10 museomag   02 ‘ 2022 
Detail from portrait of Adriaen Dircksz van Leyden, c. 1560. 
all the Dutch provinces in 1543, he sought allies who 
could defend and guarantee his interests there. His 
confidant, Adriaen van Leyden, will therefore have been 
made one of the highest noblemen in the northern 
Netherlands, with the elevation to Baron of the Holy 
Roman Empire on 4 April 1548. Such a status certainly 
warranted confirmation with a formal portrait, espe- 
cially when a few years later – as in the case of Adriaen 
van Leyden – further appointments were added to this, 
to key positions in the city administration of an impor- 
tant city like Delft. 
PORTRAIT PAINTED TO THE ELITE 
Ideally, the painter would be the best one the couple 
could afford and preferably the same painter used for 
such portraits by their new-found peers. For the highest 
elite of the Spanish government in the Low Countries, 
there were in fact only two painters from whom 
to choose for portrait commissions: Antonius Mor 
(Antionio Moro) van Dashorst (1520-1577) and Willem 
Key (1516-1568). Philip II of Spain, the Duke of 
Alva, William of Orange, Margaret of Parma, Antoine 
Perrenot de Granvelle, they were all portrayed by one 
or the other. Antonius Mor was almost always on the 
road and his style does not correspond to that of 
the portraits of the Van Leyden couple. Willem Key, on 
the other hand, was, literally and figuratively, eminent- 
ly situated in Antwerp, in one of the most beautiful 
houses on the Grote Markt there and as dean of the 
guild of Antwerp painters, to accept the portrait com- 
mission. 
In the earliest documentation that I found on both 
paintings, there is always consistently mention of 
Willem Key as the painter, so everything fitted. That 
the man’s portrait was initially attributed to Nicolas 
Neufchâtel is not surprising, as the painting style 
and compositions in the portraits of both artists are 
sometimes very similar. Key and Neufchâtel studied 
and worked, shortly after each other, under the same 
teacher, Pieter Coecke van Aelst, in Antwerp. How- 
ever, around 1560, when Adriaen van Leyden must 
have been looking for a portrait painter that suited 
his ambitions, Key was already an established name 
and Neufchâtel was still at the beginning of a glorious 
career in Nuremberg. Moreover, the latter almost 
always painted on canvas, whereas the portraits in 
REUNITED AFTER 150 YEARS  (2/2) 
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éric chenal