George Digby, 2nd Earl of Bristol

This portrait depicts the poet, playwright and politician George Digby (1612–77) on the eve of his election as MP for Dorset in 1640 and his elevation to Baron Digby in 1641. An ardent Royalist during the Civil War, Digby fled to France and served in the French army. Later, back in England, he was appointed secretary of state by King Charles II (1630-85) in 1657, but converted to Catholicism and lost favour.  Hand on hip, with his elbow jutting into the space of the viewer, and a swathe of satin fabric swept luxuriously over his shoulder, this portrait evokes a sense of power and psychological presence at a time when Digby was gaining influence in English society. Yet, it is not only the power of the sitter which is on display here, but also the technical prowess of the painter. The Flemish artist Anthony van Dyck (1599-1641) employs a sensitive, refined handling of paint in Digby's face and expression, particularly in the bluish shadows around the sitter’s eyes and nose. Van Dyck is using a technique that he favoured called 'scumbling', where an opaque paint layer is applied lightly over another colour to create a sense of depth (here, the blue-grey over the warmer flesh tones to create under-eye shadows). Van Dyck has rendered masterfully the shimmer of light on Digby’s satin garments with, at points, a nearly abstract quality, evident in the visibly rough brushstrokes and the working of the lighter beige tones over the darker red-brown.

Born in Antwerp, Van Dyck showed remarkable talent from a very young age: at eleven years old, he enrolled in the Antwerp painters’ guild as a pupil of the Flemish painter Hendrick Van Balen I (1574–1632), and by age nineteen he had become a master in the guild. For a time he was the star pupil of the artist Peter Paul Rubens (1577–1640). After spending time in Italy between 1621 and 1627, Van Dyck went to England in 1632, where he eventually became court painter to King Charles I (1600–49). Although he began his career interested in history painting (painting stories from the Bible or from classical mythology), Van Dyck found most success as a portrait painter, portraying many of Charles’s courtiers and members of the English aristocracy.