Velázquez Rediscovered

Velázquez Rediscovered documents the recent cleaning of Diego Velázquez's (Spanish, 1599–1660) Portrait of a Man, which has revealed it as a picture of astonishing freshness and striking presence, undeniably an autograph work by the seventeenth-century Spanish master. In his introduction, Keith Christiansen describes the provenance of the portrait, the vicissitudes of its attribution since it was first considered by the scholar August L. Mayer in 1917, and his own acquaintance with the painting over three decades, which culminated in the transformative cleaning in the summer of 2009. Jonathan Brown, the leading Velázquez scholar of our time, offers an intriguing identification of the sitter, while conservator Michael Gallagher presents an illuminating account of his cleaning and restoration of the work. Included among the illustrations are other relevant paintings by the artist, including Las Meninas and the Surrender of Breda; reproductions from periodicals showing the condition of the portrait in the early twentieth century; before- and after-treatment photographs; and numerous informative details.