English:
This small-format panel is Holbein's only individual portrait of Henry. It resembles the figure of Henry in the surviving part of Holbein's cartoon drawing for his lost wall-painting at
Whitehall Palace (right), and both were probably derived from the same portrait drawing. Other portraits of Henry based on Holbein's types were the work of studios or copyists. The costly ultramarine background is unusual for a panel painting, though it was common in French miniatures, and the portrait, which has a fine miniature-like finish including powdered gold, may have been intended as a gift to the French court.
Holbein probably painted the portrait shortly after
Anne Boleyn's execution on 19 May 1536, at the time of Henry's marriage to
Jane Seymour, whose portrait Holbein also painted. The suggestion that Henry's portrait formed a pair with Jane's is discounted by most scholars on grounds of size and of differences on the reverse. (References: Buck, pp. 119–20; John Rowlands,
Holbein: The Paintings of Hans Holbein the Younger, David R. Godine: Boston, 1985, ISBN 0879235780, p. 114; Susan Foister,
Holbein in England, London: Tate, 2006, ISBN 1854376454, p. 96.)
