Renaissance Female Profile Portraits 15-16th Century

These austere, intricately decorated profiles are more like medallions than portraits.

A portrait conveys something about the sitter’s inner world, their identity. There is usually a dynamic, an energy generated between the subject and the artist. Some kind of electricity is passed via gaze – from the sitter, to the artist and on to the viewer. In a profile portrait, the gaze is averted. These Renaissance female profile portraits are particularly lifeless and frozen – the glacial beauty of skin, hair, youth is on display on par with the lavish jewellery and the luxurious gold brocades.

Such portraits were often painted and used by families in order to display the goods (a young bride in all her finery) to the potential buyer (a prospective groom). Because marrying off a woman in early modern Italy was more often than not a contractual transaction – the bride was acquired as a package – with her dowry and chastity in tow.

Interestingly, these portraits at times were also somewhat rebellious contradictions. The women in the portraits I picked for this selection all have plucked (or shaved) hairlines. This was a fascinating fashion trend in 15th century Italy in order to make the forehead appear larger, presumably sexier and more feminine. But this trend was considered immodest and was frequently attacked in the misogynist literature of the time, along with many other trends and flamboyant styles women used to defy patriarchal pressures.

Unknown Franco-Flemish Artist, Profile Portrait of a Lady, circa 1410, oil on panel, 53 × 37.6 cm, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.

Paolo Uccello, A Young Lady of Fashion, early 1460s, oil on panel, 44.1 x 31.8 x 3.2 cm, The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum

Florentine School, Profile Portrait of a Lady, late 15th century, tempera and oil on panel, 38.0 x 24.4 cm, National Gallery of Victoria

Filippo Lippi, Portrait of a Man and a Woman at a Casement, circa 1440–45, 64.1 x 41.9 cm, The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Piero del Pollaiuolo, Portrait of a Young Woman, circa 1470-1472, mixed medium on panel, 45.5 × 32.7 cm, Museo Poldi Pezzoli, Milan.

Antonio del Pollaiuolo, Profile Portrait of a Young Lady, 1465, oil on wood, 52.2 × 36.2 cm, Gemäldegalerie, Berlin