Portrait of a Man, probably Johannes Feige

The support is a limewood (Tilia sp.) panel with vertical grain.[1] The thickness is 1.1 cm. The panel is formed from two boards; the join in the middle of the panel is 12.6 cm from the right edge. Around all four edges of the back of the panel is a rebate about 0.8 cm wide where the wood has been reduced in thickness to 0.5 cm.

[1]Confirmed by Peter Klein: report of 18 April 1995 in the NG dossier. The 1959 catalogue erroneously identified the wood as beech.

The ground is white and consists of chalk (EDX and FTIR analysis). There is no sign of canvas between ground and panel, but there are tangled fibres visible in the X-radiographs which must be either below or within the ground. The ground and paint end with a barbe at the top, bottom and right edges, leaving a narrow strip of bare wood which would have been covered by an engaged frame (the left edge is more damaged and repaint extends to the panel edge). In places the ground has seeped under the frame onto the wood

No underdrawing was detected by examination with infrared reflectography, nor were any traces revealed by examination with the microscope in areas such as the contours of the face, which might be expected to be underdrawn.

The paint is generally thin and skilfully worked wet-in-wet in places, for example in the decoration on the purse and the hair. In the black paint, in addition to the black pigment, some potassium zinc sulphate, probably a form of white vitriol, is present as an additive.[1]

The medium of the black background paint was identified by GC–MS analysis as heat-bodied linseed oil.

[1]Potassium, zinc and sulphur were detected by EDX analysis in the black paint. White vitriol is zinc sulphate, and potassium zinc sulphate could be another form of it. A small but increasing number of occurrences of both of these compounds have been reported in paintings from across Europe. White vitriol is mentioned in documentary sources in recipes for the preparation of oils and also as an additive on the palette.

[Susan Foister, 'Lucas Cranach the Elder, Portrait of Johannes Feige’ published online 2015, from 'The German Paintings before 1800', London, forthcoming.]

www.nationalgallery.org.uk/paintings/research/lucas-cranach-the-elder-portrait-of-johannes-feige

Identification of wood species: limewood (Tilia sp.)

Media analysis:

FTIR 1995-03: oil medium (black background, upper right)

GC-MS 1995-03: heat-bodied linseed oil

The picture is in quite good condition.

Support:

Balsa blocks have been attached in the rebates to bring the thickness of these areas up to that of the main part of the panel. The non-original reinforcing wood that was removed in 2010 had been slightly inset into the back of the panel and so now there is a border about 3.6 cm wide around three sides of the panel where the wood is 0.1 cm thinner and some worm channels are visible. On the left, a split had been mended using a wider piece of wood, but this has been replaced with a thin piece of balsa to reinforce it.

Paint layers:

There is damage to the paint on the left associated with the split, and further scattered losses, including some in a circular shape in the coat of arms top right and a larger one in the sitter's neck.

The winged serpent used as Cranach's signature is thinly painted but intact; on examination with a microscope, the paint appears to include some lead-tin yellow. In the area of the date only fragments of original paint survive, also apparently including lead-tin yellow. The shapes of the numbers now visible have been made by incising the background adjacent to the fragments of paint to reveal the light ground and wood in order to create the date 1524. Not enough original paint remains to be certain of the date: the digit which has the most paint is the 5; the penultimate digit only has paint across the top and so might originally have been a 2, 3, 5 or 7; only tiny traces remain of the 1. The final digit has traces of original paint along the horizontal bar of the 4.

The coats of arms are also somewhat damaged. In that on the left the female demi-figure wears something green on her head but damage makes it impossible to identify. Her left arm is missing, but a patch of original green paint suggests that it may have been raised like the right, which is holding up a branch with green leaves.

[Susan Foister, 'Lucas Cranach the Elder, Portrait of Johannes Feige' published online 2015, from 'The German Paintings before 1800', London, forthcoming.]

www.nationalgallery.org.uk/paintings/research/lucas-cranach-the-elder-portrait-of-johannes-feige

- Presented to the gallery. Actual state: good, no repairs

[National Gallery archive]

- a non-original reinforcing wooden framework was removed from the back.

[Susan Foister, 'Lucas Cranach the Elder, Portrait of Johannes Feige' published online 2015, from 'The German Paintings before 1800', London, forthcoming.]

www.nationalgallery.org.uk/paintings/research/lucas-cranach-the-elder-portrait-of-johannes-feige

Support:

Wood. Lime with a cedar frame glued on to the back. Batten of the frame, right as seen from the back is wider and newer than the other three and is presumably that put on by Morill in 1929. The framework is restricting movement and should be removed. Panel has been surrounded with mahogany strips, aprox. 1 cm wide, which are glued to the back frame with extends beyond the original panel

Paint and ground:

This has been extended from its original painted edges to the edges of the panel, which varies unevenly from 4-6 cm from side to side. The surface of the paint is very uneven around the crack in the panel, running vertically on the left side. This is probably due the warm and dry rot damage lying beneath the paint. The whole of the background and dark clothes of the sitter are scumbled over with blackish repaint which has been put on to cover numerous minute damages and whitish cracks. This repaint has been used to make the thumb of the sitter's right hand thinner. There are a number of small damages on the head of the sitter, especially on the right of the neck. A cleaning test (top right) shows a ring of damages on and near the coat of arms; cause not known.

Treatment proposed:

Remove frame from back of panel. Clean off varnish and repaints. Fill in the dented uneven paint surface around crack and old repairs; retouch where necessary; revarnish.

[Examination by A. W. Lucas, Feb. 1974]

- cleaned and restored by Lucas

[National Gallery archive]

In consequence of a perpendicular crack on the left of the panel surviving through the coat of arms, widening towards the top, and flaking at the edges

Removed the batten along the left edge of the panel and after closing and securing the crack, replaced the batten by a wider one, and secured the loose paint on the surface. Holes filled and tinted out by Holder

[National Gallery archive]

- repaired and varnished

28th July 1908: The Director reported that the Lucas Cranach had been sent to Mr. Buttery for repair and been returned in accordance with the Resolution of 7th July 1908.'

[National Gallery archive]