Portret van een onbekende geestelijke, driekwart naar rechts 1700 - 1800

This is an anonymous portrait of an unknown clergyman, made with pen in gray on gray prepared paper. The man’s identity is lost to us, but his status is clear. Here is a clergyman portrayed against the architecture of what might be a cathedral. The dress code and the architecture speak to power, faith, and institutional authority. The inscription “Ad viv” hints at the drawing having been done from life. The man’s gaze holds the intensity of a live sitting, as though the artist has tried to capture his essence in real time. There is a quiet tension here: the man is defined by his social role, yet the artist also captures something of his individual presence, as though seeking the person behind the cloth. This tension between the personal and the institutional continues to shape our world.