Twenty-five year old Youth with Fur-lined Coat

The inscription indicates the age of the subject, but as opposed to other occasions, does not give his name nor the date of the painting. The fashion of wearing a loose coat of white ermine, with black spots and sleeves with V-shaped ends, was widespread in Venice from the second half of the 16th century. Different clients whose portraits were painted by Tintoretto were dressed in this way, but so were others painted by Titian and Veronese, to mention only the best masters. Very short hair with a straight fringe, a moustache, and a trim beard were also frequent in young men. The black suit closed at the neck and wrists, scarcely enabling the white edges of the shirt to be seen, was also well-known in Tintoretto’s portraits; this is very similar to the portrait in Detroit, which is not a complete bust.

The placement of the figure, with the body facing almost completely frontward and the head slightly uncentred and turning to the right, the hand leaning on a table, is common in many portraits by the painter; even the position of the hands is similar to other works, (for example, the right hand in the portrait in the Colonna Gallery in Rome.) The expressive seriousness is coherent with the psychological analysis that the Venetian painter usually made, although it must be noted that nearly all his sitters looked at the viewer, which is not the case here. The looseness of the brush strokes is at its best when portraying the skin, but also the gold chain, the shirt cuffs, the hair and the face itself… all in the painting appears worthy of Tintoretto. The right hand is executed in his style - soft and fleshy with outlining of the fingernails - and the left hand is long, stained and deformed, as a prelude to those of El Greco.

The background perspective of the table is rather strange, and the carmines so typical of Venetian painting are not overly nuanced. Nevertheless, this does not appear sufficient to doubt that this painting is attributable to Tintoretto.