Portrait of a Young Man with a Lamp
Portrait of a Young Man with a Lamp is a small oil painting by Italian painter Lorenzo Lotto, created around 1506. It measures about 42 by 35 cm (16.7 by 13.9 in) and is housed in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna.
The work shows a young man from the chest up, in a three-quarter view, looking at the viewer. Lotto renders fine detail, from the skin to the soft hair, and the face is framed by dark clothes and a hat, with a white drapery that has a green border behind him. On the right, an opening reveals a darker background and a burning lamp. The dim lamp has been read in different ways: as a sign of the sitter’s character or deeds, with some linking it to religious ideas or to the idea that life is short.
Scholars have speculated that the sitter might be Broccardo Malchiostro, a young chancellor connected to Bernardo de’ Rossi and involved in a dangerous plot in 1503. Lotto sometimes used symbolic clues in clothing, such as “charades,” where a brocade and a wordplay hint at a name. However, some modern researchers think the fabric behind the sitter is closer to damask than brocade, which casts doubt on the identification. The painting entered the Vienna collection in 1816.
This page was last edited on 3 February 2026, at 16:41 (CET).