A Closer Look
The most famous portrait of Henry VIII was painted as part of a mural on one of the walls of Henry’s privy chamber (private apartment) in the Palace of Whitehall in 1537. The original was to be lost when the Palace burned down in January 1698, after a laundry maid left a pile of washing drying in front of an open fire, but copies of the painting survive in various locations throughout the UK, as well as one in Rome.
King Henry VIII; King Henry VII by Hans Holbein the Younger; c. 1536-1537; ink and watercolour, 2578 x 1372mm; http://www.npg.org.uk/live/search/portrait.asp?mkey=mw03080
The mural depicted Henry and his then wife, Jane Seymour, with his parents, Henry VII and Elizabeth of York, standing behind them. It was possibly commissioned when Jane became pregnant, but was not completed until after her death following childbirth in October 1537.
Theories differ as to whether the painting was intended to be viewed by the public, or was purely for the family – and to intimidate the occasional visiting diplomat. Although the first two Tudor monarchs are shown, it is quite clear which is of the greater importance. Latin verses inscribed on the painting celebrated Henry’s removal of rebellious advisers, and his ascendancy over the Roman Catholic establishment.
Worth a thousand words
Henry’s dominant pose brought him in alarming close-up to the viewer. The Dutch artist Karel van Mander, writing in the early 17th century, commented that as Henry “stood there, majestic in his splendour, [he] was so lifelike that the spectator felt abashed, annihilated in his presence”.
A sketch for the left-hand third of the whole panel, now in the National Portrait Gallery, London, reveals that the King was originally going to be shown in three-quarter profile. In the final version, he is confrontationally square-on.
The final posture is clearly intended to portray the King as an immovable political force. Even while the mural was being painted, he had crushed a further Catholic uprising known as the Pilgrimage of Grace, in which petitioners had demanded the dismissal of Henry’s religious advisor, the Lord Privy Seal, Thomas Cromwell.
Closing in
Let’s take a closer look at the painting:
The King is positioned to the left, lower down the vertical plane but more prominent than his parents, who hover on the steps behind him. His upper torso is a huge, imposing square, his breadth exaggerated by means of the massively shouldered cloak he wears. The upper body and hands are dripping with gold jewellery and insignia, while the left hand clutches a dagger’s sheath, as though to deal swiftly with any challenge to his authority.
Henry’s hands also frame his defiantly bulging codpiece, perhaps to override any doubts about the King’s uncertain potency. (During the trumped-up trial of Anne Boleyn, a note had been read out, purporting to be from Anne to her brother, in which she alleged the King to be more or less impotent.)
Holbein has discreetly lengthened the legs, which were actually rather stubby. They now appear as white pillars, like classical columns, with exaggerated calf muscles, supporting the colossal weight of the trunk. The overall richness of colour and the fabric textures, the Turkish carpet on which the group stands, and the inscribed plinth around which it is gathered, all work to reinforce the sense of monumental opulence and majesty that surrounds the King like an aura.
