Portrait of a Woman

This Florentine portrait is an outstanding example of Italian Mannerist painting, a Late Renaissance style defined by complex compositions, vivid colors, and unnaturally elongated figures. Here, Bartolomeo Traballesi emphasizes his sitter’s grace and refinement by artificially sloping her shoulders and lengthening her neck and fingers. Also typical of Mannerist portraiture are the model’s trappings of status and erudition: a Turkish carpet of a type then popular at the Medici court and a book of poetry. Traballesi’s portrait, last on view in 1956, was recently treated in the Museum’s conservation lab for this presentation.