Portrait of Sir Robert Shirley explained

Portrait of Sir Robert Shirley
Artist:	Anthony van Dyck
Year:	1622
Height Metric:	200
Width Metric:	133.4
Metric Unit:	cm
Imperial Unit:	in
Museum:	Petworth House
City:	Petworth, West Sussex, England

The Portrait of Sir Robert Shirley is a painting by Sir Anthony van Dyck, a Flemish Baroque artist.^[1] It is a portrait of Sir Robert Shirley (c. 1581 – 13 July 1628), the ambassador to the Safavid Shah Abbas (r. 1588–1629), beginning in 1608.^[2] This painting was completed in Rome in 1622 and is one of a pair; its pendant depicts Shirley's wife, Lady Teresa Sampsonia, a Circassian noblewoman. It is notable for the rich Persian dress worn by Shirley. Both of these paintings are now in the collection of Petworth House, in West Sussex.

See also

• List of paintings by Anthony van Dyck

Further reading

• Gary Schwartz, "The Shirleys and the Shah: Persia as the Stakes in a Rogues's Gambit," The fascination of Persia: The Persian-European dialogue in seventeenth-century art & contemporary art of Teheran, ed. Axel Langer, Zürich (Museum Rietberg) and Verlag Scheiddeger & Spiess 2013, pp. 78–99, 294–97, 300–20.

Notes and References

1. Web site: The English adventurer and the Persian princess Art UK . 24 January 2023 . artuk.org . en.
2. Web site: National Trust . Sir Robert Shirley (1581–1628) 486169 . 24 January 2023 . www.nationaltrustcollections.org.uk . en.