The support consists of two vertically grained oak planks (28.8 and 20.7 cm), and was planed down to 0.4 cm and cradled. Dendrochronology has shown that the youngest heartwood ring was formed in 1498. The panel could have been ready for use by 1509, but a date in or after 1523 is more likely. The white ground is visible at the edges of the panel, and was applied in the original frame. All the sides have an unpainted edge of 0.5-0.8 cm. The barbe is well preserved at the top, bottom and left sides (painted surface: 62.8 x 48 cm). The white ground seems to have a priming on top, the horizontal parallel ridges of which are visible. Infrared reflectography revealed a few lines of underdrawing, probably in a dry medium, in the fingers and the woman’s cap, the folds of which do not correspond with the painted form (fig. a). The figure was reserved. Lead-tin yellow seems to have been used on top of a reddish underpaint to imitate gold jewellery. The fur coat was painted in quite a refined technique that involved scratching with a sharp tool in the brown paint.

Fair. There are old worm holes in the original panel. The painting is rather abraded, and there are discoloured areas of retouching in the flesh tones. The red glaze in the cap is faded. The surface varnish is discoloured, and there are traces of an older varnish.

…; collection Prince Sternberg;¹¹Dealer cat. Schaeffer Galleries 1948, no. 2. .…; the dealer F. Kleinberger, New York, 1921;²²Note RKD. …; sale, Mortimer Loeb Schiff (1877-1931, New York), London (Christie's), 24 June 1938, no. 76, to the dealer Rosenberg;³³Copy RKD.…; the dealer D. Katz, Dieren, 1938;⁴⁴Note RKD.…; collection LeRoy M. Backus (?- June 1948), Seattle;⁵⁵New York 1948, no. 2. …; the dealer Schaeffer, New York, 1948;⁶⁶New York 1948, no. 2. from whom, fl. 61,497, to the museum, 1952

Object number: SK-A-3843

An elegantly clad woman is seen half-length against the backdrop of a mountainous landscape containing a vignette of the conversion of St Hubert. She is wearing a white linen cap with the lappets hanging down her back. (The folds are a little different from those in the underdrawing, and the cap itself is broader than the reserve left for it; see fig. a.) She has a white chemise with a straight, horizontal neckline into which a thin chain disappears. It was customary at the time to wear a crucifix or some other piece of jewellery under the clothing and close to the heart. Around her shoulders she has a transparent fabric, the ends of which are tucked into her bodice. Over her chemise she is wearing a red and gold kirtle, only the top and pleated sleeves of which are visible. On top of that she has a brown damask gown lined entirely with brown fur. The wide, funnel-shaped sleeves are turned back almost to her shoulders. These high sleeves and the headdress reaching to the chin became fashionable around 1520. The woman’s attire marks her out as a member of the well-to-do burgher class.¹⁴¹⁴Kind communication of Marieke de Winkel. One notable detail is the large pomegranate motif in the brown damask gown, which strongly recalls Italian gold brocade fabrics of the second half of the 15th century.

It has proved impossible to identify the woman.¹⁵¹⁵One not very convincing theory put forward by Van Luttervelt 1962, pp. 77-82, is that she is Claudine of Orange (d. 1521), the second wife of Hendrik III of Nassau, whom Van Luttervelt recognised in the figure of St Hubert. Since she is wearing a gold ring set with a stone on the ring finger of her left hand, which she is holding with the fingers of her other hand, it is likely that this is a wedding portrait that was originally part of a diptych. Her husband would have been on the left wing, which has disappeared without trace.

Van Mander writes that Jan Mostaert was ‘well thought of and loved by most of the nobility in the country, by the great as well as the minor’.¹⁶¹⁶Van Mander 1604, fol. 229v. This remark buttresses the attribution of several portraits of aristocrats to Mostaert, around ten of which can be ascribed to him with some degree of certainty. Most of them have a landscape background, often with small figures depicting subjects like Augustus and the Tiburtine Sibyl or the conversion of St Hubert. The only portrait diptych by Mostaert that survives complete is in the St Dimpnakerk in Geel, near Antwerp, and shows Hendrik van Merode and his wife Franziska van Brederode.¹⁷¹⁷Illustrated in ENP X, 1973, no. supp. 154, pl. 118. It was probably made on the occasion of their marriage in 1525.¹⁸¹⁸For Mostaert’s portraits see Held 1936; illustrated in ENP X, 1973, nos. 26-48, pls. 18-27, and Filedt Kok 2005, pp. 393-97. There is a low neckline similar to the one in the Rijksmuseum painting in Franziska’s portrait and in that of Justine van Wassenaer in Würzburg (Martin von Wagner Museum; illustrated in ENP X, 1973, no. 41, pl. 25), as well as comparable fur sleeves. The subject of the hunt and St Hubert’s conversion is also depicted in the background of the relatively large Portrait of a Young Man in the museum in Liverpool.¹⁹¹⁹Walker Art Gallery; illustrated in ENP X, 1973, no. 38, pl. 23. In his biography of Mostaert, Van Mander 1604, fol. 229v, mentions a landscape ‘with a St Hubert in which one can observe that these ancients paid close attention to nature and life’, which was in the Prinsenhof in Haarlem, but is now lost.

At the beginning of the 16th century Haarlem had a confraternity of St Hubert, the patron saint of hunting, and many noblemen from the surrounding district of Kennemerland would undoubtedly have been members. Since membership was restricted to men, it is likely that the landscape with the hunt in the present woman’s portrait would have extended onto the lost left wing with the portrait of her husband. Several of the works attributed to Mostaert have similar mountainous landscapes in the background. Equally typical of his work are the kinds of background figure, which can also be seen in The Adoration of the Magi (SK-A-671).

(Jan Piet Filedt Kok)

Friedländer X, 1932, p. 124, no. 42; Hoogewerff II, 1937, pp. 489, 495; Amsterdam 1952, pp. 53-54, no. 108a; Amsterdam 1958, p. 89, no. 86; Winkler 1959, p. 198; Van Luttervelt 1962, pp. 77-82; ENP X, 1973, p. 73, no. 42; Kloek in Van Os 'et al'. 2000, p. 84, no. 20; Filedt Kok/De Winkel 2005, pp. 396-97

1956, p. 147, no. 1674 A1 (as c. 1520-25); 1960, p. 217, no. 1674 A1; 1976, p. 400, no. A 3843

J.P. Filedt Kok, 2010, 'Jan Jansz Mostaert, Portrait of a Woman, Haarlem, c. 1520', in J.P. Filedt Kok (ed.), Early Netherlandish Paintings, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: https://data.rijksmuseum.nl/200107772