The Florentine painter Bronzino was court artist to the Medici and celebrated for his highly naturalistic and elegant depictions of his sitters, like this one. This is Lodovico Capponi, a page at the Medici court, and his portrait exemplifies the prized qualities of Bronzino’s paintings: flawless, porcelain-like face; elongated, slender body, down to the impossibly long fingers; and brilliant, exacting portrayal of his sumptuous clothing. The black and white colors he wears evoke those of the Capponi family coat of arms. His silk-weave sleeves have tiny slashes all over them, a fashionable convention that reveals another layer of costly fabric through the slits. The young man wears a shimmering white codpiece—that most literal of accessories of male dress, advertising a man’s virility, strength, and prowess. In his left hand he holds brown gloves, and in his right, he half-conceals a circular object, perhaps a medal or cameo. It appears to bear a portrait of a woman and the word sorte—“fate,” or “fortune.” Obscured by his finger, the inscription seems to imply that Lodovico cannot know his fate, or perhaps more generally that one cannot know one’s fate.

Wordplay and visual play might be expected from the artist, Bronzino, who was also an accomplished poet. In this painting, Lodovico’s physical concealing of the object inscribed with sorte has been related to the dramatic events of his love life. He fell in love with a woman, Maddalena Vettori, who was promised in marriage to someone else. After years of perseverance, Lodovico was finally granted permission to marry her by the duke of Florence, Cosimo I de’ Medici, but he had to do it within three days, which he did. Precisely when this portrait was painted and for what occasion remains unknown. What is certain is the young man’s sense of himself, his cool, confident authority set off against a vibrant green curtain.