Hans Holbein the Younger

Hans Holbein the Younger was born in Augsburg, southern Germany, in the winter of 1497–1498. His father was the painter Hans Holbein the Elder, who trained him and his brother Ambrosius.⁠[1][2]

In 1515 Holbein and his brother Ambrosius arrived in Basel, Switzerland, from Augsburg. There he worked as a portraitist, book illustrator and designer of stained glass, also painting murals and large religious pictures, and he portrayed the humanist Erasmus of Rotterdam several times.⁠[2][3]

In 1519 Holbein joined the Basel artists’ guild.⁠[1]

The coming of the Reformation in Basel had a negative impact on the production of art, and by 1526 religious changes there had reduced the market for art. Holbein therefore sought work elsewhere, travelling to France in 1523/24.⁠[2][3]

In 1526 Holbein travelled to London with a recommendation from Erasmus to Thomas More, seeking work at the Tudor court. More and his circle became his first patrons in England; his portrait of More’s family is described as the earliest group portrait north of the Alps.⁠[1][4][2]

During this stay he became the most sought-after portraitist in the country, and painted A Lady with a Squirrel and a Starling (Anne Lovell?) in oil on wood, probably in 1527–1528.⁠[5]

In 1528 Holbein returned to Basel, where his family lived, and painted his wife with their two elder children. In this period he painted the organ doors of Basel Cathedral, made drawings of the Stations of the Cross (his last commission with a religious theme) and completed the murals of the Basel Council chamber. Several of his paintings were destroyed or damaged in the iconoclastic riots of 1529.⁠[2]

In 1532 Holbein returned to settle in England, where he remained until his death. He at first worked for the Hanseatic merchants of the Steelyard in London.⁠[1][4][2]

In 1533 Holbein painted The Ambassadors, dating it beneath his signature on the marble floor. On the left is Jean de Dinteville, shown on his second diplomatic mission to England; on the right is his close friend Georges de Selve, Bishop of Lavaur. The anamorphic skull can only be seen properly by looking up at the painting from the bottom right corner. The National Gallery bought the painting in 1890.⁠[6]

By 1536 Holbein had been appointed King’s Painter to Henry VIII, one of several artists paid a salary at court. His famous portrait of Henry VIII from this period is in the National Portrait Gallery, London, and he drew Henry VIII’s third wife, Jane Seymour.⁠[4][3][1]

After Jane Seymour died in October 1537, Henry VIII was looking for a fourth wife in 1538 and sent Holbein to Brussels to paint Christina of Denmark, the 16-year-old Duchess of Milan, so that he could assess her. Her sitting with Holbein lasted from 1 to 4 p.m. on March 12, 1538, and from it he produced Christina of Denmark, Duchess of Milan. The painting was presented to the National Gallery by the Art Fund with the aid of an anonymous donation in 1909.⁠[7]

In 1539 the widowed Henry VIII, looking for a new wife, sent Holbein to Düren castle in the Holy Roman Empire to paint the Cleves princesses Anne and Amalia, and chose Anne. The Louvre portrait of Anne of Cleves, long believed to have been painted in Düren, was more likely painted from a sketch after Holbein returned to his London workshop. The couple married on January 6, 1540, but Anne was repudiated a few months later.⁠[8]

Holbein died of the plague in London in 1543, a year after his self-portrait now in the Uffizi, in which he calls himself a burgher of Basel. Most of his drawings were probably acquired by Henry VIII on his death; the Royal Collection now holds a group of 80 drawings by him.⁠[1][2][4]

In 1992 the National Gallery in London bought A Lady with a Squirrel and a Starling (Anne Lovell?) (NG6540) with contributions from the National Heritage Memorial Fund, the Art Fund and Mr J. Paul GettyJ. Paul GettyJ. Paul Getty (1892–1976) was an American oil businessman and art collector who held a controlling interest in the Getty Oil Company and founded the J. Paul Getty Museum; his bequest built the J. Paul Getty Trust after his death.Open the full entry Jnr (through the American Friends of the National Gallery, London). The sitter is thought to be Anne Lovell, whose husband, Sir Francis Lovell, was employed at the court of Henry VIII; the starling is probably a rhyming pun on East Harling, and the squirrels relate to the Lovell family heraldry.⁠[5]

The National Gallery lists this painting among the selected works associated with Sir Paul GettyJohn Paul Getty Jr.John Paul Getty Jr. (1932–2003), known as Sir Paul Getty, was a son of oil businessman J. Paul Getty and a Britain-based philanthropist and book collector who made large gifts to the National Gallery, the British Film Institute and cricket, and received an honorary KBE in 1986.Open the full entry, and states that his endowment helped it acquire works by artists including Holbein.⁠[9]