Pope Paul III with a Nephew
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Pope Paul III with a Nephew is an unfinished 1534 oil on slate portrait by Sebastiano del Piombo, now in the Galleria nazionale di Parma. The nephew's identity is unclear but the painting's presumed date suggests it may be Ottavio Farnese, whom Pope Paul III made Duke of Parma and Piacenza soon after the work's date[1]
The work shows clear elements of an unfinished painting. Large areas of the bottom were left at the level of preparation and barely sketched. The slab does not appear perfectly smooth, but wavy, probably following some experimentation that the artist was trying to introduce in his painting. In the foreground, both the young man's habit and the pope's right hand and beard are clearly unfinished. The light that glides softly on the features of the pontiff highlights his physiognomic traits attributable to those of Paul III, especially in the design of the nose and cheekbones, while under the barely sketched beard can be seen the gaunt cheeks, a typical feature of many of his portraits made by Titian.
The identity of the young man, on the other hand, is uncertain, given that the title of "Duke of Castro" was conferred on several grandchildren, but, due to the presumable dating of the painting, its possibly Ottavio Farnese, which would be made then Duke of Parma and Piacenza. During a restoration it was possible to observe the plate with a reflectographic camera and in correspondence with the face of the grandson, a second version of the same head appeared slightly higher, completed in physiognomic characters.
