TripImprover - Get More out of Your Museum Visits!
  • Home
  • Blog
  • Museums
    • Alte Pinakothek
    • Art Institute of Chicago
    • Baltimore Museum of Art
    • Barber Institute of Fine Arts
    • Bargello
    • Barnes Foundation
    • British Museum
    • Church of Sant’Anastasia
    • Cleveland Museum of Art
    • Courtauld Institute of Art
    • Detroit Institute of Arts
    • Frans Hals Museum
    • Galleria Borghese
    • Gallerie dell'Accademia
    • Getty Museum
    • Guggenheim
    • Hermitage Museum
    • Kunsthistorisches Museum
    • Kunstmuseum Basel
    • Legion of Honor Museum
    • Louvre
    • Mauritshuis
    • Metropolitan Museum of Art
    • Musee d’Orsay
    • Museum of Fine Arts in Boston
    • Museum of Modern Art
    • National Gallery in London
    • National Gallery of Art
    • National Museum in Poznań
    • Norton Simon Museum
    • Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek
    • Palace of Versailles
    • Palazzo Pitti
    • Palazzo Vecchio
    • Petit Palais
    • Philadelphia Museum of Art
    • Prado
    • Pushkin Museum
    • Ravenna Art Museum
    • Rijksmuseum
    • San Diego Museum of Art
    • Santa Maria delle Grazie
    • Städel Museum
    • Statens Museum for Kunst
    • Tate Britain
    • Tate Modern
    • Timken Museum of Art
    • Uffizi
    • Vatican Museums
    • Wallace Collection
  • Artists
    • Altdorfer
    • Anguissola
    • Berlin Painter
    • Bosch
    • Botticelli
    • Boucher
    • Bronzino
    • Bruegel the Elder
    • Cabanel
    • Caillebotte
    • Canova
    • Caravaggio
    • Carpeaux
    • Cezanne
    • Cimabue
    • David
    • Degas
    • Delacroix
    • De Maria
    • Donatello
    • El Greco
    • Fontana
    • Fra Angelico
    • Fragonard
    • Gauguin
    • Gentileschi
    • Gericault
    • Gonzalez-Torres
    • Goya
    • Hals
    • Hogarth
    • Hokusai
    • Ingres
    • Leonardo da Vinci
    • Lippi, Filippo
    • Longhi, Barbara
    • Lorrain
    • Makovsky
    • Manet
    • Massys
    • Matisse
    • Michelangelo
    • Modigliani
    • Monet
    • Panini
    • Parmigianino
    • Perugino
    • Picasso
    • Pisanello
    • Raphael
    • Rembrandt
    • Renoir
    • Reynolds
    • Rivera
    • Rodin
    • Rubens
    • Scultori
    • Seurat
    • Steen
    • Tintoretto
    • Titian
    • Toulouse-Lautrec
    • Turner
    • Uccello
    • Van der Weyden
    • Van Dyck
    • Van Eyck
    • Van Gogh
    • Van Hemessen
    • Vasari
    • Velazquez
    • Vermeer
    • Veronese
    • Vigée Le Brun
  • Locations
    • Austria >
      • Vienna
    • Denmark >
      • Copenhagen
    • England >
      • Birmingham
      • London
    • France >
      • Paris
      • Versailles
    • Germany >
      • Frankfurt
      • Munich
    • Italy >
      • Bologna
      • Florence
      • Milan
      • Ravenna
      • Rome
      • Venice
      • Verona
    • Poland >
      • Poznań
    • Russia >
      • Moscow
      • Saint Petersburg
    • Spain >
      • Madrid
    • Switzerland >
      • Basel
    • The Netherlands >
      • Amsterdam
      • Haarlem
      • The Hague
    • United States >
      • Baltimore
      • Boston
      • Chicago
      • Cleveland
      • Detroit
      • Los Angeles
      • New York
      • Pasadena
      • Philadelphia
      • San Diego
      • San Francisco
      • Washington, DC
  • Books
  • About Us
    • Contact
    • Friends and Resources

Queen Henrietta Maria of England by Anthony van Dyck

5/9/2019

0 Comments

 
Queen Henrietta Maria of England by Anthony van Dyck in the San Diego Museum of Art
Where? Room 17 of theSan Diego Museum of Art. A copy of this work is on display in the Statens Museum for Kunst.
When? c. 1636-1638
Commissioned by? King Charles I and Queen Henrietta Maria

What do you see? A portrait of Henrietta Maria, the Queen of England. She sits on a chair wearing an elaborate blue satin dress which is decorated with jewelry, including a large brooch at her chest and several pieces of jewelry in the form of a fleur-de-lis (a Catholic symbol especially popular in Henrietta Maria’s birth country of France. She also wears a very expensive pearl necklace, earrings, and a diadem. She had received these pearl jewelry from her mother when she married.

In her left hand, the queen has two pink roses. This was her favorite type of flower, and she wanted roses to be included in many of her portraits. On the left, her crown stands on a table. Finally, notice the long pointy fingers of Henrietta Maria, an aesthetic feature considered beautiful during that time.

Backstory: Anthony van Dyck painted many portraits of Queen Henrietta Maria. However, the queen did not pose extensively for each of these portraits. Usually, she posed briefly for Van Dyck such that he could draw the outline of her portrait. The queen was then replaced by a stand-in model who would wear the same clothes as the queen.

Van Dyck idealized the portrait of the queen. In reality, she was less pretty than she appears on these portraits; she was a short woman, but Van Dyck makes her appear as rather tall. The willingness of Van Dyck to idealize his sitters is one of the reasons that the royal family of England kept coming back to him with more commissions.

Who is Queen Henrietta? She was born in 1609 as the daughter of King Henry IV of France. Henrietta Maria of France was 15 years old when she married Charles I who had, months before, become the King of England, Ireland, and Scotland. This made her a queen. She was not very popular in England as she did not master the language well and she was Catholic in a Protestant country. However, she formed a strong bond with King Charles I.

​Henrietta Maria and Charles I were both art collectors. They commissioned works from some of the leading artists of the day, including Guido Reni, Peter Paul Rubens, and Anthony van Dyck. In 1632, Van Dyck made a family portrait of them which is on display in Windsor Castle.
Charles I and Henrietta Maria with Their Two Eldest Children, Prince Charles and Princess Mary by Anthony van Dyck in Windsor Castle
Charles I and Henrietta Maria with Their Two Eldest Children, Prince Charles and Princess Mary by Van Dyck
Other portraits of Queen Henrietta: On August 8, 1632, Charles I commissioned Anthony van Dyck for the first time to paint a portrait of Queen Henrietta Maria. After this first portrait, numerous other portraits of her followed. Most of these portraits were painted by Van Dyck, but for some of them, he got the help of his assistants.

Many of the portraits show Henrietta Maria by herself. For example, in 1638, Van Dyck painted the Portrait of Queen Henrietta Maria in the Hermitage Museum. In some other portraits, she is depicted together with some members of her family or entourage. One example is Queen Henrietta Maria with Sir Jeffrey Hudson in the National Gallery of Art.

​In total, about 88 portraits of Henrietta Maria are known. These portraits are not only painted by Van Dyck, but also by other painters like Hendrik Gerritsz. Pot and Johannes Vorstermans. 
Portrait of Queen Henrietta Maria by Anthony van Dyck in the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg
Portrait of Queen Henrietta Maria by Van Dyck
Queen Henrietta Maria with Sir Jeffrey Hudson by Anthony van Dyck in the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC
Queen Henrietta Maria with Sir Jeffrey Hudson by Van Dyck
Who is Van Dyck? Anthony van Dyck was born in 1599 in Antwerp. He was a very talented painter who started his training as a painter at age 10 and became an independent artist when he was 16 years old. He became the most important assistant of the leading painter of the day, Peter Paul Rubens, who painted a portrait of Anthony van Dyck in 1627/1628. While he never surpassed Rubens in terms of popularity, he achieved international fame with his work.

​In 1632, Van Dyck was invited to the court of King Charles I and Queen Henrietta Maria. That same year, he was knighted by the royal couple. They commissioned numerous portraits from him, not only from members of their own family but also for foreign friends and ambassadors.

Anthony van Dyck painted by Peter Paul Rubens
Anthony van Dyck by Peter Paul Rubens
Fun fact: An almost identical portrait of Queen Henrietta Maria of England is owned by the Statens Museum for Kunst in Copenhagen. It is probably of a copy of the version in the San Diego Museum of Art and has been painted by either Van Dyck himself or his workshop.

​There are a few differences between both paintings. Most noticeable are the brighter colors in the Copenhagen version which are clearly visible when comparing the dress and the crown in both versions. It also seems as if the version in the San Diego Museum of Art has been cut off on all four sides. Moreover, the Copenhagen version shows a bigger cleavage, earrings on both sides, and a curtain in the background that matches with Henrietta Maria’s dress.
Queen Henrietta Maria of England by Anthony van Dyck in the Statens Museum for Kunst
Queen Henrietta Maria of England by Van Dyck in the Statens Museum for Kunst

Written by Eelco Kappe

References:
  • www.nga.gov/collection/art-object-page.41651.html
  • www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/person/mp02137/henrietta-maria
  • www.rct.uk/collection/404430/queen-henrietta-maria-1609-69
  • www.rct.uk/collection/405353/charles-i-and-henrietta-maria-with-their-two-eldest-children-prince-charles-and
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Categories

    All
    Academic Art
    Altdorfer
    Alte Pinakothek
    Amsterdam
    Anguissola
    Art Institute Of Chicago
    Baltimore
    Baltimore Museum Of Art
    Barber Institute Of Fine Arts
    Bargello
    Barnes Foundation
    Baroque
    Basel
    Berlin Painter
    Birmingham
    Bologna
    Bosch
    Boston
    Botticelli
    Boucher
    British Museum
    Bronzino
    Bruegel The Elder
    Byzantine Art
    Cabanel
    Caillebotte
    Canova
    Caravaggio
    Carpeaux
    Cezanne
    Cézanne
    Chicago
    Cimabue
    Classical Antiquity
    Cleveland
    Cleveland Museum Of Art
    Copenhagen
    Courtauld Gallery
    Cubism
    David
    Degas
    Delacroix
    De Maria
    Detroit
    Detroit Institute Of Arts
    Donatello
    El Greco
    Filippo Lippi
    Florence
    Fontana
    Fra Angelico
    Fragonard
    Frankfurt
    Frans Hals Museum
    Galleria Borghese
    Gallerie Dell'Accademia
    Gauguin
    Gentileschi
    Gericault
    Getty Museum
    Gonzalez-Torres
    Gothic
    Goya
    Grand Style
    Guggenheim
    Haarlem
    Hals
    Hermitage
    Hogarth
    Hokusai
    Impressionism
    Ingres
    International Gothic
    Kunsthistorisches Museum
    Kunstmuseum
    Legion Of Honor
    Leonardo Da Vinci
    London
    Longhi
    Lorrain
    Los Angeles
    Louvre
    Madrid
    Makovsky
    Manet
    Massys
    Matisse
    Mauritshuis
    Metropolitan Museum Of Art
    Michelangelo
    Milan
    Modern Art
    Modigliani
    Monet
    Moscow
    Munich
    Musee D'Orsay
    Museum Of Fine Arts
    Museum Of Modern Art
    National Gallery In London
    National Gallery Of Art
    National Museum In Poznan
    Neoclassicism
    New York
    Northern Renaissance
    Ny Carlsberg Glyptothek
    Palace Of Versailles
    Palazzo Pitti
    Palazzo Vecchio
    Panini
    Paris
    Parmigianino
    Perugino
    Petit Palais
    Philadelphia
    Philadelphia Museum Of Art
    Picasso
    Pinacoteca Nazionale
    Pisanello
    Post Impressionism
    Poznan
    Prado
    Pushkin Museum
    Raphael
    Ravenna
    Realism
    Rembrandt
    Renaissance
    Renoir
    Reynolds
    Rijksmuseum
    Rivera
    Rococo
    Rodin
    Romanticism
    Rome
    Rubens
    Saint Petersburg
    San Diego
    San Diego Museum Of Art
    San Francisco
    Scultori
    Seurat
    Sfumato
    Sistine Chapel
    Social Realism
    Spanish Renaissance
    Statens Museum For Kunst
    Steen
    Tate Britain
    Tate Modern
    The Hague
    Timken Museum Of Art
    Tintoretto
    Titian
    Toulouse Lautrec
    Toulouse-Lautrec
    Turner
    Uccello
    Uffizi
    Ukiyo-e
    Van Der Weyden
    Van Dyck
    Van Eyck
    Van Gogh
    Van Hemessen
    Vasari
    Vatican Museums
    Veduta
    Velázquez
    Venice
    Vermeer
    Verona
    Veronese
    Vienna
    Vigee Le Brun
    Wallace Collection
    Washington

Home

Blog

BOOKS

Contact

© COPYRIGHT 2022. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
  • Home
  • Blog
  • Museums
    • Alte Pinakothek
    • Art Institute of Chicago
    • Baltimore Museum of Art
    • Barber Institute of Fine Arts
    • Bargello
    • Barnes Foundation
    • British Museum
    • Church of Sant’Anastasia
    • Cleveland Museum of Art
    • Courtauld Institute of Art
    • Detroit Institute of Arts
    • Frans Hals Museum
    • Galleria Borghese
    • Gallerie dell'Accademia
    • Getty Museum
    • Guggenheim
    • Hermitage Museum
    • Kunsthistorisches Museum
    • Kunstmuseum Basel
    • Legion of Honor Museum
    • Louvre
    • Mauritshuis
    • Metropolitan Museum of Art
    • Musee d’Orsay
    • Museum of Fine Arts in Boston
    • Museum of Modern Art
    • National Gallery in London
    • National Gallery of Art
    • National Museum in Poznań
    • Norton Simon Museum
    • Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek
    • Palace of Versailles
    • Palazzo Pitti
    • Palazzo Vecchio
    • Petit Palais
    • Philadelphia Museum of Art
    • Prado
    • Pushkin Museum
    • Ravenna Art Museum
    • Rijksmuseum
    • San Diego Museum of Art
    • Santa Maria delle Grazie
    • Städel Museum
    • Statens Museum for Kunst
    • Tate Britain
    • Tate Modern
    • Timken Museum of Art
    • Uffizi
    • Vatican Museums
    • Wallace Collection
  • Artists
    • Altdorfer
    • Anguissola
    • Berlin Painter
    • Bosch
    • Botticelli
    • Boucher
    • Bronzino
    • Bruegel the Elder
    • Cabanel
    • Caillebotte
    • Canova
    • Caravaggio
    • Carpeaux
    • Cezanne
    • Cimabue
    • David
    • Degas
    • Delacroix
    • De Maria
    • Donatello
    • El Greco
    • Fontana
    • Fra Angelico
    • Fragonard
    • Gauguin
    • Gentileschi
    • Gericault
    • Gonzalez-Torres
    • Goya
    • Hals
    • Hogarth
    • Hokusai
    • Ingres
    • Leonardo da Vinci
    • Lippi, Filippo
    • Longhi, Barbara
    • Lorrain
    • Makovsky
    • Manet
    • Massys
    • Matisse
    • Michelangelo
    • Modigliani
    • Monet
    • Panini
    • Parmigianino
    • Perugino
    • Picasso
    • Pisanello
    • Raphael
    • Rembrandt
    • Renoir
    • Reynolds
    • Rivera
    • Rodin
    • Rubens
    • Scultori
    • Seurat
    • Steen
    • Tintoretto
    • Titian
    • Toulouse-Lautrec
    • Turner
    • Uccello
    • Van der Weyden
    • Van Dyck
    • Van Eyck
    • Van Gogh
    • Van Hemessen
    • Vasari
    • Velazquez
    • Vermeer
    • Veronese
    • Vigée Le Brun
  • Locations
    • Austria >
      • Vienna
    • Denmark >
      • Copenhagen
    • England >
      • Birmingham
      • London
    • France >
      • Paris
      • Versailles
    • Germany >
      • Frankfurt
      • Munich
    • Italy >
      • Bologna
      • Florence
      • Milan
      • Ravenna
      • Rome
      • Venice
      • Verona
    • Poland >
      • Poznań
    • Russia >
      • Moscow
      • Saint Petersburg
    • Spain >
      • Madrid
    • Switzerland >
      • Basel
    • The Netherlands >
      • Amsterdam
      • Haarlem
      • The Hague
    • United States >
      • Baltimore
      • Boston
      • Chicago
      • Cleveland
      • Detroit
      • Los Angeles
      • New York
      • Pasadena
      • Philadelphia
      • San Diego
      • San Francisco
      • Washington, DC
  • Books
  • About Us
    • Contact
    • Friends and Resources