Testa di donna

Pisanello's Testa di donna — Head of a Woman — is generally associated with his work as a draughtsman and medallist rather than as a painter, and the attribution reflects the ambiguity between his drawn and painted production. Pisanello was the supreme exponent of the International Gothic at the Italian courts, working for the Gonzaga in Mantua, the Este in Ferrara, and the Visconti in Milan. His female profile heads, whether in drawing or painting, were hugely influential on portrait conventions in the second quarter of the fifteenth century, establishing the ideal of the aristocratic female profile that ran through North Italian painting into the 1480s.

The work exemplifies the International Gothic interest in linear description: contours are refined and rhythmically beautiful, with emphasis on the decorative elaboration of headdress and hair. If painted, the medium would be tempera with thin, precise brushwork. The decorative botanical elements frequently present in Pisanello's work reflect his naturalist practice as a draughtsman.