oak which was cut tangentially (across the width of the tree) rather than radially (from the outside edge in, like segments of an orange). This is unusual for Gossart’s work and in Netherlandish panels of the period, but the painting is in good condition and Gossart may have realised that, for a panel of this size, the tangential cut would not cause problems. Unpainted wood and barbes, where the ground and paint end, survive on all four sides and indicate that the panel originally had an engaged frame that was in place before the ground was applied.

The portrait was in the collection of King Charles I, whose CR brand is on the back, and it hung in the Cabinet Room off the Privy Gallery in the Palace of Westminster. It was purchased by Charles from Mantua and must have belonged to Vincenzo II Gonzaga, Duke of Mantua. Charles must have thought highly of this portrait: although he did not know who had painted it and had no particular sympathy for early Netherlandish art, he chose to place it with some of the greatest treasures of his collection. It was presumably sold from the Royal Collection during the Commonwealth but it was recovered for Charles II.