Portrait of young man (Botticelli, London)

This portrait of a young man (in Italian Ritratto di giovane) preserved in the National Gallery in London is the work of the Italian Renaissance painter Sandro Botticelli. It is dated around 1483. It is made of tempera on wood and measures 112 cm. high and 157 cm. wide.

In his late portraits, Botticelli often dispensed with landscapes or interiors as background; instead, he concentrated only on the person he portrayed. One of his most beautiful portraits is this of a young man with a red cape, the only one of his known portraits in which the protagonist is "front". It is captivating due to the vivid and alert presence of the model, whose youthful informality has managed to capture the artist in a masterful way.

Until the mid-nineteenth century this portrait was attributed to Giorgione, Filippino Lippi or Masaccio. The identity of the portrait is unknown. Botticelli has other Young Portraits, one at the Pitti Palace in Florence and the other at the National Gallery of Art in Washington DC.

wiki