FOLLOWER OF HANS MEMLING | Portrait of a young man

oil on oak panel Although the present painting is not a direct copy after a specific work, it appears to be a later exercise in the style of Hans Memling (1430/40–1494), who was one of the most important exponents of the new artistic developments that flourished in the southern Netherlands in the fifteenth century in the wake of Jan van Eyck, the Master of Flémalle and Rogier van der Weyden. It is similar to a painting which is currently lost, formerly in the Museo Lázaro Galdiano, Madrid, and which Max Jakob Friedländer published as a sixteenth century copy after Memling.1 1 https://rkd.nl/en/explore/images/record?filters%5Bkunstenaar%5D%5B0%5D=Memling%2C+Hans&query=memling+man&start=20  

All paintings available to view at the Sotheby’s Greenford Park warehouse, 5 - 7 and 10 – 13 September (10 - 4pm), by appointment. The panel is uncradled, flat and stable. The paint surface is quite dirty and the varnish very discoloured. There is a loss along the lower part of the right margin, as well as small spots of visible retouching scattered in the man's coat and the background. Inspection under ultraviolet light reveals a very thick varnish, underneath which few pinprick retouchings are visible along the left-hand side and upper right corner of the background, in his coat, and in his hat. The varnish impedes further inspection, but there may also be some older retouchings, for example, in his white shirt and flesh tones.
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