Adriaen van der Werff, 'Portrait of a Man in a Quilted Gown', 1685

We don’t know who the sitter in this portrait is, but Adriaen van der Werff has portrayed him as a man of leisure and a lover of antiquities. He is pictured outside in his garden, leaning back in his chair and wearing a luxurious quilted silk robe and white cravat. He gazes out at us, his face a little fleshy from good living, his eyes thoughtful and intelligent, if perhaps a little distant. Long, brown curls frame his cheeks and trail down over his shoulders – this is most likely a wig, as was the fashion. With his right hand, the man toys delicately with the yellow sandstone top of the wall beside him. His other hand reaches across to hold his gown across his chest. The position of his fingers is a little strange – two extended and two tucked into the palm, seemingly intentionally.

In the background, high on a plinth, is a Greek sculpture – a copy of the so-called Farnese Flora (the original is now in the Museo Nazionale, Naples), ‘so called’ because it is uncertain whether the figure represents Flora or Pomona, both goddesses of fertility and fruitfulness. It had been discovered sometime before 1532 and placed in the Farnese Collection in Rome. Here, the sculpture’s pose is in reverse; it was probably known to the artist and sitter in an engraving. Its presence proclaims the sitter as a man of taste and refinement who would know of new discoveries and developments in the understanding of the classical age.

In seventeenth-century Holland, many artists were specialists in one style of painting, but Adriaen van der Werff was very versatile. As well as portraits he painted figures, religious scenes and genre paintings, and became court painter of the Elector Palatine in Düsseldorf for a time. There are two more of his paintings in the National Gallery’s collection: A Boy with a Mousetrap and The Rest on the Flight into Egypt.