Guillim Scrots Sold at Auction Prices

William Scrots, attributed to, Portrait of Archduke Ferdinand of Habsburg

An old label to the back of the piece identifies the young sitter as Archduke Ferdinand of Austria. His features resemble those depicted in other portraits of the Duke, especially those painted by Willian Scrot and exhibited in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna. The present work, with its plainly Flemish origins, is possibly part of a group previously attributed to an artist given the temporary name of "Meister der Stadthalterin Maria". This anonymous master has since been identified as William (Guillame) Scrots, a painter at the court of Maria of Austria, regent of the Netherlands from 1531 - 1555. He was later called to the court of Henry VIII in 1546 following the death of Hans Holbein.Archduke Ferdinand II was a nephew of Maria of Hungary, second son of Emperor Ferdinand I and brother of Emperor Maximilian II, who Scrot also painted when he was a young prince (this portrait nowin the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna). The style of the present work varies from that of the two portraits in Vienna, both of which display much harder contours. Although Scrot has paid special attention to the costumes, accentuating the representative character of the work, the most striking feature of the portrait is the kindly, almost shy, appearance of its sitter. Archduke Ferdinand was an educated and cultured man who spoke several languages fluently, and also proved himself to be a skilled diplomat when he later became Prince of Tyrol. He is also known for laying the foundations of the later Ambras collection.