254. Antonio Puccio Pisanello (c. 1395-1455 ?),

Italian, Portrait of a Young Princess, c. 1435-1440.

Oil on panel, 43 x 30 cm. Musée du Louvre, Paris.

 

 

Pisanello is regarded as the pre-eminent master of the International Gothic style in Italian painting, but most of his major works have perished. This portrait of a young woman (assumed to be Ginevra d’Este) is flat – due to the use of medieval patterns in a ‘modern’ way, and its flowers and butterflies, though drawn from nature, seem like ornamental patterns from French or Flemish tapestries.