Karel van Mander III was the grandson of the famous painter and historian of Netherlandish art, Karel van Mander I (1548-1606); his father, Karel van Mander II (1579-1623), worked in Delft and in the last year of his life executed a series of tapestries for King Christian IV (1577-1648). Karel van Mander III first visited Copenhagen in 1623 to claim payment for his father’s work. After training with Rembrandt, Van Mander settled in Copenhagen becoming court painter to Christian IV, who sponsored his visit to Italy in 1635-8.

This portrait of 1640 demonstrates the influence of Rembrandt’s work during the previous decade: in the swaggering posture and the play of light over rich stuffs. Typical of Rembrandt is the way that the dark shiny forms of the armour on the floor and the crown and regalia on the table, seem to gleam mysteriously from within the shadows. Van Mander paints the features with an animation and a flicker of the brush, which owes as much to Frans Hals as Rembrandt. The effect is of an exciting, almost abrupt, confrontation with the figure, which represents an alternative to dominant Van Dyckian mode of royal and aristocratic portraiture.

Christian IV has reason to swagger: the fortress in the background, Kronborg Castle, was one of the key defences of the ‘Sound’, the strip of water which gave access to the Baltic Sea. Every ship that passed through paid ‘Sound Dues’ to the Danish King from 1429 until 1857.

The King is here shown in full-length, his left resting on top of his stick; his hair is in a pigtail resting on his left shoulder, and he wears a richly embroidered suit and the collar of the Order of the Elephant.

The painting appears in Pyne's illustrated 'Royal Residences' of 1819, hanging in the Second Presence Chamber at Hampton Court Palace (RCIN 922132).