Portrait of a Young Woman – Charming Ladies at Their Loveliest in the Seventeenth Century

Phoebus Focus X

A young woman stands before a dark grey wall and gazes at us with a restrained smile. Her delicately worked ruff and precious accessories catch our attention straight away, while also guiding our eyes towards the pale face of this lovely young woman with the compelling, almondshaped eyes, who rests her fingertips on a table covered with a green cloth. The panel is inscribed in the upper right corner ‘A .1613.’, referring to the year in which it was painted.

Who painted this engaging three-quarter likeness over four hundred years ago remains a mystery, as the seventeenth-century Antwerp master did not sign the work. The subject’s identity is not known either. Or rather not specifically: we can still discover a lot about her by carefully studying her outfit and accessories, as well as her pose and expression. In fact this mysterious beauty provides a surprisingly large amount of information about herself and the expectations that existed towards her at the time. Join us as we explore the wonderful world of the Baroque female portrait.

Leen Kelchtermans (1986) studied Art History at the University of Leuven and completed a Research Master in Art Studies at the University of Amsterdam. Her predoctoral dissertation for the Research Foundation Flanders (FWO) focused on the topographical battle scenes of the seventeenth-century Brussels painter Peter Snayers. In this first oeuvre study, she applied contextual and cross-disciplinary research methods to explore the layers of meaning in early modern war paintings. Her doctorate was awarded the Erik Duverger Prize of the Royal Flemish Academy of Belgium (KVAB). Leen subsequently worked as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Leuven. She is currently active as an art-historical researcher at The Phoebus Foundation.