Workshop of Hans Holbein the Younger: Portrait of king Henry VIII of England (1537 - 1547)

(Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool, UK)

A painting by the workshop of the German artist Hans Holbein the Younger (1497-1543). This painting is a copy of a scene of a mural which Holbein created in the Whitehall Palace around 1536-1537. The mural showed the king together with his 3rd wife, Jane Seymour, and his parents king Henry VII and Elizabeth of York. The mural was destroyed when the palace burned down on 4-5 January 1698 but several copies have survived. Holbein and other artists also made several copies of the portrait of Henry VIII of the mural of which this one was made by his workshop. Henry VIII was 46 when the mural was created and Holbein shows an idealized portrait of the king in a strong and authoritative pose. Holbein also deliberately distorted the proportions of Henry’s physique to shown Henry look slimmer, younger and more muscular. Painting from 1537-1547.