Portrait of a Young Man

We do not know the identity of the represented man. The Cabinet des dessins in the Louvre however holds a small drawing that captures the composition corresponding to the Prague portrait. An elegant man is leaning against a balustrade; the background behind him features a view of a landscape with cypresses. Judging by the inscription on the rear of the canvas, it was painted by Pierre Mignard, one of the foremost French portraitists, in Venice in 1654. This is where he worked at the end of his Italian sojourn of over twenty years; in 1657 he returned to France and became the court painter of Louis XIV. Mignard´s Italian phase does not include many famous existing works - the more important is thus this portrait, whose high quality ranks it among the most distinct of this painter´s oeuvre. It combines the tradition of the French prestigious portraiture and the colour scheme of the Venetian painters, such as Lorenzo Lotto or Sebastiano del Piombo.