This is Anthony van Dyck’s 1623 portrait of one of Genoa’s most prestigious aristocratic families, The Lomellini Family, painted during Anthony van Dyck’s sojourn there during the 1620s.
Depicted are the Doge’s wife, two young children, and his two grown sons. The Doge (governor of the city) does not appear because his political position forbade any kind of self-promotion. Van Dyck’s dark interior is offset by the armor of the Doge’s son to the left and the golden dress of his daughter to the right.
These characteristics – that of martial strength and opulent wealth – are thereby attributed to the family, the one defending the other. In typical Baroque style, there is a heavy drapery bound up to the colonnade overhead in the manner of a celebratory festoon.
Anthony van Dyck’s The Lomellini Family is in the National Gallery of Scotland in Edinburgh.