Isabella Brandt on fine Amalfi paper

It is a Baroque portrait of extraordinary solemnity, painted by Anthony van Dyck in 1621 and dedicated to Isabella Brant, the first wife of Peter Paul Rubens, to whom the work was offered as a gift before the young painter’s departure for Italy. The figure, seated in a red armchair and wrapped in a heavy black cloak that frames the embroidered gold bodice and the light ruff, emerges with a strong sculptural presence from the architectural background of a triumphal arch, probably alluding to the garden gate of Rubens’s house in Antwerp.

The slightly turned body, the slender hands holding a feather fan and a small flower, and the light gliding over the brocade sleeves and the jewelry create a refined balance between courtly splendor and domestic intimacy. The large red curtain, raised like a stage curtain, introduces a theatrical note that emphasizes the sitter’s social role, while the restless sky and the loggia in depth extend the space beyond the edge of the canvas, turning the portrait into a sort of representative scene of the protagonist’s dignity and grace.