Portrait of a man playing flute.

This portrait shows a young man turned three-quarters toward the viewer while holding a flute. He sits in an enclosed room, with a music book in front of him and a sheet of music pinned to the wall; on the right, a wall cabinet with a few books is partly visible. Savoldo painted the scene around 1540, and the composition recalls the sensibility of Giorgione, though the pastoral landscape gives way to an interior where light takes the leading role. That light defines the solitude of the domestic space and reveals the surfaces of objects with precision. The hat casts a shadow over the eyes, which appear veiled and convey a restrained melancholy. The heavy fur of the cloak looks almost like a yoke that slightly bends the figure. The hands, lit in a striking way, display a notable realism. The painting is now held at the Pinacoteca Tosio Martinengo in Brescia.

Painter

Giovanni Girolamo Savoldo

Date

1540

Medium

oil paint, canvas

Dimensions

70 × 100 cm

Museum

Tosio Martinengo Gallery, Brescia

Genre

portrait

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