Lot 1022 Nα

The sitter of this portrait by Anthonis Mor is Margaret of Parma, the illegitimate daughter of Charles V, wife of the second Duke of Parma and Piacenza, Ottavio Farnese, and Stadtholder of the Southern Netherlands. Ludwig Meyer has confirmed the authorship of Anthonis Mor, as have W. R. Valentiner and Max Friedländer before him, praising the “impressive quality” of this portrait of a lady (cf. Ludwig Meyer's expertise of 2008).
Margaret of Parma is mainly acknowledged for her role as Stadtholder of the Netherlands, a position to which her half-brother Philipp II of Spain appointed her in 1559. She mainly resided in Italy and the southern Netherlands, and her life was largely dominated by the hegemonial politics of the Habsburg family. Margaret was the illegitimate daughter of Emperor Charles V and the Fleming Johanna Maria van der Gheynst. She was acknowledged by her father and raised by her aunts Queen Mary of Hungary and Margaret of Austria. She was married to the Duke of Tuscany Alessandro de´ Medici at age 15, but following his murder just one year later she was remarried to Ottavio Farnese, Duke of Parma and Piacenza, and grandson of Pope Paul III. Her reign as Stadtholder of the Netherlands was overshadowed by religious and political conflict and ended upon the arrival of the Duke of Alba, at which point she returned to Italy. However, her son Alessandro Farnese later also took up the position.
The portrait follows the traditional scheme for portraits of courtly ladies which was developed throughout the 16th century by Anthonis Mor and Titian before him. The richly attired subject stands behind a table, resting her right hand upon its edge and grasping a gold chain in her left hand. A copy of this work with truncated edges has survived in the Royal collection in England, showing the sitter in the same head dress (Lorne Campbell, op. cit.). Alongside Titian, Anthonis Mor was the Habsburg family's most renowned portrait painter. He depicted members of this family at the courts of Vienna, Madrid and Brussels and played a significant role in the development of the Habsburg iconography of power throughout Europe. Mor was born in Utrecht in 1518 and later travelled to Antwerp and Brussels, where he entered the service of the Habsburgs in 1549. Their commissions allowed him to travel to the royal courts of Portugal, Spain, Augsburg and England.