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Compare this boy's outfit with the outfit in Portrait of a Gentlemen, painted 20 years later. Enlarge

By the time this portrait was painted, fine silk and satin fabrics in bright colors had replaced the black costumes that were popular in earlier Italian fashion. Compare this man's outfit with the Portrait of a Boy, painted about 20 years earlier in Venice.

Renaissance men of this period wore a shirt, or camicia, under a close fitting jacket called a doublet. Over these went another jacket with puffs at the shoulders. Most men at this time wore beards. Later in the Renaissance it became fashionable to be clean-shaven. A hat was essential for Renaissance men. This gentlemen's hat is decorated with a piece of jewelry called a brooch.

Janet Arnold, in her book on costumes, A Handbook of Costume, writes, "As soon as a painter starts to observe the play of light on fabrics or becomes involved with new techniques of painting, the details of dress are no longer so important to him." (Arnold, 17) Do you think this is true of this portrait?

Arnold, Janet. A Handbook of Costume, London: Macmillan. 1973

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