Francesco Botticini

A rare example of Florentine portraiture from the late Quattrocento, this sensitive portrait shows a boy on the threshold of adulthood. The elegant clothing of the roughly twelve-year-old suggests that he came from a patrician family: a white shirt, a red doublet and a mauve-coloured coat, with a cap on his curly head in the fashion of the time. The depiction in three-quarter profile is remarkable, breaking with the strict profile view inspired by antique medals that had been customary until then. Professor Pierluigi Carofano convincingly attributes the portrait to Francesco Botticini and dates it to his early mature period around 1470-72. This chronological classification is supported by technological analyses, including a pigment analysis; an infrared examination revealed a confident brush underdrawing with few pentimenti. Carofano also points to stylistic parallels with Botticini's main work from around 1470, the "Three Archangels with the Young Tobias" in the Uffizi (inv. no. 00285858). The physiognomic resemblance to the archangel Gabriel on the right suggests that the boy depicted here was modelled on that angelic figure. Botticini, who had spent his apprenticeship in Florence in the workshop of Neri di Bicci, subsequently came under the influence of Andrea del Verrocchio. He created numerous altarpieces, dozens of small panels with religious depictions and several portraits. His orientation towards the work of Sandro Botticelli and Filippino Lippi can be clearly seen in his later works. With a detailed expertise by Prof. Pierluigi Carofano, Pisa, dated 21 June 2017 (copy).