simcoe/ART

Hans Holbein, "Henry VIII in Wedding Dress" (1540)

I thought I would make a quick mention of something before the year 2009 is over. This year commemorates the 500th year since the coronation of Henry VIII, England’s “greatest” (?) king. One of my favorite images of Tudor England is the painting to the right of Henry in his wedding outfit before his marriage to Anne of Cleves. (For those of you keeping score, that is wife number four….and if you remember the little song, she survived.)

I love the regality of this picture, the result of the talent shown by its creator Hans Holbein. The German painted, lived and worked throughout Europe before working in England for Henry and his court, most famously Thomas More. He staged dramas, comedies and celebrations including the coronation of Anne Boleyn when she became Henry’s second queen.

This painting is well described by art historian Cheryl Van-Buskirk when she writes, “The combination of Henry’s imposing physical presence, his unprecedented political power, and capricious temperament made him a truly frightening figure; Holbein’s portrait captures this sense of menace.  Absent are the quiet dignity and tenderness which humanize the artist’s other portraits of great men, but this may say more about the subject than the artist.  Perhaps the most eloquent testimony for the accuracy of Holbein’s 1540 portrait of Henry VIII is that the King himself liked it.”