Anthony van Dyck, 'Portrait of a Woman', about 1625-7

The dark red curtain in the background gives a warm, luxurious atmosphere to this portrait and complements the sitter’s auburn hair and sparkling brown eyes. Her half smile and the rose – or perhaps carnation – tucked over her ear suggest an agreeable, perhaps even mischievous, character. Unfortunately, the identity of this engaging young woman is uncertain.

An old label on the back of a copy of this picture (Bob Jones University Collection, South Carolina) identifies her as Antonia Demarini, who was born in 1603 and married Francesco Lercari, Doge of Genoa, in 1638. But there are no securely identified portraits of her which would help confirm this. It has also been suggested that she is the Marchesa Cattaneo and that the picture was made as a pendant to Van Dyck’s Portrait of Giovanni Battista Cattaneo, which is also in the National Gallery’s collection. The Cattaneo were a prominent Genoese family whose members included doges, cardinals, scholars and statesmen. Both pictures were probably made during Van Dyck’s stay in Italy from 1621 to 1627, and are of virtually identical size; both were acquired from the collection of the Cattaneo family in Genoa. However, pendant portraits of husband and wife in this period were almost invariably made so that they could be hung showing the couple each turned toward the other. In these two paintings the sitters face the same way, so it’s highly unlikely that they were conceived as a pair.

The mystery is deepened by another Van Dyck portrait of the same period which is also from the Cattaneo collection (now in the Frick Collection, New York). This has traditionally been identified as Giovanna Battista, who was the daughter of the Marchese Giovanni Battista Cattaneo of Genoa. She has the same brown eyes and auburn hair but is at least 18 years old, and would seem to be too old to be the daughter of the woman in the National Gallery portrait.

The picture is not signed and some parts are in poor condition, which makes attribution more uncertain. But the style and quality of the painting are such that most experts are confident of the attribution to Van Dyck.