Portrait of a Lady

This enigmatic portrait depicts an elaborately dressed woman. She wears a crimson sottana or petticoat with separate sleeves of stamped and pinked velvet, revealing glimpses of her linen camicia or undershirt beneath, which is embellished with an intricately embroidered collar. Over those she wears a fur-lined vesto or overgown with tightly puffed baragoni off her shoulders. The gown and neckline are consistent with styles worn in Italy around the 1570s onward, though her a headdress, is similar to the French hood, which was popular in England and France in earlier decades.

Two variants of this portrait are known. One, a panel of the same dimensions with minor differences in the clothing and background, is in a private collection in New York (sold Christie’s, New York, 26 May 2000, lot 25, fig. 1). The second (dimensions and support unknown) features similar clothing but varies in the depiction of the hands and includes a sculpture in the background (fig. 2, location unknown; see E. Fahy, L'Archivio storico fotografico di Stefano Bardini: Dipinti, disegni, miniature, stampe, Florence, 2000, no. 208).