Portrait of a lady, three-quarter-length, in a green velvet and orange dress and a pearl-embroidered black hat

We are grateful to Dr. Dieter Koepplin and Dr. Werner Schade for both independently confirming the attribution (the former after inspection of the original) the attribution of this striking portrait to Lucas Cranach II. Both scholars date the portrait to circa 1541 by virtue of its affinities with a male portrait, signed and dated 1541, painted on a panel of the same dimensions but with a blue/green background (sold Dorotheum, Vienna , 20 March 1995, lot 393). The picture may also be compared to a female portrait by Cranach the Younger (Staatsgalerie, Stuttgart), whose companion portrait is dated 1543. The attitude of the two sitters is similar, and both are shown heavily bejewelled, turned to the left, their hands clasped across their midrifts. Although the pose of the present sitter might suggest that the picture originally had a pendant, the direct way in which she engages the viewer suggests that it was equally likely to have been conceived as a single portrait in its own right. The portrait is also notable for the pronounced pentiment in the drawing of the hands, infra-red reflectography revealing that the position of the hands was moved completely (see fig. 1).