About This Artwork

Quentin Massys
Netherlandish, 1466 - 1530

Portrait of a Man with a Pink, 1500/10

Oil on panel
43.8 x 29.2 cm (17 1/4 x 11 1/2 in.)
Painted surface: 43.2 x 28.4 cm (17 x 11 3/16 in.)
Gift of John J. Glessner, 1894.1025

Exhibition, Publication and Ownership Histories

Exhibition History

New York, Kleinberger, Loan Exhibition of Flemish Primitives, 1929, no. 48.

Antwerp, Exposition d’art flamand ancien, 1930, no. 197.

Art Institute of Chicago, A Century of Progress, 1933, no. 45.

Art Institute of Chicago, A Century of Progress, 1934, no. 122.

New York, Knoedler, Fifteenth Century Portraits, 1935, no. 16.

New York, Durlacher Brothers, Six Paintings by Quentin Massys, 1936 (no cat.).

Columbus (Ohio) Gallery of Fine Arts, A Concert of Masterpieces, 1939, no. 7.

Publication History

“At the Art Institute,” Chicago Tribune, Nov. 8, 1890.

The Art Institute of Chicago, Catalogue of Works of Old Dutch Masters and Other Pictures, November 1890, p. 9, no. 1.

The Art Institute of Chicago, Catalogue Paintings, Sculpture, and Other Objects Exhibited at the Opening of the New Museum, December 8, 1893 (reprinted January 1, 1894), p. 18, no. 157.

The Art Institute of Chicago, Catalogue Paintings, Sculpture, and Other Objects in the Museum, March 15, 1894, p. 63, no. 157.

The Art Institute of Chicago, Catalogue of Objects in the Museum, Part I, Sculpture and Painting, 1895, p. 81, no. 157.

The Art Institute of Chicago, Catalogue of Objects in the Museum, Part I, Sculpture and Painting, 2nd ed., 1896, p. 91, no. 157.

The Art Institute of Chicago, Catalogue of Objects in the Museum, Part I, Sculpture and Painting, 3rd ed., 1898, p. 112, no. 157.

The Art Institute of Chicago, General Catalogue of Objects in the Museum, January 1904, p. 149, no. 9.

AIC, Important Facts Regarding the Art Institute of Chicago with Reproductions of the Demidoff Masterpieces, Chicago, 1905, pp. 11, 22 (ill.).

The Art Institute of Chicago, General Catalogue of Sculpture, Paintings, and Other Objects, February 1907, p. 160, no. 9.

The Art Institute of Chicago, General Catalogue of Sculpture, Paintings, and Other Objects, June 1910, pp. 158–59, no. 9.

The Art Institute of Chicago, General Catalogue of Paintings, Sculpture, and Other Objects in the Museum, 1913, p. 108, no. 9.

The Art Institute of Chicago, General Catalogue of Paintings, Sculpture, and Other Objects in the Museum, 1914 , p. 112, no. 9 (ill.).

Giselle d’Unger, “The Chicago Beautiful—Woman and Art: The Vital Forces,” Fine Arts Journal 30 (1914), p. 301 (ill.).

The Art Institute of Chicago, Catalogue of Paintings, Drawings, Sculpture, and Architecture, August 1917, p. 112, no. 6.

The Art Institute of Chicago, Handbook of Sculpture, Architecture, Paintings, and Drawings, vol. 2, August 1920, p. 18, no. 6.

Martin Conway, The Van Eycks and Their Followers, London, 1921, pp. 319, 327.

Max J. Friedländer, Von Eyck bis Bruegel: Studien zur Geschichte der niederländischen Malerei, 2nd ed., Berlin, 1921, p. 95, pl. 13.

The Art Institute of Chicago, Handbook of Sculpture, Architecture, and Paintings, May 1922, p. 18, no. 6.

G[eorges] Hulin de Loo, “An Unknown Portrait by Quinten Metsys,” Burlington Magazine 44 (1924), p. 216.

Friedrich Winkler, Die altniederländische Malerei: Die Malerei in Belgien
und Holland von 1400–1600, Berlin, 1924, pp. 202–03.

The Art Institute of Chicago, A Guide to the Paintings in the Permanent Collection, 1925, pp. 7 (ill.), 145, no. 6.

A. E. Popham, Drawings of the Early Flemish School, London, 1926, p. 31,
under no. 51.

Max J. Friedländer, “Bildnisse von Quentin Massys,” Pantheon 1 (1928), p. 171.

Carlyle Burrows, “Exhibition of Flemish Primitive Painting,” Parnassus
1, 7 (1929), p. 9.

Max J. Friedländer, Die altniederländische Malerei, vol. 7, Berlin, 1929, pp. 65, 122, no. 47, pl. 44; rev. English ed., Early Netherlandish Painting, Brussels and Leiden, 1971, pp. 34, 65, no. 47, pl. 48.

The Art Institute of Chicago, A Guide to the Paintings in the Permanent Collection, 1932, pp. 13 (ill.), 162, no. 94.1025.

A. C[ornette], in Trésor de l’art flamand du moyen âge au XVIIIme siècle: Mémorial de l’exposition d’art flamand ancien à Anvers 1930, vol. 1, Paris, 1932, pp. 58–59, 122,no. 197.

Ludwig Baldass, “Gotik und Renaissance im Werke des Quinten Metsys,” Jahrbuch der kunsthistorischen Sammlungen in Wien, n.s., 7 (1933), p. 163.

The Art Institute of Chicago, A Brief Illustrated Guide to the Collections, 1935, p. 23.

“Leihausstellung von Porträts des 15. Jahrhunderts in der Gal. Knoedler, New-York,” Pantheon 15 (1935), pp. 210 (ill.), 216–17.

Mary Morsell, “Loan Display at Knoedler Galleries,” Art News 33, 29 (1935), pp. 7, 9 (ill.).

Hans Tietze, Meisterwerke europäische Malerei in Amerika, Vienna, 1935, p. 334, no. 141 (ill.). (Eng. ed., Masterpieces of European Painting in America, New York, 1939).

Forbes Watson, “The Innocent Bystander,” American Magazine of Art 28 (1935), p. 285 (cover ill.).

Margaret Breuning, “Current Exhibitions,” Parnassus 8 (1936), pp. 27–28.

“Durlacher Presents Massys, Fleming,” Art Digest 11, 4 (1936), p. 13.

Alfred M. Frankfurter, “Quentin Massys Rediscovered,” Art News 35, 7 (1936), p. 24.

E. P. Richardson, “Quentin Massys,” Art Quarterly 4 (1941), pp. 169–70, fig. 5.

K. G. Boon, Quinten Massys, Amsterdam, [1942], p. 51.

Walther Vanbeselaere, “Quinten Metsijs,” Gentsche Bijdragen tot de Kunstgeschiedenis 9 (1943) p. 265.

Otto Benesch, The Art of the Renaissance in Northern Europe, Cambridge, Mass., 1947, p. 77.

Charles Fabens Kelley, “Chicago: Record Years,” Art News 51, 4 (1952), p. 59.

Luigi Mallé, “Quinten Metsys,” Commentari 6 (1955), p. 100.

Ingvar Bergström, Den symboliska Nejlikan, Malmö, 1958, pp. 101, 104.

Jacques Lassaigne and Robert L. Delevoy, Flemish Painting from Bosch to Rubens, Geneva, 1958, p. 71.

Fleurs et jardins dans l’art flamand, exh. cat., Ghent, Musée des Beaux-Arts, 1960, p. 127, no. 102, fig. 5.

R. H. Wilenski, Flemish Painters, 1430–1830, New York, 1960, pp. 105, 111, 115, 601, pl. 208.

The Art Institute of Chicago, Paintings in The Art Institute of Chicago: A Catalogue of the Picture Collection, 1961, pp. 296–70.

Frederick A. Sweet, “Great Chicago Collectors,” Apollo 84 (1966), pp. 190–91.

Charles Cuttler, Northern Painting from Pucelle to Bruegel, New York, 1968, p. 421.

Margaret Whinney, Early Flemish Painting, London, 1968, p. 131.

Gert von der Osten and Horst Vey, Painting and Sculpture in Germany and the Netherlands, 1500 to 1600, Harmondsworth, 1969, p. 150.

John Maxon, The Art Institute of Chicago, London, 1970, pp. 251 (ill.), 284.

Leo van Puyvelde, Flemish Painting from the Van Eycks to Metsys, New York and Toronto, 1970, p. 231.

Dietrich Schubert, “Quentin Massys porträtiert von Jan van Scorel?” Bulletin
des Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique 22 (1973), pp. 16–17.

A. de Bosque, Quentin Metsys, Brussels, 1975, pp. 227–28, fig. 281.

The Art Institute of Chicago, 100 Masterpieces, 1978, p. 48, no. 11 (ill.).

Larry Silver, The Paintings of Quinten Massys with Catalogue Raisonné, Montclair, N.J., 1984, pp. 168–70, 232–33, 238–39, 243, no. 52, pl. 149.

Guy Bauman and Walter A. Liedtke, Flemish Paintings in America: A Survey of Early Netherlandish and Flemish Paintings in the Public Collections of North America, Antwerp, 1992 , p. 347 (ill.), no. 313.

Jane Campbell Hutchison, “Metsys, Quinten,” in Dictionary of Art, vol. 21, 1996, p. 355.

Martha Wolff in Martha Wolff et al., Northern European and Spanish Paintings before 1600 in the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, 2008, pp. 242-6, ill.

Ownership History

Possibly Colonna di Sciarra collection, Rome [according to catalogue of the 1881 Beurnonville sale]. Étienne-Edmond Martin, 2nd baron de Beurnonville, Paris; sold, Pillet, Paris, May 9–16, 1881, no. 323, as Holbein, to Brame for 14,000 fr. [according to annotated sale catalogue in the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris]. Ernest May, Paris; sold, Galerie Georges Petit, Paris, June 4, 1890, no. 106 (engraved), as Holbein, to Durand-Ruel for Charles L. Hutchinson on behalf of the Art Institute for 13,000 fr. [letter of Oct. 7, 1987 from France Daguet of Durand-Ruel in curatorial file; the purchase was supported retroactively by a gift from John J. Glessner; see Art Institute of Chicago 1895].