MANNER OF FRANÇOIS CLOUET | Portrait of Louis de Saint-Gelais, Seigneur de Lansac (1512/13-1589), bust length, in a black costume with a bejeweled necklace

oil on canvas; inscribed upper left: 'ÆT. 48'; inscribed upper right: '1564'; inscribed lower center: 'LOUIS·DE ·S·TGELAIS S·DE·LANSAC'

Miss Susan Dwight Bliss (1882-1966), New York;
By whom bequeathed to the Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Maine (inv. no. 1967.38.6).

The canvas appears to be thinly lined. A striking image reads well. There is some bulging at center left, creating a triangular shape between the dark shirt of the sitter and the background. There is a tiny spec of loss on the cheek of the sitter at left, below the eye, though there might be other associate loss with the craquelure. Possibly some discolored, thin lines of inpainting to address craquelure is scattered on the shirt, like in bottom center. These fluoresce under inspection of UV, along with other scattered thin lines of inpainting in the background and sitter's face. Small spots of retouches are on the sitter's hat, though further reading under UV is impeded by a milky varnish. The frame is offered in a giltwood and burgundy frame, with some small losses scattered here and there.
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This is probably a 19th century painting based on the drawing by Clouet in the Museum of Fine Art, Boston (inv. no. 46.350). Other versions of this painting also exist, such as one attributed to the Workshop of François Clouet in the Musée du Louvre, Paris (inv. no. 3270). The sitter represented in the present painting was the Governor of Francis II and Charles IX and Superintendent of the House of Catherine de Medici.