Self-Portrait
by GARZONI, Giovanna, Pastel and charcoal on paper, 495 x 380 mm
This self-portrait comprises the frontispiece of an illustrated herbarium. The portrait depicts the artist as an approximately fifty- or sixty-year-old woman. However, it is assumed that the sheets of the herbarium were produced earlier, since, according to a document, the herbarium was commissioned in 1616 from the sixteen-year-old Garzoni by a pharmacist originally from Delft. It is possible that the self-portrait was inserted together with the botanical sheets as the frontispiece of the herbarium at a later date.