Hans Holbein [HOLE-bine] the Younger was born in Augsburg, Germany, and is considered the most important portrait painter in England during the Reformation, a time when Christian ideals changed greatly. His father, Hans Holbein the Elder, was also an artist and gave Holbein his first art lessons. Holbein married and lived as an adult in Basel, Switzerland, but as the Protestant Reformation grew and religious images were being smashed and burned, it became increasingly difficult to succeed as an artist.
Holbein moved to England, where his reputation for highly skilled and dignified portraiture preceded him, and he became the official painter to King Henry VIII beginning in In addition to painting royal portraits, he also traveled in Europe with a writer, assigned the unwelcome task of returning with portraits and written descriptions of potential brides for the king, to whom attractiveness was highly important.
Through his meticulous technique, Holbein achieved remarkable realism in details and, despite his emotional remove, some sense of individual character. He died of plague in his forties, but his artistic influence was significantβEnglish portraits were patterned on his style for almost a century after his death. Prince Edward was about 14 months old when Holbein painted this portrait of him.
When she died two weeks after giving birth, King Henry was devastated. Though he was a frail child with weak eyesight and periodic deafness, he appears healthy and robust in his portraits. Prince Edward sits up straight, looking down slightly at the viewer, and holds his hand up in an intelligent gesture of speaking, of benediction like a bishop or Christ himself , or perhaps acknowledging the cheers of his adoring subjects.
His control of his arms and head make him seem older. Prince Edward is dressed in a very formal adult-like outfit. He is wearing a red velvet tunic and a fancy hat tied under his chin, both of which have elaborate gold details. Holbein has placed Prince Edward behind a parapet draped with a dark green cloth. This separates the space between the royal child and the viewer, and also creates the perfect spot to place an inscription.
