1201 - Carlo Portelli

Carlo Portelli Portrait of Alessandro de' Medici, Duke of Florence Oil on panel. 159 x 115 cm. Provenance Italian art ownership. Exhibitions “Speak of me as I am” curated by Fred Wilson, US pavillion at the 50th Biennale di Venezia, Venice 2003 (as Giorgio Vasari). - Carlo Portelli, Pittore eccentrico fra Rosso Fiorentino e Vasari, Galleria dell´Accademia, Florence, 2015, no. 16. Literature A. Donati: Gli Acquaviva d’Aragona dalle origini ai fuoriusciti in Francia, in: N. B. Pugliese, A. Donati & Lionello Puppi (ed.): Tiziano, Bordon e gli Acquaviva d’Aragona, pittori veneziani in Puglia e fuoriusciti napoletani in Francia, Foggia 2012, p. 121 (as Giorgio Vasari). – R. Ciabattini: Il Duca Alessandro de’ Medici, in: L. Brunori & A. Tartuferi (ed.): Carlo Portelli. Pittore eccentrico fra Rosso Fiorentino e Vasari, Florence 2015, p. 136, no. 16. This portrait is a later version of the famous portrait of Alessandro de’ Medici, attributed to Giorgio Vasari, in the Uffizi Galleries in Florence, with minor differences in the background. Roberto Ciabattini (op. cit., p. 136) suggests that Vasari passed on the commission for a replica to Carlo Portelli. Stylistic parallels can be found in Portelli’s portraits of figures in armour, such as the allegorical portrait of Giovanni dalle Bande Nere (Minneapolis Institute of Art) and the portrait of Cosimo I (Robert Simon Fine Art, New York). Alessandro de’ Medici is seated in full armour against a view of Florence. A letter from Vasari to Ottaviano de’ Medici dated 1534 elucidates the complex iconography: the gleaming armour alludes to the Duke’s exemplary deeds, the round seat to the duration of his reign, and the red drapery to the blood shed during the uprising against the Medici. The portrait thus celebrates Alessandro and his rise to power. Alessandro ruled Florence from 1531 until his assassination in 1537. In 1532, he was appointed Duke and Gonfaloniere for life. It is said that he was the illegitimate son of Cardinal Giulio de’ Medici, later Pope Clement VII, and a black servant. In 1534, he married Margaret of Austria, an illegitimate daughter of Emperor Charles V. The marriage of two illegitimate children symbolised the coming together of the two highest political and religious authorities of their time: the German Empire and the Papacy.